As delighted as we were to have a space to stay, it was obvious immediately that Frankie and Allie, our hosts, had started celebrating Friday night before we arrived. It was not their first glasses of wine or rum and coke. We had great fun though; they were as nice as could be, asking questions about our trip, offering us a shower, and telling us about Surfside.
Allie
Allie is living in the small apartment downstairs, no bigger than a large bedroom with a kitchen sink and microwave added, along with a very small bathroom. One large bed in a beautiful iron bedstead is covered in large comfy quilts and soft fluffy pillows; it dominates the room, centered in the middle of the room space. Two small chairs are right in the entryway, positioned perfectly to give a view out the only windows, and set to watch TV and drink early morning coffee.
The back of the apartment is a small sink with a bitty table for a microwave; the sink abuts the bathroom shower. The whole space is maybe 300 square feet, but gives the feeling of a safe, snug, relaxing hidey-hole.
Allie moved here from Arizona, wanting to be back in the area that calls her heart, an area she’s known for years and years. She arrived only two days after Ike. The apartment was flooded with water and dirt from the storm; Allie spent weeks cleaning and repairing.
With the classic husky voice and leathery skin of the lifelong smoker and sun lover, along with her great energy and waist length hair, we couldn’t place how old Allie was. She could be in her late forties, but she’s had enough wild stories and experience in her life to be in her early fifties.
Allie originally hails from Lompoc California, near Santa Barbara, which tickled us no end because Chelsea’s dad is from there, and her paternal grandparents still live there. We have visited there any number of times on visits to the grandparents, especially since we lived in Santa Barbara for many years.
Though she’s currently supporting herself with professional housecleaning, Allie is an accomplished artist, with beading as her medium. We were awestruck with her talent! She primarily does bracelets, but we saw bandanas and anklets as well. Allie has designed her own loom to do the beading (the beads are incredibly tiny) and does all her own designs on each piece that she creates.
The work is so intricate and so beautiful that each piece sells for at least $200. You’d be guaranteed an individual work of art! We’d love to work with Allie to sell some of her work, because it’s a shame not to have the world see her beautiful pieces.
Allie, whose real name is Almeda, is apparently famous for her direct approach to things, and is apparently not shy at all about asserting herself physically, thus earning her the moniker of “Allie Cat”. Known simply as Allie, she shares her apartment with her dog Sasha.
Frankie and the house
With his round, almost cherubic face and clear powder-blue eyes, Frankie looks to be somewhere in his late forties; he works for the village of Surfside. We think he’s in charge of maintenance for the whole village. Whatever his position is, he works the regular workweek, and at least several hours on Saturdays and Sundays. He spent a fair amount of his time throughout the two days we were there on the walkie-talkie with his co-workers, issuing instructions, checking in, and solving problems.
Frankie lives in the main apartment upstairs. It’s much bigger than Allie’s place, and has a nice view. The whole building is only three houses away from the beach, so the location is amazing, and the view from the upstairs porch is nice. No maintenance has been done in a while, and it shows.
Allie’s drains don’t drain properly, and after the hurricane somehow the hot water pipe got rerouted under her shower floor; it’s now so hot that she can’t take a shower without wearing shoes or she’ll burn her feet. The electrical is so out of whack that there are huge power surges frequently as a wall air-conditioning unit on one apartment or another kicks on or off. Lights will dim or brighten significantly every few minutes. The porch has a number of rotted and broken boards.
Though the bathroom is nice in Frankie’s place, and it’s quite clean, the kitchen is another story. We needed to cook there one night, and had to wash everything we used before we used it, as cockroaches were actively running around in the dishes.
With at least one extra room, Frankie always seems to have someone else living with him temporarily. While we were there he had a roommate named Beverly. She showed up after midnight Friday – she and a friend had closed the bar.
