John & Tom: From Brooklyn To Portland, Here They Come!

It's not often a New Yorker uses a phrase like "my beloved neighbors," but that's what John and Tom have become over the years in my Brooklyn Heights apartment building. John and I served together on our coop board for years, and rolled our eyes in unison more than once, while Tom showed his great intellectual compass as a regular visitor to The Smoking Nun.

I've spent evenings over drinks giggling and gossiping with the guys and even hid in their apartment once to escape my own party that I was just not feeling, two floors below. We've taken care of each other's dogs, shared afternoons at our building sidewalk sales and just been really good neighbors and friends.

And now, I bid them farewell, as the couple heads west—perhaps to escape the earthquake-trodden Northeast?—all the way to Portland, Ore. While their belongings are being packed as I write, they will spend the next several days driving the 2,908 miles cross country.

John and Tom... Packed and ready to go!

And it really couldn't be easier: Just take the Holland Tunnel to I-80, a slight right to I-84 in Utah, merge onto to Morrison Bridge in Salem, Ore., and a left on 6th Street... done!

They had the great and rare fortune of selling their fourth-floor apartment—which has a golden view of the Brooklyn Heights Promenade—in less than one week. Can you imagine... in 2011? That has much to do with John's impeccable taste; he pretty much gutted the joint and designed it from the sub-floors up. It's a true beauty.

John & Tom will spend the next several months renting an apartment to get a feel for just the right Portland neighborhood before they apply their Brooklyn investment to new digs. I can only imagine how much farther a dollar will go in the Pacific Northwest... In fact, I have pics below of their current digs, alongside the entrance hall to their new apartment... quite a difference, huh?
Godspeed, guys. You will be missed!