Santa Rosa, CA 1978

Rane and I briefly lived in the upper flat of a large Victorian in Santa Rosa, CA. Downstairs from us lived these two guys, Jason and Njama. Njama's real name was David but one day he came home from school and announced to his family that his name from now on was going to be Njama and from then on, that's what he was called.  He was a very sweet kid. He liked to save part of his lunch every day and bring it home to his little brother Jason.

There was a big veranda that went around three sides of the house and that was just the best place to hang out and drink coffee. Njama used to come upstairs and I would make coffee for the two of us. I think his was mostly milk but still, there was some coffee in it so I guess you could call it coffee. He took his coffee drinking seriously. :-) That's what we did. Sat on the veranda and drank our coffee seriously and talked about things.

Njama was fascinated with a battery operated drill I had (a very weak one). There was nothing more fun than to run that thing and try to stop it with your fingers. Fun for an entire morning.

And this is Kelly. She and her little sister Lacey lived next door and they would come over too... sometimes climbing in through the windows in the morning to wake me up if I didn't respond to their knocking. Gawd. Kelly was something else.

There were also a lot of dogs that liked to come up and hang out on the veranda too. I have no idea how but I think they were there by my cat Jack's invitation. And in the middle of the night, since there was a private cat door in the pantry, sometimes the kitchen would be filled with the cats of the neighborhood taste testing Jack's cat food. When I turned the light on, I'd see a lot of happy cats, all with their tails straight up. 

I don't think we lived in that house very long-maybe just the summer. I think we had to move because the house was sold. It's a good thing we moved when we did too because in the backyard was an enormous fennel bush. I told Kelly it was a licorice bush and that by the end of summer, there would be licorice growing all over it. It was not very nice of me to say that but she was such a in your face know-it-all, it was kind of fun to make her believe such a big fat lie. Good thing I moved before that licorice "ripened" on the fennel bush. I would not like to face the wrath of Kelly when she found out I was pulling her leg. >:-)