Journals

Prologue

B’RASHEET
I thought I’d come to the end of my journey when I moved from West Hollywood to Vallejo (get the Dante connection?), but no, despite my own predictions there was yet another move in me.
And so it came to pass that on October 13, 2018, at the wizened age of 82, I packed up and moved into an old-folks home, aka Assisted Living, in San Francisco, one and a half miles away from my grandchildren.
What follows is the record of this unexpected chapter in my life as I wrote about it in diaries, letters, and journal entries. This book is not a novel or biography, nor is it a memoir, in the way I understand and have myself written, but is me talking to myself, sometimes to an unknown imaginary reader, sometimes (in missives) to 120 friends around the world, about the time of my life I call “The Final Chapter.” Prominent among my many woes is a painful lament of my inability to achieve Book Two of the memoir I wanted to write before I die.
Much of it is boring; some, I’m told, is racist, bigoted, & homophobic. To the latter, I plead not guilty. My diaries are full of hyperbole; my language can be extravagant, often to a fault, and not meant to be taken literally. Heck, it’s just a diary. Get over it.
There are discrepancies for which I apologize, parts are out of place, and many details are missing altogether. And, yes, I know, I repeat myself. Sorry. No harm is meant toward anyone who mistakenly thinks they recognize themselves in these pages. Except for dead and famous people, all names are changed to protect me from the wrath of the righteous.

WHEN YA GOTTA GO…
The decision to move into a home hatched sometime in 2017, while living in a pretty little condo on the river in Vallejo, when I realized how much time I needed to take care of myself. I had cleaners and a girl who helped in the kitchen and watered my prodigious vegetable garden, but I still had too much to do. I spent so much time cooking for myself I often chose not to eat rather than take out my knives & chopping boards one more time. Then came cancer, which forced me to reassess my life. The end was in mind, if not in sight. I could hear the grim reaper rumbling up the road. My surgeon gave me a fifty-fifty chance of living two more years. My son suggested I hire someone to live in and take care of me full time. I considered the prospect and told him, “I’d rather die!” So, it’s an old-folks home for me, but which one, where? I knew nothing about the subject, but google did. I requested brochures from all the senior homes in San Francisco, compared details, met marketing directors, and ate meals in the finalists’ dining rooms. My dear friend Angelica, an angel who’d been my pulmonary rehab teacher, accompanied me on these excursions. She did all the driving and talked things over to help me think. There was much to learn. One marketing director gave me the best advice: “Stick to the non-profits,” she said. I remembered a greedy friend back in the 1970’s who made a fortune in the nursing home business. This narrowed the field to three non-profit homes, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, and Jewish. I put down deposits and joined all three waiting lists. Tilly Zaretzki came up with an apartment first and I grabbed it. I lucked out, actually, as I came to know over time. Tilly Zaretzki was the best home for me, and, while I’m sure I would have adapted, I don’t think I would have liked the two others. With a Kosher kitchen, a Rabbi on staff, and celebrating Sabbath services, Tilly Zaretzki was not really my style, although my parents would have loved it. I would have preferred a more diverse resident body, but nevertheless, came to love this place. The food is great, and the hard-working staff is committed to residents’ happiness under the leadership of a brilliant director, who became my friend. He was so good at his job, maybe everybody thought he was their friend. They showed me a sunny 400 square foot studio/alcove on the top floor facing east, with a million-dollar view of the downtown skyline, and an unobstructed view of the sky with moon and stars and whatever else flies around up there. It’s got a nice bay window that gives great light, and a partition wall with a long ledge where I could put a plant. The ledge won me over. The job of liquidating my possessions, all the furniture, books, art, knick-knacks and doo-dads of a life-time of collecting, including a fully equipped kitchen, dishes, linens, the outdoor furniture from my patios, and the contents of the storage units I had built into my garage was excruciating, and would have defeated anyone let alone an 82-year-old crone on oxygen who just had cancer surgery. I brought Sid, the brilliant designer who masterminded the renovation of my Vallejo condo and transformed it from Motel 6 style into a charming river cottage. He’d tell me what furniture I could bring and how to decorate my new home. Whatever I didn’t need I’d sell; whatever I couldn’t sell I’d donate to Maria, the angel who took care of homeless people in Vallejo, and was opening a shelter for homeless mothers My kids didn’t want any of it. My white-whiskered friend Lester listed my stuff on Craigslist. No takers. On my own I sold a sofa-bed, the Italian pea-green velvet tufted sofa, an antique French bamboo and cherry wood chest of drawers, and sadly gave away my beautiful Oriental carpets. The dealer who took them off my hands explained, “Nobody wants these things anymore.” The move nearly killed me.