Rick is a self-avowed 45 yrs old but acts like he’s in his early twenties. He occupied the second upstairs apartment, right next to Frankie. Before the first evening was over, he’d invited us to stay in the bed in his place, rather than have to be down in our tent, but he warned us about the cockroaches. We declined and we never did go look at his apartment.
Roommate drama
It didn’t take long that first night to figure out that we had wandered into the middle of some kind of domestic drama among the housemates, centering around Rick. Whatever he had done, he’d done it royally, as Frankie and Allie could barely talk to him. When Beverly came home after midnight, she started in immediately on Rick.
Having had a few too many drinks, she wasn’t particularly articulate, but the strength of her emotion was very clear. She’d end each outburst with, “I’m a crazy bitch! Hell hath no fury like a crazy bitch!” We made our escape within a few minutes.
Sitting down in the tent we could still hear the commotion. From a distance it was much funnier than being right there. Finally Frankie tried to divert Beverly by telling her about the two “girls” that had arrived on bicycle and who were staying in the tent. She was so focused on her upset with Rick that she didn’t understand. “Whose girls are they? Are they your girls or his?” she kept asking.
When she finally understood what Frankie was telling her she said, “They’re probably down in the tent right now thinking, what the f*** did we get into? Welcome to Texas, baby!”
The days
The tent was so hot each morning that we had to be out by 7:30, and had to get all our things out of the tent except clothing. The first morning Allie met us at the tent door with a big smile and big mugs of coffee, but we clambered out to sit in beach chairs in front with her.
We spent Saturday and part of Sunday sitting in chairs out front to catch the breeze, having to adjourn inside for several hours in the heat of the day when there was no shade anywhere. We used Allie’s place to shower and used it for bathroom facilities and toothbrushing.
Meanwhile our trailers couldn’t be in the sun either, so we kept them under the porch. The upside was that they were in the shade. The downside was that they caught whatever fell through the broken slats of the porch, and they were under the air conditioning units, getting the frequent condensation drips from the units. We kept them tarped the whole time.
By Saturday night Allie talked us into a walk on the beach. People find it hard to believe that we wouldn’t want to go to the beach, but when we spend eight to ten hours a day cycling in the direct heat and sun, we aren’t in the slightest bit tempted to be out in the direct heat and sun for any other reason. We waited until almost sunset to take a walk; by then it was gorgeous. We had another gorgeous walk on Sunday morning.
John and his beach house
Frankie’s next-door neighbor John showed up late Saturday at his beach house. We’d been introduced, but didn’t spend any time with him until he invited us for breakfast on Sunday at his place, with Allie and Frankie. A homemade breakfast of eggs, toast, bacon and potatoes was far preferable to instant grits on the camp stove! Besides, the house was beautiful, with air conditioning and a beautiful view.
We talked more with John throughout the day. He wanted to go out in the Gulf on his boat, but everyone else was busy, so Chelsea and I were the only ones who finally went.
John’s got a rental house a few miles away where he keeps the boat, and from there we went out the local canal, across the IntraCoastal, to the Freeport Harbor and the Jetties. We had a great time on the boat; we spotted a number of frigate birds – I got to see one snatch a fish right from a seagull’s mouth – and we saw several schools of dolphins.
The waves in the Gulf were three to four foot swells, which got us totally soaked top to bottom. We were really rockin’ and rollin’. We loved the chance to be out on a boat, and we loved being so close to the dolphins.
On route, John suggested that we come to his house to stay for a few weeks to a month to finish our book. He said it’s a beautiful house in Angleton, on acreage. His wife had recently moved out, and he needed help with rearranging things. He also said that we could help him with two other rentals he’s got, possibly earning a cash commission on renting one of them for him in Lake Jackson. At the very least, he promised, we’d have a full refrigerator and all the food we could eat. It sounded good to us, though we felt hesitant about John.
We spent the night at his beach house in a great bed in air-conditioned comfort, and headed out with him on Monday morning to his home in Angleton.