I Am A Time Traveler - Stepping Into A Time Warp

This morning Jay and I decided to run a few errands.  In return for his faithful service, I promised Jay we would go to Pronto’s, the Mexican restaurant down the street from our home, for Huevos Rancheros.  (He will do anything if I promise him food!)  

After a yummy breakfast, we were walking back to the car when I spotted a sign I could not believe…it said Meat Shop and Deli.   

Could it be?  Dare I hope?  I opened the door and low and behold…it was!  It was a real butcher shop.  It had fresh meat arranged without plastic wrap in long trays in a meat case.  It had machines behind the meat case…machines like a meat grinder, a butcher’s saw, knives and cleavers, a scale. I felt like I had died and gone to heaven. 

While we have certainly reduced our consumption of meat products, we are not vegetarians.  So it is frustrating to go to a market and look for a specific cut of meat to told, that cut doesn’t do well in this store and we do not carry it.  I remember my mother going to the butcher’s shop to request three types of meat cut into cubes (veal, pork, beef) to be used to make one of her favorite recipes, “City Chicken.”  The meat was threaded onto thick butcher skewers (which the butcher happily provided), then breaded, browned and baked in the oven.  I remember as a young wife, seeing an unusual cut of meat and the butcher, as he wrapped the exact amount I asked for, proceeded to tell me exactly how to prepare it when I got home…and the next week he remembered to ask me how it turned out.

So to find a real butcher shop in my new neighborhood was a delight.   

South Shores Meat Shop is owned and operated by Darko Skracic, a friendly dynamic, gray-haired Croatian immigrant.  Darko said he has been in this shop since he was twelve years old.  Not only does he have fresh meat and seafood, he makes and sells his own sauerkraut and traditional sausage as well as cevapcici (a Croation style sausage).   

We left with sauerkraut, cevapcici, some freshly sliced liver, freshly baked rolls and a smoked ham hock for split pea soup.

From there we went to stop in at the Assistance League Rummage Sale.  Many women in our Park belong to this philanthropic organization and we had given them some donations for the sale.  When we turned on to 8^th street in San Pedro we experienced another time warp…here was a little piece of Americana, one block long with unique shops where people stop and talk to you. 

I found a Clock Repair store that says they could repair our wall clock from Sorrento, Italy. “Please bring it in and we will see what we can do.  If we can’t fix it, no charge to you!”  

We discovered an Italian Deli, Pirozzi's, that had imported products and the Italian pastry, Sfogliatelle, that they get shipped in frozen from New York and then they bake it fresh on site.   

 

We left with a six pack of blood orange flavored San Pelligrino sparkling water, a tube of Italian Tomato paste and....ONE sfogliatelle.

There is a tiny post office…the only volunteer post office in the United States that is staffed by Assistance League volunteers.  

Finally we reached our destination, the Assistance League’s Sale.  As I browsed around talking to some of our new neighbors who were working there, Jay was off pursuing his own objectives.  I found him out front talking to man about a horse…no...about an old set of golf clubs.  Now that we have a 9 hole golf course just outside our door we are thinking of trying the game.  Not knowing if we will take to it, we do not want to invest heavily in equipment.  

So the guy says…”Make me an offer.”  

Jay says, “I’ll give you a dollar and a half.”   

The guy says, “Make that 5 and it is yours.”   

Jay says, “I’ll take it!”

On the way home, we remarked “What a great day!”  We could have been in Kent, Ohio or Macomb, Illinois.  We could have been 10 or 17 years old.  For those few hours we experienced a time warp!  No wonder we feel younger in our new home!

I Am A Wishbone - Pulled in Two Directions

Our new home is in a 55 Plus community that sits right at the boundary between San Pedro and Rancho Palos Verdes.  When we drive out past the gatehouse to 25^th Street, we can turn either right or left. 

Gate House at Palos Verdes Shores

 If we go right, we head down to San Pedro.  San Pedro is a very eclectic, ethnic town that has been the “put down roots” place for many immigrant groups.  Fisherman from Croatia and Italy and Greece settled here in the early 20^th century and their descendants continue to offer food, wine, music, and culture at local haunts.  We have yet to visit the Croatian Club or the Dalmatian American Club but we have been to the Italian American Club and we have shopped at A-1 Imports.  The residents of San Pedro are proud of their heritage and love to share it.  It is fun to drive through the neighborhoods of small, traditional, World War II housing,  to drive to the end of 22^nd street and see the wholesale fishmongers, to stop at The Corner Store to browse or buy a Chicago Hotdog!

