Apparently I am very much a creature of habit. More than a decade after finishing at UCLA I caught myself making the same lane changes on the freeway in the Sepulveda pass that I had used when hurrying to make it to one of my morning classes back when I was a sophomore. Consequently, when I drive to my HMO I almost always use the same route. A few months ago, for no apparent reason, instead of driving south on Balboa I nipped over to Desoto and used that. The commute was so much faster that I began experimenting with other streets on the way to and from my HMO.

Today I drove north on Reseda Blvd. for the first time in a very great while. I used to drive on Reseda all the time, back when I worked at ‘The Lab,’ but that was many, many, many years ago. Two weeks after my overly dramatic departure the lab employees formed a bowling league, and they invited me to join. I wasn’t very good, and by that I mean I was very bad. After only a few appearances my team asked me to feign illness for the rest of the season. I believe that this actually helped them win the tournament, because the handicap that I’d established was so enormous that the random substitutes bowling in my place always seemed to do very well.

Anyway, back when I made my unsuccessful bowling debut the building was a large, white structure with a sign reading “Valley Bowl.” Many years later, I attending a wine tasting at a brand new vintner who’d just opened for business on Reseda Blvd. Imagine my surprise when I arrived at the address and discovered it to be the location of the former bowling alley. The building was now a sort of dark brown, and the sign read “Valley Vineyard.”

I always found the story of the vineyard evolving from a bowling alley moderately amusing. So whenever I drove up Reseda I’d make it a point to watch out for the building. Well, today the building is once again under new management. It is now painted a sort of olive yellow color. The sign has not been taken down, merely augmented yet again. Now it reads, “Valley Vineyard Community Church.”

Oh, and across the street, where the “Independent VW Dealership” used to be is an empty car lot. The VW sales office is now a beauty salon with the name “Pleasure Thyself Salon” painted on the plate glass window.

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