Dust in the Wind

I want to tell you a story about this house. It's not true -- I have a vivid imagination. But here it is.

It's a bit much, isn't it? The guy who designed made a bundle in sanitation, not in a Tony Soprano kind of way, but on the up and up, as far as I know. Then he took his bundle and built this Beverly Hillbillies looking thing. The dogs have their own bedroom. Seven chimneys. Lots of class, in the Tony Soprano sense.

But this story isn't really about the house as it is my friend, let's call him Phil. It's not his real name, and this story isn't true, remember? In fact, it probably didn't happen.

Anyway, Phil was a great guy. His wife, Leslie (not her real name), worked with my wife (or not). Anyway, Phil and I became friends. He wanted to come to work at this dot-com I was at (or not) back in the late 1990s. He'd just finished his MBA, and was looking for something new and I tried to hook him up. We had lunch and some great talks. Really great guy. He restored a Porsche 356 by hand. He was very mechanical that way.

So Phil was fascinated with this house. He lived close by, so he walked down every day while it was under construction. He was there so much that the crew actually thought he was the architect. So he'd just bop on down there with a clipboard and he had his run of the place. He wanted to know how everything worked. He LOVED this place.

Well, Phil didn't get the job at the dot-com, which turned out to be a great thing when the whole thing went in the tank. I found a new job, Phil and I had lunch a couple of more times, then we just sort of lost touch.

Anyway, Leslie called my wife one day and said Phil dropped dead of a heart attack while he was on a business trip. He was only 50 and it was completely unexpected. Leslie, needless to say, was devastated. It rained torrentially at Phil's funeral. I ruined a pair of shoes.

Leslie was kind of lost for a while. My wife and I would see her from time to time, have a few drinks, tell a few jokes, just make sure she was feeling OK. She did as well as she could under the circumstances.

One day she told us this story. Or maybe she didn't, because this isn't a true story. It seems Phil was cremated and Leslie didn't know what to do with Phil's ashes.

You see where I'm going with this, don't you?

So Leslie had a couple too many martinis with some other friends of ours (NOT me or my wife and NOT anyone I know) one night and decided she knew where Phil's ashes needed to go: on the lawn of this house. So Leslie had her friend drive her down to the house, drop her off and circle the block. I don't know how she got over the fence, but she entered the grounds and dumps Phil's ashes ALL OVER THE FRONT YARD. Then she ran like hell. You know you have a good friend when they'll act as a getaway driver.

So if your ever driving down Cheek-Sparger Road in Colleyville and pass by this house, say hi to Phil. Just remember that's not his real name. And this story is absolutely, positively not true. But it'd be a hell of a story if it was.