BYRON DE ARAKAL -- Between the Lines

Lee Potter died, quite suddenly, in the summer of 1969 at the age of

57. He was my grandfather. I called him Pop, as did my brother and

sister. And at the time of his death, I was a lad of 10; awkward and

unsure, and I loved this man enormously because of his childlike

curiosity and zest for life. What I feared, he did not. And so he was in

many ways -- as only a grandpa can be -- the light for a kid on a spooky

planet crawling with monsters.

Pop was a Renaissance man with a nomad’s thirst for science, outdoor

sports and world travel. He taught me about the stars and planets and how

to find them in the sky. He would chuckle as I struggled to knock an old

golf ball around a dusty lot near his and my grandmother’s home in Sierra

Madre.

But my best memories of Pop are of the summers we shared on Lake

Gregory in Crestline. He had built a cabin there, just off San Moritz

Drive, and he would wake me in the morning and give me a cup of coffee in

an old mug. Lots of milk and sugar. And then we would go fishing.

As we sat in the boat on those chilly and quiet mornings -- the lake’s

surface as smooth as black travertine -- we’d watch the sky lighten

before the sun crept over the peaks of the mountains. He would tell

stories and sing stupid songs and show me how to bait a hook and chum the

waters. And, boy, did we catch some dandies.

I never wanted those times to leave. For the world to change. But when

he died, nothing was the same. My grandmother sold the cabin and I grew

up. Time grabbed a flight on the Concorde and the world turned over.

A few summers ago, I decided to return to Crestline and Lake Gregory

with my family for vacation. I wanted my kids to fish the same waters Pop

and I had trolled more than 30 years earlier. But I think more than that

I wanted to go back for hope that it was the one place on Earth that

hadn’t changed.

Last week, when this column was dark, I was there again. And on one of

those chilly and quiet mornings, as I sat alone on Lake Gregory’s shore

with a line in the water and a few trout in the creel, I had a chat with

Pop.

“So, lad, you’re back,” he said.

“Yeah, Pop. I love this place. It just never seems to change. And

anyway, you’re here.”

“It’s a beautiful spot, son, that’s for sure. But is that why you come

back? Because you think nothing here has changed?”

“Yeah, I--”

“Or are you here because you wish things hadn’t changed?”

“Maybe a little of both. I mean, the lake still looks the same and I

drove by the cabin and it’s pretty much the same except for the color.

And Crestline still has the bowling alley, you know.”

Then I could hear Pop’s laugh dripping with wisdom as the morning

breeze swept through the boughs of the pines.

“And you think because of that nothing’s changed? Remember what I

taught you about the stars, son?”

‘You taught me a lot about the stars.’

‘Well the skies I showed you 35 years ago don’t look any different now

than they did then. But remember how I told you they’re moving away from

us at incredible speeds?”

“I do.”

“So they’ve changed.”

“Good point.”

For a while that morning, as I sat quietly scanning the Lake Gregory

shoreline and began noticing subtle little differences, I couldn’t hear

Pop’s voice any longer. And I had to wrestle with the truth of time and

change and how nothing is constant. It made me noodle on much that’s

going on in our twin cities here. How the Greenlight folks are scrapping

like hungry wolves to protect the fabric of Newport Beach. How Allan Beek

can’t bear to pull the plug on his beloved yellow ’61 VW bug, and how

he’s leading the fight against the annexation of Newport Coast because it

will “change” the character of the city.

My thoughts landed, too, on the Home Ranch scuffle that’s brewing in

Costa Mesa. And I wondered whether opposition is really about traffic and

smog, or more about trying to protect a memory of what the city once was

but is no longer. “Pop?”

“Yeah, son.”

“Why did you have to die so young?”

“Everything and everyone has a time and a place, son. Nothing lasts

forever.”

“And yet we want it to. Why?”

“Do you think I wanted to die when I did?”

“No. But you didn’t have a choice.”

“No one does. The clock moves and the calendar turns and things

change. People fight to protect what is, when inevitably what is will

become what was. It’s a nifty way of denying their appointment with the

grave.”

“Now there’s a sunny thought.”

“But true nonetheless. Let me give you some advice. The days you have

remaining will be far happier for you if you’ll spend them embracing

change instead of running from it. Change always overtakes provincialism.

So use it to make sure your kids and theirs have opportunities to learn

and prosper.”

I packed up my fishing gear when the sun reached its midmorning glow,

as it had warmed the waters and tranquilized the trout. And as I walked

the trail back to the car, I heard Pop one last time.

“Are you coming back?” he asked.

“Yeah. The kids like it here.”

“Good. But I won’t be here, you know?”

“I know.”

* BYRON DE ARAKAL is a writer and communications consultant. He lives

in Costa Mesa. His column runs Wednesdays. Readers may reach him with

news tips and comments via e-mail at o7 [email protected] .