The sign is still there at the Calaveras entrance where Hill Street goes down past the golf course, still green, which you can see through the chain link fence that used to be covered with vines of trumpet flowers, clematis, and wisteria.

Every year the Country Club sponsored and hosted an Open House. It was designed to expand ties with the neighborhood, and to recruit more members.

The Open House was free to the public (us), paid for by the hoard of money accrued from membership fees, approved by the Board of Directors.

We went, several times, more than once. Free food! Free drinks!

This was a chance to see how the upper class lived. To save up enough to join. A neighbor up the street was a member. She recommended it. She could afford it.

There was free valet parking, tips accepted, but we lived so close, just around the corner, that we walked over and nodded to the parking attendants.

We climbed the stairs, signed in, name, address, phone number. That was enough information to check our bank account.

Everyone was friendly, welcoming. They made us feel like we belonged.

The upper ballroom with the windows overlooking the golf course, the tennis courts, the pool, and a view of the mountains.

Tables were set up with displays, brochures, and helpful people who would explain the opportunities and advantages. One table could plan your wedding, a catered affair. They would take care of everything. Hiring the band, the photographer, the microphone and sound system, the food, the drink, the rose petals or confetti, your choice, to throw in a shower at the bride and groom as they escaped to their waiting car they would drive to the hotel for their wedding night inaugurating their honeymoon. The car was already festooned with ribbons and ropes of trailing cans and signs proclaiming, “Just Married.”

The wedding planners had already reserved the hotel room for the night of bliss, which included champagne and chocolate wafers on the pillows. They thought of everything.

They had directories for us to peruse, lists of services available if the newlyweds were planning to take up residence in the community. Business cards, sometimes competing, for all the enterprises who had paid for the privilege and opportunity for representation.

Dueling photographers, should the couple choose a favorite to replace the photographer included in the package. The opportunity to hear the bands for live music. The choice of ministers to perform the ceremony.

And caterers. Tables set up with samples of food they could provide for any event, not just weddings. They would do conventions, back-yard parties, extravagant quincenieras, whatever you wanted or had going.

Shirley and I went from table to table, display to display, trying everything. They promoted their products without being pushy, and you wanted to choose them until you tried the next one.

You could take your filled plate to a table on the lower level, then go to the bar set up for free mimosas and a range of free drinks, some carbonated, including tea and coffee, Arnold Palmers, and sparkling champagne.

On the other side of the room, bar attendants would prepare or shake up a special drink with higher alcohol content, for a separate fee, not included in the free Open House, but letting you know what it was like to be a Member of the Country Club.

We met our neighbor, sitting with her Member friends. She came to our table, and we toasted drinks. “You should join,” she said, but we already knew the price, a Membership fee, with an annual renewal.

Then we looked over the rest of the facilities, the gym with exercise machines, the sauna and steam room, the pro-shop where you could buy athletic attire like tennis shorts, and rent a racket to use on the tennis courts where they would match you with players at your level, and a tennis coach if so desired or needed. The courts were regulation size where they hosted actual tournaments. There were lights so you could play at night after dark, and Members did. You could see the lights through the bushes as you drove by on Mendocino Street past the adjacent golf course.

The swimming pool was just before the tennis courts, overlooking the edge of the golf course. Children attired in swimwear were frolicking in the water. We assumed they were related to family Members and were probably paid to show what it was like to belong to the Country Club.

The day was exhausting but not tiring. We were encouraged to spend as long as we wanted, to sit on the balcony, feel the satisfaction of Membership in the Upper Class, the quality of the Good Life, as we looked over the rest of the world on the lower level of the street beneath us.

Toward evening, the Open House drifted to a close, and those who remained were already Members. We were conditioned to feel envy, and if we signed on as New Members, we could stay on into the evening.

One of the best parts of the whole experience, I should have mentioned it before, was at the very entrance after you signed in. There was a harpist with a big harp, filling the air with the welcoming quality of real music.

Instead of just rushing on to the displays and food, Shirley and I stayed as an audience of two. The harpist, a lovely young woman, nodded in acknowledgement, and played directly to us. She took a break and talked with us, very friendly.

She was a Russian harpist in the diaspora and periodically returned to the Mother Country to visit friends and family and perform internationally.

We talked Russian music and harp, repertoire like Britten’s Ceremony of Carols, underlined with harp, a continuity through one of the glories of modern music. And, of course, Harpo Marx, and the Cobb Estate at the top of Lake Avenue, once owned by the Marx Brothers in days gone by. This verified and established our credentials of music listening, and we conversed at a high level.

She was as good as any musician in any orchestra. Like so many musicians, she had to cobble together bits and pieces of a career, performing wherever she could to put together a livelihood. She entertains every Tuesday at lunch in the restaurant on Green Street, and we were welcome to see and hear her there.

We bemoaned the state of the international world, the fact that music, especially classical music, unifies the world and breaks barriers. If only more people listened to classical music, there would be peace in the world. Our harpist new friend, I wish I could remember her name, was like the advance guard of a charge for peace. I may have mentioned that I am a Charter Member of Poets for Peace. We left a tip as contribution.

We always wanted to go hear her at lunch on Green Street, but somehow never managed to schedule a visit. That was many years ago. I wonder if she’s still there. I should stop by on Tuesday for lunch.

The Country Club held its Open House every year, and we went back.

The Eaton fire destroyed the whole building, though the tennis courts survived and are still in use.

They may rebuild. If there are enough Members and future Members who can afford to rebuild their own homes and have the money to join, the juggled statistics may say yes.

I lost Shirley three years before the fire, so, walking through the desolation of the vanished former neighborhood, my hands and arms close on empty air.