A visit behind the orange curtain, part two

August 28, 2024

By DELL FRANKLIN

Editor’s Note: The following series, “Life in Radically Gentrifying Cayucos by the Sea,” to be posted biweekly includes the notes, thoughts, and opinions of an original American voice: author Dell Franklin. 

Franklin’s memoir, “The ballplayer’s Son” is currently on Amazon.

It is 6:30 in the morning at the colossal retirement complex in the bowels of south Orange County, where I am a guest of Sean, an old basketball friend and teammate who once played at an Ivy League college before joining the Peace Corps after graduation in the late 1960s. I am sitting on his balcony (which I call the ledge) overlooking one of the many finishing holes of a golf course that snakes through this massive town-like grid of some 24,000 retirees.

There is also a pitch-and-putt course, gyms, pools, recreation rooms, tennis courts and I suppose pickleball courts, and  a sort of cafe/countryclub, possibly a fishing pond, etc.

It is balmy this time of the morning and I am suffering from two straight nights of terrible insomnia and too much vodka and somewhat miffed because Sean, a perfect host, does not have coffee. Nevertheless, sans coffee and newspaper, I am totally entertained observing activity on the golf course and putting green, as well as the consistent flow of dog walkers and strollers on its periphery at this unheard of hour.

From my heightened perch, foursomes of what appear to be Vietnamese women in separate golf carts (some with racy flags attached) seem tiny spidery beings, clad in fine golf ensembles, animated, talkative, obviously pleased to be on the links as one after another smacks the ball stiffly but with focus perhaps 40 yards straight away, nary one of them hitting a ball out of bounds as they eventually arrive at the putting green, line their individual carts on a paved side road, and walk briskly, putters in hand, to the green.

When finished, all four gun their carts, looking neither right or left, and speed across the road that circumvents the course and disappear into the path leading to more condos and the next hole.

These people appear as indoctrinated into, and thriving in the American Dream as well as anybody ever. There is no doubt they worked hard to amass enough money to exist in this exclusive retirement complex. It is not cheap. Sean has done well in sales. He is a social person and has made associations and friendships with some of his neighbors.

A man he mentioned (one of very few black people at the complex) drives a huge black Lincoln Continental with gleaming gold spokes and which bounces as if on suspension. His car eventually emerges from the underground parking lot below and, blaring rap music that bellows above all possible noises, begins its slow jouncing circular route around the golf course, headed toward the gates leading to a subdivision and eventually a major highway connecting to Interstate 405.

I stand and wave and somehow he spots me between Sean’s American and Boston Celtic flags and waves back, and I feel reassured there’s DEI (diversity, equality and inclusion) in retirement homes in the OC, though a majority of the people here are Asian, as I read their names on a list at the elevator leading to Sean’s apartment.

Actually, I am thriving in luxury if only I could have my coffee. Sean is a sound sleeper, but finally at around eight thirty he comes out earlier than his usual rising hour wondering why I was laughing so hard it awakened him. I explain that I watched an old stiff very tall white male golfer take two efficient practice strokes from about 20 yards from the putting green, then jerk spasmodically and practically jump off the ground taking his real shot, gouge out a huge divot and shank the ball out of bounds onto the road and then take his club in two hands and throw it on the ground and kick at it while his fellow golfers looked away.

Then I complimented Sean on how so many employees, all Latino, were tending to the grounds, shrubbery, golf links, keeping the complex immaculate.

“They take good care of this place and there’s plenty of money to do it,” Sean explained.

I informed him I was shocked at how many stooped white-haired women walked tiny dogs.

“Lots of widows,” he explained.

“Any of them hit on you?” I asked.

“Well, the one across the hall is pretty friendly.”

“Are you biting?”

“Not a chance. I’m loving my solitude.”

I asked Sean, an ardent reader, who is three years younger than me at 77, why there were so many moving vans coming and going.

“There’s a big turnover here,” he said. “Let’s go get you some coffee.”