The Real Deal

Several months ago, an uninteresting house in our neighborhood was sold and the new people made a Japanese garden in the front yard, complete with a giant (by which I mean three feet high or so, and too big to wrap my arms around) statue of Buddha. I was so intrigued by the kind of people who would put their faith so out there like that, especially in our neighborhood of little ranch houses, that includes, for example, across the street from the Buddha house a fence made of honest to God wagon wheels.

On my morning walk, I sometimes go a little out of my way to visit the Buddha house, because I'm always hoping to catch whoever lives there. This morning I saw a for sale sign on the house. "Ohhhhh. It's a FLIPPER."

After we'd lived here a while, we realized that flippers sold us our house, which explained mysteries like why the bathtub was actually dusty when we moved in.

For some reason, I'm sad about this. I've been walking by the Buddha house and imagining it populated by real BUDDHISTS, not just a couple of guys trying to sell a house (for 20,000 more than we sold ours by the way). No matter how long I live, I seem to keep expecting things to be what they appear to be.