The Boy Next Door

When I was in fourth grade at Woodside Elementary, I was the shy new girl. My teacher’s name was Miss Cherry. The class size was small, around a dozen students. One of my classmates was also my neighbor from down the street, a boy named Tom Mogensen. One of two children, he came from an unusual family. His parents were considered racy for the times. His mom, a Swedish blonde bombshell, was rumored to sunbathe in the nude by their swimming pool and could often be seen riding in her convertible with the top down. His father, a well-regarded architect, was a dashing figure who went by his nickname of Mogie.

Tom was my frenemy back then. On schooldays when we made the long uphill climb from the school bus stop coming home from school, we’d swap insults as boys and girls will do. He’d yell, “Hey, what are those strings hanging from your skirt? Oh, it’s your legs!” I’d yell back, “Do you use weed killer on your hair?” I was a skinny kid. He had a head of thick, dirty-blond curls. Our teasing was good-natured, never mean or hurtful. I liked Tom and he liked me. But we’d die before either of us would admit it.

It was a dark day for Tom the one time Miss Cherry appointed me class mural monitor. Who knows why she did? Maybe she felt it should be someone else’s turn since the honor usually went to Tom. He was the most talented artist in our class by a mile. I was pretty good but not in Tom’s league. Years later when we were old enough so we could laugh about it, he remembered it as being a blow to his confidence the day he was usurped by me, if only for a brief time.

When we were both in high school we didn’t take the school bus home together every day, so we didn’t see as each other as often. We’d wave to each other in passing in the school hallways or in the neighborhood where we both lived. It wasn’t until we reconnected at a class reunion years later that we became friends. Our friendship became one of the touchstones of my life. We had so much in common. We were both artists—Tom had become an acclaimed fine artist and muralist; I’d become a published novelist. We were both well-traveled, both curious about the world and other cultures. We shared the same gallows humor. Whenever we talked we’d laugh until we cried describing awful stuff that had happened to us. We also had the shared experience of having come of age at the same time and in the same place during the sixties. We used to talk about our experiences growing up on our cul-de-sac, Roan Place, which from the stories he told sounded more like Peyton Place (there was a lot going on I was unaware of, apparently!) Our running joke was “It was something in the water.”

One year when we met at our class reunion, Tom and I and another classmate from WSE made the uphill climb from our school bus stop for old times’ sake. Along the way, we reminisced. When we got to the top of the hill, huffing and puffing, we agreed it was every bit the long-ass haul it had seemed to be when we were kids.

Tom lived on the West Coast and I’d relocated to the East Coast. Every other year or so he’d come to New York City to tour art museums and we’d get together for a meal, either the two of us or with our spouses. I saw him now and then during my trips to the San Francisco Bay Area to visit my family. We talked over the phone in between visits. Tom was one of those friends with whom you can pick up a conversation as if no time had passed since you last spoke with them, whether it had been days or months. I’d pick up the phone and hear him say, “It was something in the water” and we’d be off and running. We never ran out of things to talk about. We always made each other laugh.

I was proud of Tom’s achievements as an artist, one of which is the mural he painted that’s displayed at the San Francisco Giants’ clubhouse. Perhaps his greatest achievement came later in life when one of his paintings was chosen for an exhibit at the DeYoung Museum in San Francisco. When I got the news I congratulated him in an email. I wrote, “I crown you the King of Mural Monitors.”

Yesterday I got the sad news Tom had passed away. Some years ago he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s and his health had on the decline since. One of his final outings was to the DeYoung Museum to see his painting exhibited there. I’m so grateful Tom had that moment, the validation of knowing he had reached the pinnacle in his career as an artist even though he could no longer pain or even hold a paintbrush. The king of mural monitors. I imagine him now painting the skies in Heaven.

Rest in peace, my friend.