Closing my secret account on this day, I took five thousand dollars in the form of a cashiers check, and left the balance of ‘thirteen thousand dollars and fifty-two cents’ in a new savings account—of course in my name only.
Tme Marching On (TMO) 2
Westlake Village, California
Year 2021
Author’s Notation: Here’s what happened three years ago on that balmy summers night in 2018 when Marsha and me were banned from Westlake Lake…
May 13, 2021
10:07 PM
Me to you...
“Huh? You don’t think that a eighty-two year old woman and an eighty-four year old man could even have passion, let alone do something considered bad enough to be banned from anyplace?
Well, seeing as nowadays I have plenty of time to talk…”
10:09 PM
“Marcie, baby, no, I’m not ready to go to bed.’”
“Okay, honey. See you in the morning then.”
“Love you!”
“Love you, too, Mitchie.”
10:11 PM
Me to you...
“Okay, okay already! So if you really want to know how Mitchell Lipensky ended up in “hoity-toity” Westlake Village!
So I’ll tell you, but first we must go back to...? Ancient history? Nay, just plain old history.
After thirty-one years of marriage, our last minutes of marriage came down to...
June 16, 1986
Woodland hills’
2:20 PM
‘US 101’ (Ventura Freeway) to ‘Ca 405 ‘( San Diego Freeway).
The forty-five minute drive drive from our home… Actually at that time more so our house in Woodland Hills to Los Angeles International Airport was in what could only be described as ‘thick silence’.
Pulling to ‘United Departures’ curb, I helped Marsha remove the four suite cases from the rear of the Ford Station Wagon that were then loaded onto a cart by a ‘Red Cap’ that would then be brought to the ‘United’ window that would then be loaded onto the plane that would transport my soon to be ‘X wife’ from Los Angles, California to Chicago, Illinois.
Standing at the curb as the ‘Red Cap’ wheeled away.
“We’ve still better than an hour before you take off. Give me a couple of minutes to park the car and I’ll wait with you.”
“No…” she said “...no reason to prolong it, I’d just as soon say ‘goodbye’ here. Now!”
“Okay, Marsha…”
May, 13, 2021
10:30 PM
Me to you...
I remember feeling a profound sadness at this, asking my soon to be ‘X’ wife, “If this is the way you want it.”
“Yes, I do, Mitchell... ‘Bye!’!” Marsha said, and without a further word, turning away, she rushed to catch up with the ‘Red Cap’.
Watching for the few seconds it took Marsha to meld within the crowd and disappear from sight…
Sighing, getting into the Ford, I drove home.
Well, actually to my beautiful black girlfriend, Lita, who was waiting in Woodland Hills to help me do some last minute packing and transporting the five or six cartons containing items that I… Actually ‘we’ would need until the moving van delivered what Marsha and I decreed to be my share of mutually owned property.
Possibly now might be a good time to tell you that our divorce was ‘financially’ amenable. However not so much personally, as Marsha had told me...
10:36 PM
No, I’m not going to get into the ‘Lita and me’ story or the reason for our abrupt ‘goodbye’, or the years between 1986, when Marsha left, up to the time, twenty-four years later when we — thanking God right up to this very minute — when we were reunited. But rather how a lowly real estate salesman ended up in ‘hoity-toity’ Westlake Village.
Actually it took some sneakiness and conniving and downright lying along with a whole bunch of ‘creative financing’— to say nothing about a secret savings account in my name that I’d been quietly adding to for years, to hold the ‘Transfer of Title’ to this property in Westlake village off until our divorce was completely finalized.
So you do not think me a terrible husband, the secret savings account was earmarked for a super surprise vacation for Marsha’s sixtieth birthday.
However, at this time feeling fully justified considering Marsha’s — ‘I don’t give a fuck what you think’, attitude and confession on the night of...
May 27, 1986
1:08 AM
Me to you...
From the time we said good-night after our Elysium Field nudist group, black-room orgy and got into in the car, neither of us had said a word.
Coming off the maharajah high, having entered the ‘mellow’ and sober enough stage to drive the four miles to home in Woodland Hills…
Leave it alone, I’d thought., but...“Seemed like you enjoyed yourself tonight.”
Answered immediately. “Yeah, Mitchell, I ‘really’ did!”
No anger… No sarcasm… Glancing at her… for ounce no argument, thank God!
