Nightglow Window

My Commute

I used to have a 120-mile commute -- from La Jolla to Laguna Beach. It sucked. I don't know how many dinners I had behind the wheel or how many hours I passed listening to NPR during those two years.

So I can appreciate the twenty-mile commute I have now -- especially since I take the long way to work and hug the coastline.

Every day, as I check the surf, I pass by a rather rundown, shabby looking house that millions of people from around the world have seen.

It's the Top Gun house, where Maverick (Tom Cruise) and Charlie (Kelly McGinnis) hooked up in that iconic 80s flick.

I'm not a movie fan boy and I'm beginning to loathe Mr. Cruise, but I still think of the Jerry Bruckheilmer film everytime I pass by -- which is usually, well, ten times a week.

According to the Save Our Heritage Foundation, "It was built in 1887 by Dr. Graves as a vacation home in the newly founded community of Oceanside. As one of the fanciest ocean front Victorian cottages in San Diego County it is now the “last best” existing such house in San Diego County. It is also the best representative of the origins of the city of Oceanside and the development of the town as a vacation and tourist destination that continues today with the new resort planned at this location."

With a new 305-room resort going in across the street from the Oceanside Pier, the fate of the Top Gun house was in doubt. But it now looks like it will be preserved and rennovated, which is pretty cool. Not because it's where Maverick shagged Charlie, but because it's a slice of California beach culture that should be preserved.


The Graves house as seen in Top Gun.


What the Top Gun house looked like this morning.


Cruise and McGinnis In O-side (1983) Photo SD Historical Society


The Graves House