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I spent eight years in LA searching for my people — then found them under my nose

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There’s an entire industry devoted to selling community to Millennials and Gen Z: social clubs, friendship apps, curated dinners with strangers.

But perhaps the best place to find it is not another organized event, but the ordinary places where our lives already overlap.

I’ve lived in Los Angeles for nine years; it took me eight to figure this out.

It started three years ago, when I was looking for my first solo apartment and fell in love with a building. A Spanish Art Deco masterpiece built in 1927. He was just my type: older, handsome and haunted by an Old Hollywood past he couldn’t quite escape.

My building is steps from Hollywood Boulevard, where the street is a spectacle, the sidewalks are an obstacle course and the smells are best left unidentified. 

But it took me two years (such a fast learner) to see how special it was.

Early on, my neighbor Shawn introduced himself. A charismatic guy with a penchant for bold prints and Panama hats, he always said hello. I kept it to that because forgetting names is one of my special talents.

Two years later, I saw him at Trader Joe’s with another neighbor, Colin. I expected a wave or quick hello. Instead they greeted me like we were college students in the same dorm on the first day of classes. We walked home chatting.

After that, things were different.

I discovered that our courtyard, a little oasis of tables and a fountain tucked away from Hollywood’s commotion, was the center of a thriving social world.

I met Shawn’s wife Alicia. I met Joe and Glenna, the........

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