The House that Tex Built (part 2)

Tex all dolled up and happy to be Ladybug's pillow

Tex's little house in the desert is now almost 60 years old and noticeably empty. Looters have foraged through the house, broken the windows, ripped off a lot of the knotty pine paneling and generally trashed the place. We heard it was destined soon to be demolished.

So we called Grampy at 8am on a beautiful June Saturday morning. Grampy was on his fifth pot of coffee by then. “Dad you want to go to Lancaster with us today and see the old house on Avenue A?” “What?” he said “See an old horse they put away? What the hell are you talking about?!” “No” Mike said “Go take a drive down Avenue A and see the old house you built. It's deserted now so let's go take a look”. “ Well I guess I can go. OK” he said.

We went to pick him up. His face was scrubbed and the little hair he has left on his head was properly gelled and combed straight back. He had on his good pair of cowboy boots and his wife's old Sam's Town jacket she won in Laughlin back in 1987—he was ready to roll. As we helped him into the back seat of the van he said “Can we go by and get lunch at the Casa Roma?” The Casa Roma was an Italian restaurant there in the 50's that was owned by his good friend, Arthur and his Italian family. Arthur died many, many moons ago. The restaurant has changed hands several times and is no longer a restaurant, but a biker bar inhabited by bearded, tattooed, beer guzzling, ruffians....who may or may not like Italian food—but they sure ain't getting any there. But to Tex, the Casa Roma is frozen in time and he fully expected it to still be thriving, still painted bright red and green and still serving the best damn pizza this side of Chicago. I broke the news to him gently. He just sighed, stared out the window and shook his head back and forth. Unfortunately, he's getting used to news like this.

Mike peeking in the front window

Original linoleum on the kitchen wall

Knotty pine living room and wet bar

We drove the one and half hours it takes to get there, straight through the desert to the middle-of-nowhere house on Avenue A. After 60 years it is, not so surprisingly, still in the middle of nowhere with only tumbleweeds and rattlesnakes to watch it's slow deterioration. We parked in the dirt in the front yard and as we stepped out of the car, into the silence of the desert wind, I watched Grampy's face closely, looking for signs of alarm and sorrow. The house is deserted, dilapidated and has been picked over by desert salvagers. We walked around to the back and found the old kitchen door swinging loosely on one hinge. As we walked into the house, across the floor, side-stepping the debris, Mike observed; “This house looks so much smaller than I remember it”. Grampy was silent, looking at the tattered walls and the tiny kitchen sink. The original stove and oven were still there, long in a state of disrepair. I wondered how my mother in law ever managed to feed four hungry men in that miniscule space. We moved into the living room, the pride and joy of the house. Mike and I exclaimed over the genuine knotty pine paneling (what was left of it), the rock fireplace the hand-made hammered tin switch plates on every light fixture. The original drapes were still there as well, dusty but surprisingly intact. Grampy was silent as we surveyed the neglected living room, every piece of paneling and every rock in the fireplace put there by him all those many years ago.

We made our way to the kid's room. It was hard to believe that three growing boys all slept in that little room, and harder yet to believe the original wallpaper that Tex had hung there for was still there! Oh it was sure enough tattered and water-stained but it was there, 50's style astronauts and rockets cascading across the room...offering Grampy and Mike a blast from the past. (pun intended)

Mike looking at the astronaut wallpaper

Grampy stoically took that walk down memory lane that day, pretty quiet throughout the whole ordeal.  As they walked along Mike would reminisce with him over some of their past adventures; “Dad remember that big hole out back that we piled high with scrap lumber? Remember that?” and Tex would solemnly nod up and down. “Dad here's the spot where we butchered chickens. Remember how we boys hated plucking those feathers? Remember dad?” “Yup” he'd reply, moving on. When we'd seen it all we stopped to take one last photo of Grampy and the house he built then got into the van and drove off into the sunset.

Last photo of Grampy and the house he built

They say you can't go home and I expect we all realized it first-hand that day. As we ate our lunch at Marie Callenders (a poor substitute for the fine Italian dining at Casa Roma) we talked about everything BUT that house. Mike and Grampy knew they'd never see it again. No use crying over spilled milk. Grampy has learned many times over the course of his advancing years that all of life is transient and brief. But I suspect he tucked away, in some corner of his mind, his memories of that old house and his life back then when he was a strapping young man with no gray in his hair and no arthritis in his joints. When he didn't have to depend on his son to mow his lawn, write his rent check every month , take him shopping and to his doctor appointments. And I suspect he brings those memories out for inspection more often than most as he sits in his recliner alone, living out the sunset years of his life.

 “Time it was and what a time it was. It was a time of innocence a time of consequences. Long ago, it must be. I have a photograph. Preserve your memories, they're all that's left you”. ~Simon & Garfunkel