I Haven't Been Down the Hill in a Coon's Age Last week I took my dog to San Bernardino to get a rabies shot. As I was driving down the 18 through all the landmarks I had named when I was a commuter—Tire Eater, Side Rock Bash, Fog Wall, Sideswipe Heaven, Bump Off, Hairpin, Drag Strip, Dead Man’s Curve, Muddy Spot, Fault Line, and the rest, I’m sure you have your own names for them—I thought that I hadn’t been down the hill in a coon’s age. Just the fact that I had couched it in those Jed Clampett terms in my mind was a good indicator that I had been on the mountain for way too long. I couldn’t remember the last time I went down the hill. I guess it was when we went to the kids’ grandparents house down at the beach sometime, but that must have been a long time ago. Not that I miss it. As I jumped in surprise every time I heard the many half-empty plastic bottles of Arrowhead water on my car floors being crushed by the increased air pressure, I realized that I have been becoming something of a mountain person. Last spring I went to visit an old client and friend in San Diego County (350-foot elevation), who has this beautiful spiraling staircase that has 40 steps to the second floor, which is at the height of a usual fourth floor. I met with the managers on the bottom floor, and then at 11 a.m., we went up to a meeting in his office on the second floor. I bounded up the stairs to his office while the rest of them huffed and puffed and held onto the handrails until they reached the top. I guess this was the worst part of their day. They were amazed that it didn’t faze me. I didn’t let on that I actually felt a little giddy from all of that extra oxygen that was going into my lungs and brain from that little sprint. When I was getting ready to move up to Crestline after many recreational visits to the area, I imagined that from just being up here in the high altitude and exercising I was going to turn into another Arnold Schwarzenegger. The Incas carried big packs up Machu Picchu at 8,000 feet and had these huge lungs and chests, and that was going to be me. Well, in five years, I have grown a pretty big chest, but I think we can give most of the credit to Billy Bear’s and The Loose Caboose than anything else—you know, bacon, cheese omelets, waffles, stuff like that. Things have really changed down the hill. On one visit a year ago, I decided to stop by my old neighborhood in Temecula. Four years before we moved to Crestline, I bought a 1,100-square-foot matchbox in a new development in Temecula. We sold that house after four years at a $10,000 profit for $135,000. Big deal--the equity barely paid off the real estate agent and the escrow company. When I visited my old next-door neighbor last year, she told me that the people who had bought the house from us four years earlier for $135,000 had just moved out after selling it to some real suckers for $219,000. Do I wish I would have stayed there for four more years to reap that kind of bonus? One big, giant NOPE! That’s because my house here is worth much more now too, and it doesn’t take me 30 minutes to move my car two miles from the freeway exit to my home in the evening. And also, I bought my house here for less than I sold my house in Temecula for and it’s more than twice the size of that house. And if my house that I have here were in Temecula, you couldn’t touch it now for less than a half million. Oh, except for that lack of air conditioning thing. But hey, it’s got a big old heater! One thing that is really strange after being up here for months is driving on the freeway. I’ll go down there after being up here for months on end. I’ll jump on the 30 then the 215, and I realize that people are whizzing by me and yelling things that they couldn’t possibly know about my poor, deceased mother. Then I look down and I’m doing 45. So I inch it up to 50, my heart races a little, then 55, then I realize that that old speed limit got abolished quite a few years ago and now I’m up to 60, my heart is pounding and I realize that I need to at least go five miles per hour faster before I can stop hearing my heritage questioned by these people passing me... and that’s when I really realize that I haven’t been down the hill in a coon’s age. I’m only 46 years old and I can’t even get up the guts to go the speed limit down the hill at my young age. How slow am I going to be driving 30 years from now when I’m 76? That will probably be the next time I’m down the hill anyway, so stay tuned to this column and I’ll let you know you how it goes. |
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