What Goes Around

When I first met her, she didn’t like me. Why should she? I was there to take away her last remaining daughter.  Her first daughter had gone into the Air Force as a nurse.  And there was a son, still in high school.  My goal was that very special middle child.

Oh, she was cordial, nice enough while she waited for me to take my new blind date out for coffee, but she really didn’t like me.

It cost me less than two dollars for a great first date.  When we returned and I was invited back into the house, she had gone to bed, so I sat down at the piano and started to play.  I even sang a little bit. 

I was twenty-two and my date was eighteen, just out of high school and starting college.  I was on the football team, and since most football players weren’t expected to play and sing, I scored  my desired impression on her daughter.

Times were tough then.  Her husband was an out-of-work carpenter who soonafter went to Hollywood to build movie sets.  She stayed to support the family with a job as a nurse’s aid at 75 cents an hour.  Her husband found a lady friend and never returned from Southern California.  I married her special daughter and took her away.

All her children raised families of their own.  When she left her job at the hospital, she alternated living with her son and our family.  Over the years, I think she came to believe I was an O.K. guy.

In 1993, after an extra successful year in business, we had the cash to build her a house of her own on our property.  She was eighty-two years old.

We had a secluded hilltop acreage on the Central California Coast covered with mature oak and toyon trees and a few pines.  She enjoyed being next door to her daughter.  She enjoyed taking care of her cat and watching the deer.  She seemed very content.  Then, as the years went by, she became a little forgetful.  Sometimes she forgot to turn off the burner under her oatmeal.  But she never failed to thank me for raking the pine needles and mowing the lawn.

On December 22, 2003, a 6.5 magnitude earthquake centered off the coast at San Simeon trashed our home.  “Gram”, as the kids called her, was in town at elder day-care.  Luckily, no one was home when the quake hit.  There was serious structural damage to the main house but, except for food and broken glass covering every square foot of the floor, Gram’s house was spared.

After a major clean-up mission by an army of friends and relatives, we moved into Gram’s little house.  She made us feel very welcome.  She said she enjoyed the company.  Actually, she wasn’t feeling very well.  She had difficulty breathing in enough oxygen.  The doctor said there was a problem with her lungs.  We decided it might have been the result of something she breathed during the war when she worked as a welder in the shipyards.  But she didn’t have to go to the hospital.  She was able to stay at home.

On Valentine’s Day, she passed away peacefully in her own bed, in her own little house, surrounded by her family.

As is true for most of us, the equity in our property accounted for most of our estate.  Our home was not insured against earthquake damage and it cost over $185,000.00 to rebuild.  As if that wasn’t enough bad news, the real estate bubble evaporated just as we were ready to sell our property and move to a smaller place.  Most of our nest egg evaporated with it.

So where’s the happy ending?  What came around?

Well, soon after the earthquake, my wife’s brother began construction of a guesthouse on his property.  On July 7th, 2007 (7/7/07), we moved into our new home.  We now have an unwritten life-time lease on a beautiful little house on “La Familia Place”.  And now, from my home office, I originate Reverse Mortgages for seniors throughout California.

- Marlan Jennings Holland