Blowin' in the Wind

"There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands' necks. Anything can happen."
--Raymond Chandler, Red Wind, 1938

**This is the male half of "Bernie & Milly" (better-known to most of you who know us at all, as Brandon & Camile). Yes, we're beginning a blog together. The blog I maintained a couple years ago ("CafeBrando") lost momentum upon my graduation from USC, eventually ceasing entirely; and Milly has never blogged before, so don't be surprised if this new one has a bumpy take-off. But we invite you to share in our high hopes for this new-born blog.**

Wind has been much on my mind, lately.

After a wonderful holiday in Albuquerque, New Mexico (and Lubbock, Texas, too) -- where my brother was growing increasingly interested in Bob Dylan and learning to play "Blowin' in the Wind" on his guitar (among numerous other tunes) -- I returned to blustery Los Angeles, which is possibly being raked by the infamous Santa Ana winds (referred to by my main man Ray Chandler) -- although these winds are quite a bit chillier than Chandler's "red wind" is described.

In his short story, "Red Wind," Chandler picks up on the nerve-wracking, crazy-making quality of strong winds, and that's something I certainly have no trouble believing in. I remember many a maddening windy day in Albuquerque, the windowpanes shrieking like banshees. But there's another side of wind that I've also long been conscious of, and that's an aspect which the recent movie The Holiday hints at: its magical properties. It makes sense, doesn't it? Wind is invisible, which itself is sort of magical. And it rearranges things, invisibly going about its busywork while we mortals cower inside. When we emerge the next day, we find a changed world.

Eric Burdon and the Animals called it the "Winds of Change," and there's much change afoot in L.A. Milly and I decided around New Year's to go ahead and move in together, if we could find a suitable place. So, since we've been back in the City of Angels, we've been leaning slant-wise into the Santa Anas and pounding the pavement for RENT signs in her neighborhood, the "Miracle Mile."

We'll need something of a minor miracle (or a magical wind) to pull this off: as we recuperate from our holiday deficits and as I prepare to go back to school in April, we have only a narrow window of time in which it makes sense to put down a deposit on a place, scramble around to pack up our separate apartments, fork up the first month's rent, and move in. I spent my first night home in L.A. tossing and turning with restless dreams of not quite having enough money to make it work, and being enormously disappointed that Milly and I wouldn't be able to move in together, after looking at apartments and daydreaming of the future and generally getting our hopes up. It might be easy to construe my fitful sleep as a bad omen, a sign to play it cool for a while longer, and stay put. But part of my restless night was due to that damn wind, which was howling around the corner of my (current) apartment, jostling the window back and forth noisily in its frame while rearranging the world outside, and my world in general.

The next day I sat down and wrote out a pep-talk to myself, reasoning things out in the logical light of day, and discovering that this could actually work out just fine. I now feel better, and our apartment search is gathering steam. We've been pleasantly surprised both to discover an abundance of available apartments in the Miracle Mile, and a possibility of getting a nice nest for the money we're willing to spend (which should actually give us both a financial break each month, compared to what we owe currently for rent). I'm thinking this is really going to happen. The question is, when exactly? Or, to put it another way: how many apartments must one couple view, before they're ready to commit?

Well: the answer, my friends, is blowin' in the wind; the answer is blowin' in the wind.

So please, remember us and our search in your thoughts, and send us good vibrations. In return, we'll try to keep this blog up to date, so our progress can be tracked. And meanwhile, as Jack Black says in The Holiday, "Don't blow away!"

(I can't believe I'm quoting The Holiday.)