There is also the port area, the less prosperous part of town.  Here we experience loud bars, noisy motorcycles, and some “urban outdoorsmen” as Jay calls them, sleeping on benches or looking for a handout.  Some families crowd into tiny homes with children playing out on the steps.  Some trying to rehabilitate themselves take advantage of organizations like Beacon House, where recovering residents sober up and attempt to put their lives in order and learn new skills, like restaurant serving and cooking.   

The Beacon House

 We attended a wonderful Bistro Night dinner there, enjoyed a great fish dinner and were even sent home with cookies!  We hear they also have Sunday Breakfasts and while you are eating you can have your car washed across the street for $5.  This is San Pedro and it is the vibrant culture to our right.

If we go left, we head to Rancho Palos Verdes.  Rancho Palos Verdes is one of the most scenic, beautiful places in Southern California.  While driving along the coast, seeing the cliffs reaching down to the rocky shore, the greens of Trump golf-course, the Wayfayer’s Chapel, the mansions spread out on the hillsides, the cyclists with their slim bodies peddling for all they are worth, the coves of tidepools you cannot help but feel like you are in an automobile commercial.  You ask yourself, “Is this for real?”  

  

We travel this way to get to the Palos Verdes Library, where we obtained our new library cards.  In this direction is the South Coast Botanical Gardens where we purchased a year’s membership so we can attend events, go for hikes and moonlight walks and learn more about plants and gardening.  

 

The Botanical Gardens

 This is also the direction we would go to drive up to Marymount College, where as members of Peninsula Seniors we can audit for free various classes.  It is fun to think of learning in the same rooms where I attended high school, but now as a Senior auditor!  Sunday we headed in this direction because I wanted to attend the weekly Palos Verdes Farmers’ Market. We drove the beautiful coast, stopped at a lovely Yellow Vase Café for a light breakfast and sat outside looking at the ocean with “the beautiful people,” sipping a vanilla latte.   

Yellow Vase Cafe

 Then we continued to Peninsula  Center where many vendors had their fruit and produce.  I bought beautiful heirloom tomatoes, some fresh dill, colorful peppers. Then I spotted the succulent yellow peaches that cried out to be baked.  As I was selecting my peaches, another man had his purchase ready which he handed to the farmer with the question, “Do you have change for a $100?”  This is Rancho Palos Verdes and it is the culture to our left.

Two different worlds, two different life experiences, separated by just a few miles.  We, living right on the edge, get to experience both!

I Am An Unpacker - Revisiting the Past

I wonder if it is true that just before you die, your life passes in front of you.  I feel like I have had a preview of that during the past two weeks.  I have been unpacking…picking up, unwrapping, holding in my hands, pausing, and remembering.   

I realize that when you move there are two moments of purging:  when I am packing items and I ask myself, “Do I really need this anymore?”; and when I am unpacking and I ask myself, “Why did I pack this? Do I really need this anymore?” In either case, if the answer is “No” it usually goes into the Goodwill pile.

However… there are times when the answer is “no” but it does not go to Goodwill. I will hold it in my hands and recall a memory associated with the item.  For that moment I am in the past, reliving an event, the people present, the words shared, the emotions and I realize that this is more than an item…it is a part of my life.

Like the orange squeezer. 

Do I use it?  No.  I have a nifty modern squeezer that is much easier to use and squeezes the juice right into the container I want to use.  Will I ever use it? Probably not. 

 

However…when I pick it up and hold it, I am in the kitchen at 1034 Merydith St. in Kent, Ohio…I am about 8 years old, watching my mother cut and squeeze some wonderful oranges that came "all the way from California" for some fresh juice for us to enjoy.  Will it go to Goodwill?  Not during my lifetime.

And what about my container of rocks?  When Jay and I married, my children gave us this decorative candle stand for our living room.  We looked at it and wondered what to do with it.  Neither of us liked burning candles but it was a gift from my children!  We decided it could hold other things besides candles…it could hold rocks.   

 

We had started a little tradition of picking up a small rock whenever we were on a trip or someplace special and bringing that piece of the world home with us.  We label it with the date and the location and place it in the glass bowl.   

