Romy's Greatest Hit

Romy’s Greatest Hit

Romy was a loner with skin so pale it left no question that he rarely left his house––and he never left during the day. Everyone in the village knew about him, of course, but no one knew him well, and we never saw him with a companion. He was a man without friends, and he liked it that way. Despite his reclusiveness, he was an accomplished tenor saxophonist with an international following.

As a young man, Romy accepted every invitation he got to board an airplane with his cherished Selmer ParisTenor Saxophone tucked snuggly in its original black leather case. Stickers from cities around the world covered the case, reminding him of all the recital halls and clubs he had performed in. Those years were behind him now. As he had grown older, Romy had become more and more introverted. Finally, the year he turned sixty, he moved to Twisted Creek where he lived on his own terms with little human contact. But he had a conflict. He loved to perform for live audiences––and that meant people.

Romy found a solution. He built a strange-looking house hidden away in the quietest corner of the village. He never invited anyone to visit him there––not even the other great jazz musicians he had played with late into the night in his younger years. But the house gave him an ideal stage for performing. Romy called it his fortress.

The house had four levels, and each level was only as big as a room, and smaller than the one beneath it. The top level was half the size of the room at street level, turning the house into a foreboding spire soaring into the sky. Trunks from giant redwoods anchored each corner from ground level to roof, but Romy designed the house with every trunk tilting slightly off true vertical, and each in a different direction. The explanation we heard is that Romy wanted his creation to look like a giant had thrown down a pile of pick-up sticks. To me, the structure looked like it had begun to sway and buckle in an earthquake, but froze seconds before it collapsed to the ground.

There were no windows on the front of the house facing the street, but on the back side, floor-to-ceiling windows framed dramatic views of the ocean crashing against the shoreline a few hundred yards away. In the evening, people walking on the beach saw an equally dramatic view when they looked over at the house. Six nights out of seven, there was Romy, standing on the balcony four stories up. The man was unmistakable––tall and skinny, dressed all in white, with long silver hair whirling in the wind. And as soon as the sun dropped into the ocean, Romy picked up his shining brass saxophone and started to play.

Romy had a wide repertoire. One night he’d play a classic John Coltrane solo. Another night he’d riff on a theme from classical music. His evening concerts usually ended with a long improvisation so full of energy and sound it often left people thinking more than one musician was performing. But Romy was always alone. His only accompaniment was the pounding ocean.

Most people who lived along the coast looked forward to a trip to the post office. They counted on seeing neighbors and catching up on the local news. But not Romy. He planned his day around avoiding talkative neighbors who would waste his time telling him stories he didn’t want to hear and asking him questions he didn’t want to answer. Playing his nightly balcony concerts for anyone who happened to be walking on the beach was the only human interaction he needed.

Romy was consistent and he was disciplined, which made it possible for him to reduce his time away from home to a couple of hours once a week. He had perfected his timing so that he could dash to the grocery store and fly through the aisles just before closing. Then he’d make a beeline to the post office to grab his mail and get back home as soon as possible.

Romy's life of contradictions didn't stop there. As much as Romy loved living by the ocean, the sand dunes filled him with anxiety. He worried that the constantly moving dunes were threatening his house and would eventually swallow it up entirely. His fear transformed him from a tranquil musician into a snarling guard dog.

Late every Saturday night, Romy descended the four flights of stairs from his sitting room to the front door and stepped outside. He carried his 100-foot surveyor’s tape in one hand and a flashlight in the other. Romy walked behind the house and hooked the measuring tape onto a stake planted deep in the sandy soil. Holding the opposite end of the tape, Romy started walking toward the ocean. Seventy-five steps later, he reached another stake, the second of five. This one was notched at every inch, from bottom to top. Romy pulled a notebook from his pocket and wrote down the height of the sand around the stake. He kept walking from stake to stake, recording the height of the sand at each one.

When he got home, Romy pored over the numbers and compared them to the ones he recorded a week earlier. Then he wrote a scathing letter to the California State Parks Department. He expressed alarm over the latest measurements, and pointed out how much the sand had risen in the last six months.

“The sand dune is creeping ominously closer and will bury our houses,” he always wrote. Every week, he ended with the demand that State Parks control the shifting sand before it was too late.

Romy had been tracking the shifting dunes for years. Every time State Parks received a letter, they promptly called him or sent a short note to say they had the situation under control. But that response never satisfied Romy. He just grew angrier that nothing was being done.

One day, a letter to all Twisted Creek residents arrived from a new park ranger named Barney McElliott. His title was Resource Ecologist, and he was the first person to have that position in our area. “Subject: Shifting Sand Dunes,” his letter began. Then the ecologist laid out the situation and addressed Romy’s concerns point by point. He even mentioned Romy by name. The ranger explained that the department was monitoring the changing sand position and was prepared to bring in backhoes to protect houses, if necessary. According to Ranger McElliott, no house was in peril. He ended with a reminder that we were living on sand dunes, and it was a fact of nature that they shift constantly. He urged everyone not to worry and to enjoy the interactions of the ocean, our unique geography, and the forces of nature.

I ran into Romy not long after receiving that letter. For the first time, he walked up to me and started a conversation. He brought up the sand dune issue and the letter from the new ranger. Instead of complaining about the department’s lack of action, he said Ranger McElliott finally understood what he had been writing about for years. He told me he was still taking measurements, but he wasn’t worried any more. He was simply curious. He said he hoped we attended his informal balcony recital that weekend. He was planning to debut some new work.

When the sun started to set on Saturday night, my husband and I bundled up for a walk on the beach. Twisted Creek is never warm, and the forecast for that night was for the low 30s. I wasn’t taking chances and left the house wearing two sweaters, a down jacket, ski gloves and a wool knit cap. We walked to the end of the street, crossed the beach parking lot and turned down the coast until we had a good view of Romy's house. Then we waited.

Fifteen minutes later, Romy appeared on the balcony carrying his beloved sax. He played a well-known Tina Turner hit as he danced from one side of his balcony to the other. As usual, a small crowd formed on the beach below. Fortunately, the ocean waves were gentle that night, so we could hear Romy's performance rising above the droning water.

Noel and I stayed to watch a second tune and then a third. By that time, several more neighbors arrived to join the audience: We were just about to walk home when Jim called to us to look up at Romy’s top balcony one more time. It was a sight we’d never seen before. Three musicians walked out of the house to join Romy on stage––a bass guitarist, a jazz violinist, and a trumpet player. For the first time in decades, Romy was jamming with friends. And thanks to Ranger McElliott, Romy was at peace with the sea.