In 2003 Sylvia and I took an exploratory road trip through the Pacific Northwest, going up through Northern California and Oregon and from the coast to as far east as Boise, Idaho, and finally decided to move to the St. Johns neighborhood of Portland, Oregon. In 2005 we sold the place in Oakland and rented a house, sight unseen, in St. Johns, figuring we’d use it as a base while we looked around for something we wanted to buy.

Toward the end of August we packed everything and everyone, including two sedated cats, into my Subaru station wagon and a U-Haul truck. Our friend Helen Robillard, a strong, competent woman, wrangled the U-Haul. Sylvia alternated riding passenger in my car and in the U-Haul with Helen. The trip was pleasant aside from some pitiful mews from the cat carriers.

Just as we pulled into our new neighborhood we were greeted by a terrific downpour—our introduction to the climate of the Pacific Northwest. Helen backed the U-Haul across the lawn, right up to the covered front porch of the house. We hung a tarp over the gap between porch and truck and unloaded.

Even before moving we had learned that our landlord, a very pleasant gentleman, had sold the house to someone else, a guy named Brian Friel.

I don’t remember when we first met Brian, but once we had moved in he told us we were responsible for taking care of both the back yard of the house and the adjacent empty lot, which he also owned. We hired someone to mow the grass. A week or so later he came and inspected and told us we needed to remove the mass of blackberry brambles around the perimeters. We replied that the brambles had been here before we moved in, and that normally people paid to have brambles removed. It was not our job.

A couple of months later part of the sidewalk in front of the house had to be repaired (not the part that Helen had driven over). Brian hired the cheapest labor to pour the concrete and they poured it in the rain. You don’t pour concrete in the rain. When the city inspector looked at it, of course he said it had to be redone. Brian hired a different crew and this time some neighborhood kids rode their bicycles through it while it was still wet and someone carved their initials and a heart in it.

After a third time replacing the slabs, Brian ordered Debbie, one of the people who did occasional work for him, to sit in her car by the new patch while it dried overnight, to guard against juvenile vandals. By then it was winter and Debbie was freezing in that old jalopy, so we invited her inside where she could sit by our front window and keep an eye on the sidewalk.

Gary, a short older man, was another occasional employee. Once Brian promised him $100 for some clean-up on one of his properties, but only forked over $50 when the job was done. When Gary asked why, Brian shrugged dismissively. “I’m cheap,” he said. There was no agreement in writing so there wasn’t anything Gary could do.

Spring came. One day Brian came by and said he was going to take over the basement for storage. We said no. We were paying to rent the house, which included the basement. We were using most of it to store our own belongings. I got the impression that Brian wasn’t used to people saying no to him.

By then we had purchased a fixer-upper a few blocks away. We hired Mike, a carpenter that Debbie had recommended, and Sylvia and I worked as his assistants—along with Debbie and Gary.

Not too long after, Brian showed up with another scheme. He planned to build a new house in our side yard for his own use, but didn’t want to spend the money on the permits that would require. It would cost him a lot less to call the new house an extension of the existing one. Doing so legally would require connecting the two buildings somehow, such as with a passageway between them. He would just have to tear down our kitchen wall, leaving that room open to the outside while the passage was being constructed, and… Again, we said no. We were renting the house, which included a kitchen with four walls.

One afternoon, Brian arrived with a large nursery pot, at least 5-gallon size, full of dirt and raspberry canes, and set it down in the back yard. He intended to plant them there, to use when he was living in that house he was building.

Debbie happened to be visiting us when he arrived. As soon as he left, she and I exchanged glances and headed for the back yard.

Sylvia was washing dishes and looking out the kitchen window, and told me she saw that pot arrive with Brian and then almost immediately zip back out of the back yard and disappear.

When Brian returned the next day he seemed quite perturbed, and asked if I had any idea what happened to it. I replied that there were meth-heads in the neighborhood. They’ll steal anything.

That same day a pot of raspberry canes appeared in another back yard a few blocks away. Once planted, they thrived in their sunny patch for about 12 years before needing to be replaced. The berries were quite tasty.