I met Kei at Shady Pines sometime in 1995. She was an interesting Japanese woman, in her early 60s, who moved into the apartment across from mine. Kei was divorced and had relocated from Orange County, California. Before leaving, she sold a successful business and most of her possessions. She didn’t talk a lot about her family, but I was under the impression they were a little surprised by the move.

Kei took an interest in both KSND and me, thinking I was very “together” for my age, and we quickly became friends. While working overnights at the station, I had to stay in town Christmas weekend of 1995, and since she didn’t have any family around, she came over to my place to celebrate the holiday. I put up a tree, and we exchanged cards. It was fun.

Eventually, I moved from overnights and had a schedule more conducive to socializing. I had made a few friends closer to my age by then, but none of them got off work at 11:00 am and most had families, so I looked for other things to do. Kei was up for road trips, so we did a little traveling up and down the coast. I drove. She bought dinner. That was a good deal for a starving radio guy. She even introduced me to Japanese food at a little place called Yuzen Japanese Cuisine in the tiny coastal community of Seal Rock — not exactly a place one would expect to find such food!

My colleagues laughed themselves into a collective coma over jokes about this relationship. Kei became known as Mrs. Livingston — a reference to the old sitcom, The Courtship of Eddie’s Father. For the most part I ignored it, but the harassment was endless. That’s what happens when a 25-year-old somehow moves into a seniors-only housing community.

Despite the age difference, Kei was a good sounding board. She listened to my tales of dating disasters. There were many; it was a small town! She was encouraging but also realistic — sometimes a little too much. That was a bone of contention between us, but it was nice to have an adventurous neighbor who was young at heart and also wise.

What’s unfortunate is that this friendship eventually flew off the rails before I left the coast. Kei and I, like many friends, didn’t always get along. She had a temper! When something or someone bothered her, she got a scary look and lashed out. One day I ended up on the business end of her wrath.

I had recently gone through a difficult period in my life but felt like I had moved past it. By this time, I was doing a morning show at KSND. One day I came home after a show that went really well. Kei did not agree. She left a rather rude message on my answering machine, critiquing my performance and letting me know I was falling apart. She wasn’t home, so I left a message on her machine, making it clear I didn’t appreciate her unsolicited rant. If she had a problem with the show, she could talk to me face-to-face. There was a little irony there, and in retrospect, I wish I had ignored her message. I laid down to take nap. I heard her come home, though, and one minute later my phone rang. I let the machine get it, and she artistically belted a long, drawn out f-bomb  — encouraging me to do something uncharitable to myself. If Whitney Houston had sung in profanities, this is how it would have sounded.

I jumped out of bed and stomped across the hall. She answered the door with her eyes firing bullets. I apologized for being testy in my message, but she had none of it — slamming the door. Hmmm. I tried going back later, but she made it clear our friendship was over. Just like that. It disappointed me because friends have disagreements, but they should be able to work through problems. It got weirder though…

Months later I was talking with a Newport police officer who started dating a colleague of mine. We hadn’t met, but he knew of me. He was the officer on the call when Kei apparently contacted police to tell them I was listening to her thoughts through the electrical outlets. Their advice to her — neither helpful nor professional — was to cover the outlets with aluminum foil, which she did.

This incident, her anger, and the strange move she made to Newport made me realize there was a lot more going on with her. Compassion didn’t work though. She refused to have anything to do with me, regardless of gestures I made, so I stopped trying. Then one day, not too long before I left the coast, her family came from California to move her out of the apartment and presumably back home. The family smiled at me; she gave me one last look of death, and that was it. I never saw her again. We knew each other four years.

While this was a disappointing life experience, there were more to come in Newport. Quite a few life lessons were learned in the little coastal town. Some of them, though, were a lot more humorous. My dating disaster attempt with “Bank Girl” was one of those.

More to come in Part XII…