Paradise Found
The deep sustained rumble of a massive climate control system provides a throbbing baseline for the morning’s soundtrack. A variety of invisible birds call to one another tropically, like trumpet fills or cymbal crashes above the din. A steady parade of delivery trucks and rental cars rumbles down the four-lane road in varying registers. Looking down through the balcony railing, I see a man in a printed shirt and outsized headphones operating an electric leaf blower nine stories below. He is tidying the blacktop around the four large dumpsters. To his left is a chaotic yard, visible from my perch on high, but obscured at street level by deceptive and cleverly trimmed plumeria shrubs. Inside the yard, damaged lounge chairs are stacked like corpses on a battlefield, their rubber and vinyl cracked by the sun, legs broken and bent at odd angles. Several chaise lounges are respectfully covered by a tattered brown tarp. Most are left exposed, rotting in the heat. On the other si