a house on ridgeview avenue

It was the day after I arrived from Tokyo three years ago. Aric and I were trying to take our first steps as a couple on the same soil, after having been apart for eight months. We were fiercely trying to get past my final days in Tokyo, which were hard on our relationship. So before I could get over jetlag, we went to a birthday party together.

The whole house was lit up with people laughing and eating. The backyard, with a lone wooden swing, was idyllic. I remember clutching onto a purple lily for the birthday girl I'd only met once. The house, with its dark wooden beams, Rockwell paintings and oversized black leather chairs seemed rustic and inviting. The girl, a newly wed, had just leisurely walked out of a shower and seemed at ease as she brushed her hair even as people bustled around her, cooking and prepping for dinner. "I like her," I thought. "She knows how to take things at her own pace."

I would sleep over in their guest room that night, and many more nights as I drove up from San Diego on weekends to spend time with Aric in Pasadena just across the bridge. The house on Ridgeview Avenue became sort of a home to us just as Kenny and Alicia became a resting place for our relationship. It was to that home we returned to after Aric proposed on a winter beach. It was in that home our small group became a family. It was to that home the Kaos brought home two beautiful, beautiful daughters.

This month, the Kaos sold their house and they're moving away. And while most of my life has consisted of goodbyes and long-distance relationships, I am finding myself mourning a loss. We know Kenny and Alicia, who stood in our wedding, are perennial friends. And their daughters Naomi and Olivia have a permanent place in our hearts. But it's the end of an era for the Kaos and the Allens.

I'll miss Alicia's note to her husband -- "You so hot in Eagle Rock" -- that always hung a little to its side on the refrigerator, their creaky door that I never managed to open on my own, and Kenny's "magnificent" tea.

Kenny and Alicia, here's to a new chapter. You'll be missed, sorely missed, here in Eagle Rock.