3 OUT OF 4 DENTISTS PREFER CRESTLINE

Seems like I've been back and forth to Aunt Helen's in Crestline on a weekly basis now, almost.

The latest effort has been to help her update her will. (The original was drawn up in 1964 (!) and amended in 1977!) I drove up to the mountains when she met with a paralegal in March, who very patiently went through all the questions with her. (The woman has had a lot of senior citizens for clients up in the mountains, so she's professionally experienced in patient explanations!) It's hard getting Helen just to sit still -- she's up and down out of her seat like a kindergartener -- and then to keep her focused on the question at hand for more than half a minute before she asks something off topic.

After a few postponements in April due to snow and nasty weather, we finally got together this Thursday (April 13) for the second and final session with the paralegal and notary public, who notarized signatures. Helen felt relieved (and I no less so) to finally have an up-to-date will, plus living will, and nomination of conservator for health decisions. (Ann will be executrix, conservator, agent, whatever ... with me as back-up.)

After saying goodbye to Helen, I stopped by the real estate agent, Steven Hethcoat in the village to check on a possible new house for Helen for $200,000 that was about to come on the market (he knew the seller and had called to alert us, so we get first dibs). He took me by the house, a cottage-y 2-bedroom with one story and only a few steps from the front door down to the yard. It looked decent but not thrilling. Inside it looked larger than I expected with lots of dark pine paneling on the walls like an old mountain cabin and a huge stone fireplace. The house seemed a bit dark inside, but maybe a lighter paint job and better lighting would do it more justice.

Steven pushed me to go ahead and draw up an offer that same day since the owner was likely to get instant buyers once he officially listed. I hesitated - it all felt a bit rushed - but I saw the reasoning, and after checking with Ann by phone in Fallbrook and after she agreed to go ahead, I relented. We might not do much better in the future.

The timing was a bit coincidental. April 13 is/was Dad's birthday. Last April 13, Ann sold her condo for $520,000. This April 13, she and I made a formal offer ($190,000) on a house for Dad's sister Helen after years of trying to get her into a more suitable place. A friend said she thought Art was looking out for us "from the other side" when I told her about it. Now the only itty-bitty problem is to convince Helen that she needs to move to a smaller place from the house she's lived in rent-free since 1992! (I express-mailed a letter with pictures to her today to give her some advance warning. She'd live in the new place rent-free, as well.)

HOLY WEEK

It's also been a busy week for me musically. After flying back from Portland a week ago Thursday, I had a choir practice for Fauré's "Requiem" that evening, a performance of it in church with orchestra the following Palm Sunday, a practice for Easter Sunday this Thursday evening, and an Easter service (with the same choir) the day after tomorrow! It's at San Pedro Presbyterian Church, where old Aramco friend Kim Ayers and her husband Allen Petker go (he's the choir director). The choir has been very chummy, and I'll miss them once the flurry of seasonal music is past. But it's not the church for me even though I like the people.

Today, Good Friday, I stopped in for the first time at the neighborhood Episcopal church here in Old Town Torrance, St. Andrew's. The amount of scripture reading was staggering. I think they bested the Baptists! All of Psalm 22, all of Isaiah 53, all of Hebrews chapter something, and all of the Passion according to St. John. It's a cute little old wooden church - built in the '20s, I'd say. The rector gave a very "fundamentalist" (Anglo-Catholic) sermon, stating the mystery and necessity of the crucifixion and railing against the recent "alternative" gospels in the news (one attributed to Judas) that undervalue or deny Christ's real, physical death. It was a gray and rainy day out, appropriately enough for Good Friday (or "Sad Friday", as they say in the Eastern Arabic-speaking churches). I came home and listened to a CD of Arabic Good Friday music by Fairouz, one of Lebanon's top singers.