Summer 1997

The girls from Sacramento moved into the middle bungalow when I lived in the front of the Compound. Being the front house, I was meet and greet duty, and was able to distract the unwelcome, the overbearing or the belligerent by inviting into my place.

The girl in the cottage before Donnie was from San Pedro, and figured she will be a super real punker chick now that she has moved to Long Beach. She also fronted an all girl band, and within the first month had her reluctant guitarist/artist installed in the house to her left. The artist brought her best girl party friend, who kept us all in gossip and scandal until she had one too many and had to be run outta town. To balance party girl’s misogyny, they set up drummer girl in the last spot on our side. Such a sweetheart, The Norwegian, such a good girl. She turned out to be punker than the rest. She was a preschool teacher at her church. She held us to her scale of morality and virtue. To add some sunshine, the girls in the middle rounded out the Compound, bringing us a fresh faced, 18-year-old small town glee.

For that first year, our inter-habitation among the Compound blended so smoothly, when visitors came for one or another, it was etiquette to pop in all the pads. Guests would trail along to the next house for a beer, knock on one door for a cigarette, and check on the party girl to see how she was feeling from the night before. You could head to the back for a bong load, then back to the front house, where I was always prepared to entertain, and entertain we did- any and every according to their preference of hospitality. The Compound was estrogen ruled. One time or another everyone six degrees separated from another spent some quality time in or about one of the cottages. Many a night, if chemically challenged, one of the couches each of us had outside (these were TINY cottages) had a sleepover guest. It got a little out of hand.