An extraordinary life

Do you have a favorite place you've ever lived? I do. I instantly become nostalgic every time I think about it. It was the very first place Jared and I lived after we were married.

Leading up to the wedding we became increasingly frantic about finding the perfect home to rent. We are total house whores and had spent many evenings driving around our favorite neighborhoods, day dreaming about raising a family in a giant old house with fireplaces and mature trees. And secret passages to spy on people. Duh.

We toured some real winners. There was the shack next to a frat house. The place with a washer in the front yard. My personal favorite was walking into the bathroom of an apartment we were both totally feeling and finding a guy sitting on the toilet. Pooping. It was awkward and pretty much ruined it for us.

The apartment I was currently living in was out due to the naked guy beneath me who thought getting drunk and yelling at me up the vent was the best way to pass time on a week night. Who am I kidding, dude loved it on the weekends too.

I couldn't move in with Jared. Sharing a bathroom with six dudes and the soap scum they so meticulously cultivated over the last year kind of made me throw up. It still does. We lucked out though.

We almost didn't see the for rent sign. It was half stuck in a bush. We weren't even sure it was supposed to be there, but it was love at first sight. I can't even say that about when I met Jared. First sight of Jared I thought, “Hmm, red hair.” First sight of house I thought, “I could have babies there!”

It was the perfect. A little white brick house with a red shingle roof. It had corner windows. It looked old! The street was tree lined. This was back before either of us had cell phones so we rushed back to my apartment to call the number on the sign. We left a message and we waited, tortured by the thought of someone else living in our house. I think we drove by it ten times before we heard from anyone.

Then Art called with a tiny, crackly voice. We didn't know it at the time, but he was just out of the hospital. Jared spoke to him.

“Are you married? I don't rent to couples that aren't married.”
“We're actually getting married next month. We're looking for our first place.”
“Well I can't rent it to you if you aren't married.”
“But we're getting married...in a month.”
“Sorry, if you're not married, I don't want to rent it to you.”
“We're not even planning on moving in until after the wedding.”
“But you're not married?”
“No, not until next month.”
“I'm sorry, I don't rent it to non married couples. They aren't stable.”
“But we're getting...We are married! We just got married.”
“You are married?”
“Yeah, we are. Married.”
“Great, do you want to see the place?”
“We'll take it! Yes we do, but we'll take it!”

Swear. That's exactly how it happened and the first time we met out future landlord, Art.

We were cautious at first. He told us there would be no lease, just month to month. That way if he found out we were crazy bikers he could kick us out. He was joking, kind of.

Art lived in the house next door with his little wife Ola. It took us about ten seconds to fall in love. Art and Ola met while working at the high class joint The Riverside after World War II when Reno was still a kickin town.

He told us about her hair salon where she styled the likes of everyone from Eleanor Roosevelt to Marilyn Monroe. He told us about how Cary Grant would ride his Cadillac up and down the street annoying the hell out of Renoites. Apparently people couldn't stand him. I knew it.

He shared stories about flying over The Hump during World War II. About the narcotics that were given to them after the war. About the rehab he and all his fellow vets had to go to. About how horrible it was and how nobody wanted to talk about it.

He told us about growing up back east and running through a shoe factory. We heard about sneaking on the train to Boston where prostitutes would yell prices out of open windows on the street. We heard about when he lost his mother.

These stories, his life, were impressive enough, but it was the way he treated us that made us fall for Art. I tell Jared all the time that I love Art. I can't help myself.

He never minded when our rent was a few days late. When we left the water in the front yard on all night long, he paid for it and just asked that we didn't do it again. Every month we found thirty dollars in the mailbox with the receipt for our rent. At first he told us it was for mowing the lawn. Then winter came and the money didn't stop. It never stopped. Sometimes it was a little more and sometimes a little less. We told him it wasn't necessary. We loved doing yard work and he already charged rent far below the city average. The little bit helped so much the years we were both working part time and I was still in school.

He wasn't just kind to us. He would hire people down on their luck to do little chores. He let a man sleep in his detached garage for a whole winter. We discovered that one in the middle of the night. Jared stepped on the poor guy. He loved his daughter, Marie, and in return she loved him.

Our dining rooms each had giant corner windows that faced each other. It was comforting on the many nights Jared was out of town to sit down at my table and wave at Art over the little ivy covered fence. How a man in his nineties who could barley walk could make me feel safe defies logic. It did though.

I knew it would happen. He's been in and out of hospitals and rehab facilities since we met eight years ago. Art passed away. It's a different kind of mourning when the person who leaves has lived such a full life. He was nearly a hundred. Ola has been gone for many years now. He has been a prisoner of his failing body for so long. Still, I'm heartbroken for Marie. I'm mad at myself for not visiting more when the house we purchased exactly four years after we moved in was just down the street. I will miss him but I know I'll see him again someday. In the mean time, I'll try to channel a little Art. Be kind to strangers. Give more than you take. And don't rent to crazy bikers.

Art feasting at one of the early Pie Day's.