Joe and Arlene Halper loved their home, their neighborhood and their lifestyle in Pacific Palisades, and they planned to stay there indefinitely.
Even as Joe turned 95 and Arlene approached 89, neither of them considered themselves old, and Arlene had no desire to enter what she called age-related conditions.
For example, a retirement community.
Then there was a fire which destroyed their home and most of the Palisades.
So where do they live now?
The retirement community has 175 apartments.
Arlene said their sons were familiar with Avocet in Playa Vista, which offers both independent living and assisted living with on-site care for those who need it, as well as many amenities including a rooftop pool and fitness center, bar, movie theater and daily meals for those who don't want to turn on the stove.
Firefighters battle a house fire on Bollinger Drive in Pacific Palisades on January 7.
(Wally Scalage/Los Angeles Times)
Halpers checked this five months ago.
They moved in.
They adapt.
“I feel different now that I’m here,” said Arlene, a former teacher. “We have a beautiful apartment… and the people are very warm and friendly.”
One big advantage: there is no danger of epidemic isolation among older people.
But social life takes some getting used to, Joe said as we ate lunch in the communal dining room a few days ago with three other Palisades evacuees who had moved to Avocet.
“You can have dinner or breakfast, whatever, and people will come and stand over you and talk to you,” he said. “It's all about communication. And caring too. But it's just tiring.”
And yet.
Joe, who worked in the parks administration and served until recently As the Los Angeles Recreation and Parks Commissioner, he goes to the gym on the top floor of the building, where he lifts weights one day and swims the next.
Restaurants and shops are within walking distance.
Arlene took up pickleball at a nearby park.
And the gist is this:
Transitions can be difficult at any age, especially as you age. But there is life after the Palisades, and it's a real bargain if you can afford it.
“This place isn’t cheap,” he said. Bill Klein 94 years old, retired UCLA law professor.
Bill Klein (from left), his wife Renee and Joe Halper finish lunch at Avocet Playa Vista, an independent retirement community in Playa Vista.
(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
Bill and his wife of 85 years, Renee, were friends of the Halpers in the Palisades (where Renee and Arlene were longtime Library Association volunteers). They all said that in the close company of good friends time of loss and the revival has been a big help, even as Joe and Bill nurse lingering bitterness over the chaotic evacuation and rapid spread of the fire that upended their lives.
Renee, a retired social worker, said she was beginning to think their oceanfront Palisades home of 54 years had become too big to take care of. Unlike the Halpers, their house survived the January fire, but the entire neighborhood burned down and they have no plans to return.
“It was in the back of my mind, but it wasn’t something we had planned at the moment,” she said.
“We had disagreements about this,” Bill said. “I wasn’t inclined to come to a place like that.”
Bill looked around the dining room and said bluntly:
“Look around you,” he said. “There are a lot of old people here with walkers, and it's not a very busy place, except under emergency conditions, in my opinion. I think people here are trying very hard to deny that they live in a nursing home.”
This is not a verdict on Avoset or the people. It's more of a commentary on the trade-offs that aging imposes. Bill said he and Renee once visited her mother's nursing home and he couldn't hide his thoughts.
“Don’t let them grab me and keep me here,” he told Renee.
But Bill knows he's fighting the inevitable.
“I had to accept that I belonged here,” he said. “But I didn’t like it.”
Although he is getting closer. What he really enjoys, Bill said, is “carrying weights” in the gym and swimming in the pool.
“I’ve made a good life for myself here,” he admitted, declaring that he was devouring a stack of books, mostly non-fiction, including one he had just read about Jesse James and another about artificial intelligence.
(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
When he runs out of his own books, there is a library next to the lobby. And daily video lectures from experts on various topics.
And while Avocet varies by age, according to Bill and Arlene, neighborhood does not. Step outside and you're surrounded by ethnic and generational diversity, with neighbors going to shops, restaurants and parks.
“You could cross Lincoln and end up in a wetland,” Arlene said.
Janet H., 85, another Palisades evacuee, joined us for lunch. A retired teacher, who asked me not to use her last name for privacy reasons, said her husband was upstairs in their apartment recovering from an illness that left him in the hospital for a month.
“This place saved our lives,” said Janet, who has lived in her Palisades home for 53 years.
On-site care provides peace of mind, and her home in the Palisades was somewhat isolated. At Avocet, caring neighbors and staff were a daily comfort, Janet said.
And that's not even the best part of the package.
“What makes me really happy is that I will never have to cook again,” Janet said.
While we were talking, a woman about 98 years old passed by and we exchanged greetings. She was followed a few minutes later by her husband on a walker.
He just turned 100.
“And we’re still going,” Arlene said.
“Well, the alternative is a little darker,” the gentleman replied.
For me, a first-time visitor, Avocet felt like a grand resort or a luxury cruise ship.
(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
But does it feel like home here? I asked.
“You're right,” Arlene said. “We’re on a cruise and we won’t land.”
“But maybe that’s where we belong at the moment,” Janet said.
They belong in the place they choose, and make the best of it in a year of unfathomable loss and unplanned reinvention.
Sure, it was a bumpy ride, but Joe made a point about where they ended up.
“It’s a soft landing,” he said.