The bland tone of voice. The set of her face telling me that something was on her mind.
Stopping for the red light on Ventura Boulevard, turning on the seat, facing me… “You’re so fucking stupid…” she spat “... I can’t even stand looking at you.”
Where the hell did that come from?
Me to You
I could tell you of the vile, stomach churning things my wife had confessed regarding our marriage along with the hatred she said, she’d ‘always’ felt for me and the love she’d always, and still did feel for another man…
Really, as their sexual relations began while in their early teens, Marsha had told me she’s always loved a boy, then a man by the name of Stanley Jacobson.
But, really, I do not want to get into all of that shitty past history, because if I do then I’ll have to go into the reasons for our reuniting twenty-four years later, and suffice it to say I’m really happy with my life as it is now.
However, for now the present question being, once more: How did Mitchell Lipensky end up in “hoity-toity” Westlake Village and for the answer to that question we’ll have to go back to...
Woodland Hills, California
Country Club Realtor’s
Thursday, June 12,1986
9:55 AM
“Conejo Valley Real Estate’!”
“Good morning. Is Marge Hendson in?”
“Yes. Hold on, please.”
...“Margie speaking.”
“Margie, good morning. This is Mitch Lipensky, Country Club Realtor’s in Woodland Hills.”
“ ‘Morning, Mitch. How can I help you?”
“Your listing in Westlake…”
Notation: With interest rates at an all time peak, in the midst of one of our countries worse recessions, condominiums and attached units a glut on the market, and this unit approaching it’s fourth month on the market without so much as one offer…
“...when can I get in to see it?”
“You’d be ‘showing’ with your principle?”
“Yes. So to speak; it’s me.”
“Anytime, Mitch. Whenever you can make it here…”
Having something I must do first. “How’s about… say in an hour?”
“ Eleven’ll work for you, then?”
“That’ll be perfect, Margie.”
“You know how to find it?”
“Yeah. Little tricky at first, but I found it.”
Just conferring.“ You interested for yourself, Mitch?”
“Want to see what it looks like inside. But, yes, if we can put a deal together.”
Thinking: All I want to do is to have an offer to show that old lady. “Okay, Mitch, see you in about an hour.”
Leaving Country Club, driving about a half mile east, parking in the ‘Global Savings and Loan’ parking lot, I closed an account I’d opened—in my name only, about three years earlier with the commission from one of two escrow closings thinking that if there was enough ‘dough’ in the account, I would surprise Marsha for her birthday with a two week cruise to Hawaii and Haiti…
But due to my wife’s bouts of— in my opinion, irrational anger, I never did.
However, giving me a slight degree of comfort, I remembered that I did enjoy the thought that I had something my wife knew nothing about.
All ‘Global S&L’ documents sent to me via the Country Club address and on Ventura Boulevard.
Curious: At one time giving the information requested, I filled out a loan document, and a few days later had been advised that I’d been ‘pre-approved’ for an eighty percent home loan for up to the amount of ‘one hundred fifty thousand dollars’.
Closing my secret account on this day, I took five thousand dollars in the form of a cashiers check, and left the balance of ‘thirteen thousand dollars and fifty-two cents’ in a new savings account—of course in my name only.
The property at ‘2821 Waterview lane’ about fifteen miles from the office of Country Club Realtor’s in Woodland Hills.
11:07 AM
Arriving a few minutes late, there was a recent model, dark blue, Mercedes Benz sedan parked in the driveway.
The Ford parking along-side the curb, Mitchell approached the driveway as Marge Hendson stepped out of her car.
“Hi…” shaking hands “...sorry for being late.”
“Good meeting you!” The chubby, older lady said, “Just got here myself.”
Second to the last of the long, four unit, one story, cream -colour stuccoed, Mexican tiled roof structure—each of the four units fifty foot frontage having a different exterior design giving the appearance of four individual, rather than one long property.
Punching the code into her offices lock box, pushing the ornate wrought iron gate, Marge opened the gate leading into a beautifully maintained California flora planted entryway.
From the front entrance there was a clear view from within the Spanish floor tile foyer, through the plush, light-chocolate colour carpeted ‘forty by twenty’ living-room through what appeared to be a glass wall looking upon a wide redwood deck and beyond the rippling blue water of man-made West Lake Lake.
