San Diego Way, originally uploaded by Here in Van Nuys.

In Carthay Circle, not far from Fairfax and Wilshire, I stumbled upon a neighborhood of old homes, gracious and traditional, smack up against glass skyscrapers.

Calm, clean, prosperous, and quiet, it represents one of those anomalies of life in Los Angeles, which people either find exhilarating or deadening, the idea that you can have a suburban house in the center of the city.

In a few years, a subway stop will exist only a block north of here, making this area even more convenient, and blessedly less car-dependant.