October in Los Angeles

How do you measure, measure a year?

In daylights, in sunsets

In midnights, in cups of coffee

In inches, in miles

In laughter, in strife

In five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes

How do you measure a year in the life?

Seasons of Love, from the Broadway Musical Rent

Tears

I knew it was going to happen. I knew there would be a moment when I suddenly realized I’d moved to the other side of the country and there was no going back. But I didn’t expect that moment to happen the first night I arrived in LA. I did not expect to be sitting cross-legged on the sidewalk of a park somewhere, sobbing on the phone to my best friend, hyperventilating as she tried to calm me down.

As I sobbed and sobbed and tried to grasp any leftover, coherent thoughts—all of which seemed to have disappeared in the last two hours I’d been driving in the glorious reality of LA traffic—several people who were homeless walked past. I could almost feel them saying, “Well, at least my life isn’t that bad.”

After six days of driving (three of which were on a highway through open desert), I expected to receive a warm welcome from my new church community.

Instead, I arrived to a dirty camper in the driveway of the home of a church family. They were loaning me the camper until I found an apartment. No welcome basket or greeting party. Seeing the filthy sink of the inside of that camper, a place that had obviously not been cleaned before I arrived, pushed me over the edge. I started crying tears that eventually turned to sobs. I searched my phone for a Trader Joe’s, thinking if I found something familiar it might help. 

But then I realized I didn’t have a place to store groceries. That’s when I ended up seated on the ground in that park. 

Emily encouraged me to find a hotel and a place to get something to eat. After a good night of sleep, I could figure out what was next. 

I searched my phone for hotels and got in my car again. My precious Toyota Solara that had taken me from Alabama to Mexico. From Mexico to St. Louis. From St. Louis to DC and now from DC, all the way to the other side of the country. To Los Angeles. 

As I carried a small suitcase into the hotel lobby, a man in his mid-thirties with pale skin, dark hair, and too-perfect features took my information. When he handed me a key to my room, he did not smile or even say hello. Is this what all people and Los Angeles are like? They offer you a place to stay but they don’t make it ready when you arrive? They’re rude to you at a hotel where you’re a paying guest? 

I didn’t know where I was in the city. So I asked if there were restaurants within walking distance. I couldn’t stand getting back into my car. The concierge—who clearly believed he was too good for his job—said, “Yeah of course there are.” No smile. No offer of recommendations. 

I was puffy-eyed from sobbing. I obviously wasn’t having a good night. And this person didn’t even bother to be kind. 

But I had cried so much already. I took my keys and carried my suitcase up the stairs to my room (there was no elevator). 

It was almost 10PM on a Tuesday when I went in search of food. I saw a sign across the street that advertised Italian. Oh, Italian comfort food sounded so good. Pasta and a glass of red wine. Yes, please. 

But that restaurant had already closed. The restaurant next door was open, “Matteo’s” blinked from a light-up, retro sign, so I wandered inside. Self-conscious of my puffy, red eyes, I almost fled when I saw how empty it was. Fading into anonymous obscurity would be difficult to achieve in this quiet little bar with dark paneling, leather seats, and Sinatra’s singing voice wafting about. But I was too tired to find a different place. I took a seat at the bar, and after staring at the menu for what must have seemed too long, the bartender said, “You look like I could use some wine.” 

I must have muttered acceptance, because he began pouring me a glass of red. I was so, so tired. Having someone make the decision for me, show some kindness, it nearly brought me to tears once more.

Joe’s 

After a while, I noticed a small gathering of people at the other end of the bar. One man stood out. He had a very elaborate mohawk. Mohawks are hard to pull off no matter how old you are, but this gentleman was probably in his seventies. And he was wearing his mohawk proudly. He said to his friends, “Joe likes my mohawk. Don’t you Joe?”

“You’re a dumbass,” Joe the bartender replied.

“Joe, you should try a mohawk,” said a woman who sat beside the man with the mohawk. “You’ve got great hair for your age.”

Joe really did have great hair: a thick and puffy head of gray.

A few other people wandered into the bar. They greeted Joe by name and took their seats. He immediately supplied them with drinks before they ordered anything, and they each ordered food without looking at a menu. What I began to notice, as my fuzzy brain became less congested with the help of food and wine, was every person at the bar was late sixties or seventies. They were also on a first-name basis with the bartender—and each other.

A man who sat next to me introduced himself as Erik. White-haired with a matching beard who I eventually discovered was a lawyer. “We’re like that TV show—Cheers, I think it’s called. Only the old-people version.”

I’d never seen Cheers, but I nodded and smiled like I had.

Home

We watched the Dodgers game together. The restaurant closed down around us, but none of Joe’s patrons made any move to leave, so I stayed, too. It was way past closing time when we all peeled ourselves off the barstools and headed for the door, saying, “See you later,” to Joe, who waved a disgruntled dishcloth in our direction as he cleaned up the remaining wine glasses.

On the sidewalk outside of Matteo’s, I told the one gentleman I liked his mohawk. “It’s taken me four years to get it this way,” he told me. Then he walked up beside me and looked deliberately down both sides of the street. “I’m going to make sure you get across the street okay.” 

I went back to Matteo’s the following Tuesday. Tuesdays and Fridays were the nights the Cheers club gathered to poke fun at Joe while he took care of them, knowing what they wanted before they asked and religiously filling their water glasses as they drank way too much.

I still marvel that I stumbled into that oasis on one of the loneliest moments of my life. For over two years, I returned to Matteo’s. I tried to go every week on either a Tuesday or a Friday. We’d watch old movies, and they’d tell me about the glory days of Hollywood. We’d play, “Have you met…” with Joe, throwing out names of seasoned celebrities and he’d respond yes or no if he’d met them before. If he was in a good mood, he’d tell us the story behind the meeting. 

Matteo’s, I later learned, had once been the regular haunt of Lucille Ball and Ronald Reagan. The patrons remembered the “good old days” and clung to the world of their memories as they re-lived that life through the old films. 

They were my first friends in LA.

My first day in Los Angeles was also my half birthday. I celebrated by putting my toes in the Pacific Ocean. I felt, after all my searching and fighting and crying and healing, I’d finally come home.