Walkin', Talkin' Nostalgia Scrapbook

A few days ago, Leela discovered wasps nesting in a ventilator drain pipe next to the water spigot outside our building. We called a guy who advertises in the paper that he will collect wasps and yellow jackets for free. He sells them to a company that makes vaccine from their venom. Today he came over. He said they were paper wasps. He vacuumed out a couple of insects and then pulled out their little nest, which was just visible inside the pipe. He said he could hatch out the pupae. He squirted some clove oil in the pipe, and I covered it with a sock.

Conversing with this fellow, I learned he'd lived in Austin for 11 years -- 1974-1984. "The good years," I told him, and he agreed. We talked about various places around the city, and I realized Austin was frozen in time for him in the mid 1980s. He hadn't been back since, and in his mind nothing much had changed. For him the airport was still at Mueller, there were no toll roads or gigantic condo towers, things like that.

Well I guess it's too late for me to freeze Austin's good years. My experiential tea bag has steeped too long; I didn't pull out until after the end of bad-old 2007, with the impossible traffic, SoCo mania, and endless heat. I'm happy to be rid of that. But actually I must have all those other eras stored away as still lifes too. Otherwise how could I have so favorably compared Corvallis to Austin in the 1960s? I'm just a walking, talking nostalgia scrapbook!

Why I am Austin

Until this year, I had lived all my adult life in Austin, Texas. During that time my name was Bruce. Bruce is a fine name, but it was also my father's name. Before he died a couple of years ago, we'd often get each others calls (he also lived in Austin). And during my childhood, I went through stages when I wanted to change my name, in large part to distinguish myself from my father.

So I've always been fascinated with the idea of switching identities, and our move to Corvallis provided a good opportunity, especially since our new cohousing community already has an established Bruce whose last name also happens to begin with "H." I picked the name Austin because:

• I liked the name.
• I wanted to commemorate my hometown.
• It might have been my given name, if my mother had had sufficient foresight.

That last point needs explaining. I am the oldest of 4 boys. I was born in Austin; #2 was also born in Austin; #3 was born in Dallas; and #4 was born in Flint, Michigan (when our family lived there for a little while). We were named Bruce, Don, Gary, and Mark. But my mother has often mused that she should have named us Austin, Travis (the county that Austin is in), Dallas, and Flint. Well, 25% of her fantasy has now become reality.

It's taken some getting used to, and of course all my old friends and family still call me Bruce, which is fine. I've discovered I can be both. I am a city; I contain multitudes!

Why Leave Austin?

I was born in Austin, Texas, in 1947 and lived there all of my adult life -- until this year.

What happened?

I loved Austin, but the city's size and traffic were becoming more and more irksome. And the heat! I don't think I was made for months and months of near-100-degree days. And besides, I'd always wanted to find out what it was like to live somewhere else. I wanted some perspective on my hometown. I wanted a change.

In 2007 I retired from my long-time state job. My wife Leela and I sold our home for a good price just before the real-estate market went into a nosedive. Meanwhile we'd had our eye on Corvallis, Oregon, a university town of about 55,000 in the Willamette Valley. Concurrently we had also become interested in the cohousing concept and were delighted to find a new cohousing community getting started in Corvallis. At first we didn't think we could get in, even if we wanted to, which we weren't sure of. There weren't any units we liked available. But during a reconnoitering trip to Corvallis last year, we found that a CoHo unit just right for us had opened up (someone had dropped out). At that point the buildings weren't quite finished, and we got on the waiting list. After that everything just fell into place -- or snowballed -- or avalanched -- or pick your own cataclysmic, earth-shifting image. We rushed to sell our house, we ridded ourselves of mountains of stuff, and we made it out here to Corvallis in mid February 2008, somewhat befuddled and surprised at what we'd done.

Sometimes I don't think there is a why. Maybe we just landed here after a storm. But that's not true -- we really did make this happen. And if we can pull off this amazing transformation, we can accomplish a lot of other incredible things too.