Itis a gloriously beautiful mid-October day, and my wife and I are backin California after nine long months away. Back in California in abrand-new house in a mind-boggling brand-new community developed just afew minutes from Monterey.

The house is so new the curtains are not even hung yet, so I wake upjet-lagged at 5:00 in the morning and the room is bathed in light. Walkover to the window and look out over the 7th-hole green. It is, ofcourse, deserted at this hour and I have the scene all to myself --which seems an almost obscene extravagance.

So I throw on a bathrobe, find some flip-flops, and wander outside.Even though smoking has been banned in my house and throughout the restof the state, I am out in this no man's land enjoying a wake-upcigarette. Of course, this is not really a no man's land. It is thePasadera Country Club development. And I am here because I sold myhouse at Pebble Beach, paid off the mortgage, paid the state andFederal taxes -- 28% when you add everything up -- and then used therest of the money to buy a piece of the Pasadera dream.

This 18-hole course designed by Jack Nicklaus sprawls over aspacious 900,000 tsubo (approx. 300-hectare) site. Here and there, thelandscape is dotted with white-stucco houses with distinctive red tileroofs. It is breath-takingly expansive -- a very American scene.Although it has just been opened, Pasadera is well on its way tobecoming a must-see, must-play California destination. As one of thelocal papers headlined: "Jack Nicklaus Brought His Vision to Pasadera.Now It's Your Turn."

Your turn? My turn. Maybe. But even if not, it is good to be backand to see the vast changes that are underway here at the turn of thecentury. Everybody is talking about change, a new day, moving around,improvements and upgrades, discrimination, segmentation, selectivity,and more. I hear the cynics dismissing this as "another in a long runof bubbles," but that utterly fails to understand or describe thesituation. There is a tremendous dynamism of change here and everyone-- all 250 million of them -- is caught up in it. Never has it beentruer that there is nothing permanent except change. Indeed theconstancy of change is a major defining feature of this young society.

Within that, one of the things that stuck me about Pasadera is thatthere is no imposing gate or even any billboard announcing this newresort. Likewise, there are no yardage signs or even tee-off markers onthe course. When I asked about this -- don't you think that's awfullyconfusing for guests and other first-timers? -- I was told, "We are notcatering to one-off players. This is a limited-membership community anda limited-membership club. Our members know what they are doing, and wedo not need a lot of signage."

Perhaps it is because of the greater concern with personal safety,but change and segmentation seem to be pushing in the same direction.America has traditionally been a very open, friendly, and welcomingsociety. But now we have restricted-membership gated communities. Wehave people wanting to limit their encounters in the interests ofsecurity. Indeed, it may well be that this represents a yearning forlife in the walled cities of Europe.

Finally, I would be remiss were I not to share a new term that Ipicked up during my stay: high-profile and low-profile. People nowspeak about moving from high to low profiles -- moving from theconspicuous consumption that characterized so much of America'sconsumer society to a more low-profile inconspicuous consumption withgreater emphasis on non-material aspects. This too is one of the manychanges taking place here. Change is everywhere, and it may well bethat the only people in the whole country not eagerly embracing changeare these two old and old-fashioned Japanese in Pasadera.

Author's afterword: This essay was written many years beforeBarack Obama rode change to the White House, yet I hope it is still ofsome interest.