First place called home

My first apartment on the Lewis Street side of the property after fleeing the nest (like both my sisters, when Dad threatened to start charging rent 😏), from June 1996 shortly after graduating from Vanguard until June of 1998 when I transferred to a one-bedroom on The City side of the same property in anticipation of getting married. It was $554 a month for 450 sq ft. It now *STARTS* at $2,098/mo. A 15-minute bike ride to the bike rack in front of Disneyland Guest Relations next to the ticket booths or a half-hour walk when the tire was flat. It was directly across the street from The Crystal Cathedral (now Christ Cathedral) and near the corner of the parking lot where they housed the live animals (and their smell when the wind was just right, or wrong) during the Easter and Christmas pageant seasons. The Cathedral's artist-in-residence/chief organist lived two apartments over from mine where the hallway turned.

The Hector Mine quake happened in 1999, my now-ex's first experience with the earth moving under her feet, and it wasn't long after that I agreed to move to Florida so she could be closer to her family (that and she wasn't handling the fast-paced California culture very well). We left California the last week of June 2000 just as DCA was breaking ground.

Needless to say things did not go well for me after the move. It was my turn to be the 'fish out of water' with neither friends nor family and it went downhill from there. Now that I've been on my own two feet again a while I have no interest in going back, though, even after the losses.