As I unpacked these rocks and replaced them into the bowl, I relived so many special moment.  There was the rock that I took from my cousin, Salvatore’s, rock wall surrounding his olive grove in Ferla, Sicily where we helped him pick olives in 2004.  I held it and I remembered. 

 

There was the rock from Cefalu, Sicily from the piazza where Jay and I first exchanged our marriage vows.  There was the rock from MIT in Boston, from when we attended Jay’s 50^th reunion.  There were the rocks from Macomb, IL and Kent, OH where we showed each other our childhood homes.  There was a rock from Sedona, AZ where Milli and I spent a “mother-daughter getaway” together.  There was the rock from the Yangzi River in China when we visited a tiny village while traversing through 3 Gorges Dam. Each rock gifting me with a memory and an emotion…reminding me of all the precious places, people and times in my life.  They may look like rocks to others, but they are gemstones to me.

So I guess that if in the moments before I breathe my last breath, my life passes before me, it will truly be a rerun, because I can experience scenes from my life anytime I want.  All I have to do is pick up items in my home.

I Am A Newcomer - Moving In To Palos Verdes Shores

THEY say that “Nobody likes change.  It is human nature to resist change.”  I suppose it makes a difference if change is a choice or if it is forced upon you.  In our case it was a choice and two weeks ago we officially changed our permanent residence.  We left a home in Playa del Rey that we loved, but knew would present difficulties as we aged, for a new home in a 55 Plus community where we could easily and pleasantly “age-in-place.”  Palos Verdes Shores is a community of manufactured homes.  To quote Jay, “Now we are officially trailer-trash!”  But this home is far from trash.  

 

#154

It is 500 square feet larger than our previous home, is spacious with one level and is located on a hillside with a 180 degree view of the Pacific Ocean…and on clear days of Catalina Island!

Taken from our deck when Catalina Island "was out!"

We decided to purchase the home the minute we walked through it.  Even though we could certainly envision ourselves living there, we had some trepidation.   

“Would we regret our decision?   

Would we make friends?   

Would we feel too removed from life as we knew it and miss the hustle and bustle?   

Would we age faster in a Senior community? 

Would it ever feel like home? 

Would our family come visit us?   

Would we get bored?”

Two weeks is not enough time to answer all those questions, but so far we are smiling!  We are discovering that our experience can be whatever we choose to make it.  Right now it feels very new.  We are exploring new neighborhoods, new farmers markets,

San Pedro Farmers Market every Friday morning.  We bought a fig tree!

 new routes to and from places, new routines (where to drink our coffee in the morning, where to store the can opener), new restaurants, 

Delicious food at Sirinat Thai just 1/2 a mile from our house.

new neighbors with new names that we can never remember but who gladly introduce themselves over and over again, new transportation to transport us 

 

Jay with "Pegasus," our white-winged divine stallion golf cart.

to the clubhouse, the fitness center or my new garden plot in the community gardens.  

Learning Square foot gardening in my little 4 x 8 plot!

 We can be as involved or as uninvolved in the activities of the community as we choose.

The greatest surprise is that our new home and new surroundings seem to invite us to slow down, to focus, to be mindful and pay attention to the beauty, the breeze, the simple tasks we choose to do.  

 

Checking the ships leaving port, and we even saw whale spouts!

 It feels good!  

We look forward to new experiences.  We purchased a membership at the near-by South Coast Botanical Gardens where there are many walking trails through various natural landscapes.

We obtained library cards at the local Palos Verdes library and joined Peninsula Seniors so we can take advantage of the opportunity to audit for free classes at Marymount College, just up the hill from our home.  

Yes, family and friends come to visit!  All my children and grandchildren have been here and Gabriel especially seems to delight in learning to play shuffleboard and have Uncle Marc teach him the fine points of pool.  Gabe is delighted that his new school is just 15 minutes away so we can still have our quality time together!

Marc and Gabe playing pool

Joe stopped in on his way home from San Diego!

Friends, Cindy and Dennis enjoying our deck.

Change has been invigorating for us.  It has changed us a bit as well.  It seems to open us up to be even more willing to try new things.  After taking “Pegasus” out for an trial run around the park we found ourselves tooling around the golf course at twilight.  A few golfers were out, it was so quiet, the grass smelled so fresh.  Jay turned to me and said…”I think we might try golf!”  Stay tuned....

We are newcomers to the next chapter in our life and we are delighted!