Within 2821 Waterview Lane were two large bedrooms one with a full bath and the second with another full bathroom in the shallow hallway immediately to the right of that bedroom.
To the right of the living-room was a fully workable kitchen including a stove, but not a refrigerator, which the property owners had taken apparently for their own use.
To the left of the kitchen, alongside the glass wall was an ‘eight by ten’ dining area appearing large enough to comfortably seat eight people. To the far side of the kitchen was an ‘eight by ten family-room which, under needed conditions might be used as a third bedroom.
“Margie, this place is beautiful!” Sliding a patio door open and stepping onto the redwood deck. “What’s the square footage?”
“Near eighteen hundred.”
Looking down the shallow, concrete stepped, ice-plant covered embankment, to the boat dock and — only type of boat allowed on West Lake Lake, is the battery operated ‘party boat’ docked there.
“Boat come along?”
“If the purchase price is right.”
“What are they asking?”
“Reduced to one-seventy.”
“Let’s get some coffee and talk.”
11:12 AM
...At ‘DuPars Coffee Shop’ in Thousand Oaks.
Taking a blank, five part ‘deposit receipt’ form from my briefcase and placing it on the small, round table upside before Marge Hendson; speaking as I wrote….
“I’m going to offer ‘one-sixty’, all cash with special conditions.”
“What ‘special conditions’?”
“Seeing as it’s vacant already, I am to take occupancy on ‘this’ Monday! But will not actually move in for… ? I’d say for two weeks…” taking the ‘cashiers check’ from my jacket pocket and laying it face-up on the table “...with this transaction being set up as a ‘lease purchase’ for two months, then reverting to a straight purchase with this five thousand dollar deposit to be ‘absolutely’ ‘non-refundable if I do ‘not’ close escrow within those two months…”
“Going through a divorce, huh?” Marge Hendson knowingly said.
Smiling, “You guessed?” I asked.
“Nah, seen it before… You want your name on ‘nothing’ your wife can get her hands on before your ‘final papers’.”
Repeating... “ ‘you guessed’, ’Margie?"
“No. I did a bit of ‘creative financing’ during my divorce, too.”
“So? Think you can get it done.”
“ Old lady is out of state now, so I’ll have to try to catch her by phone, then — ‘yes’ or ‘no’ have her send a telegram in ‘either case’.”
“Don’t call my home. I’ll be hanging around the office till I hear from you.”
“She’s old and doesn’t do much dancing, so she’ll probably be home…”
“Soon as I hear, I’ll head back to your office to ‘sign’ and hand the five grad to you.”
“I like your positive attitude, Mitch.”
2:15
The #1 button on his phone flashing.
“Mitch Lipensky.”
“Mitch, it’s Marge Henson.”
“Hi Marge! So?”
“Got the telegram in my hand.”
Sensing his heart quickening. “Don’t keep me in suspense!”
“We got a deal...”
“No shit!”
“… with one exclusion.”
“What’s that?”
“Everything works ! She’ll certify t hat everything works: electricity; gas; water. The roof hasn’t the slightest leak.”
“So, then, what’s the problem?”
“The boat. She says one of her sons wanted to take the boat out a couple of months ago and it wouldn’t start.”
“Batteries?” I asked.
“That’s my guess. But she wants you to except the boat in, ‘as is’ condition’.”
“Of course!” Thinking the boat’s an added bonus. “Where should we meet?”
Mitch certainly had two things in his favor. Sensing a divorce, setting up that private savings account certainly was the right move. Second, being a realtor, he knew how to work the deal quite well. I've had good luck working both with realtors and private individuals. I find working directly with the seller or buyer saves a lot of money and some aggravation when realtors set up an adversarial situation to get a higher fee from a higher selling price.
Marsha reaped the benefits of Mitchell's savvy when she returned. Although I read about it, I can't remember what happened to the Woodland Hills property. Did Marsha and Mitchell sell it and divide the proceeds?
A homonymless man writes shows what it's like to look up the laid he skirts when you’re lying prone(d) to the sidewalk, beer / joint / needle dangling from your hand /lips / arm.
The gifted and fascinating Urban Poet, Asa D Seeley, once again speaks. He introduces a New Genre of Poetry...Reality Confrontation. Juxtaposed with Essay and staying true to his unique style, Asa brings a breath of...fresh air...to the world of poet
