Silvering bard by the bay

San Francisco — IT started out as a gag, a literary riff on aging gays and lesbians who flock to retirement homes built just for them. Armistead Maupin toyed with the idea when he began writing "Tales of the City" back in the 1970s, and his imagination ran wild: No one would be allowed to wear golf clothes; Broadway sing-alongs were mandatory. With the right accessories, you could be 50 \o7and\f7 fabulous.

Thirty years later, those punch lines are giving way to plumb lines. And the dream that Maupin wrote about -- a nurturing seniors community in the Bay Area for people of all sexual persuasions -- is becoming a reality. This fall, the Barbary Lane Communities for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender seniors will open on Lake Merritt in Oakland. The fully renovated Art Deco building, taking its name from Maupin's fictional community set in San Francisco's Russian Hill, will offer 46 units renting for $3,295 to $4,295 per month. It is one of the first urban retirement communities catering to such a middle-income clientele -- and the only one known to draw its name from a series of bestselling books.

"I think I'd want to move in," said Maupin, 63, only half seriously. With nearly 4 million copies of his novels in print -- and a new book, "Michael Tolliver Lives," just out -- he can easily afford to grow old in his rustic Parnassus Heights home, high above San Francisco Bay. The handsome man with silver hair and a thick gray mustache is one of America's most successful, openly gay authors.

But at this stage of his life, Maupin is also haunted by questions of death, aging and community: How will other, less affluent gay and lesbian seniors find safe harbor in a culture that remains hostile to them? When they look for senior housing, will they be forced back into the closet they fled years ago? A growing awareness of these problems persuaded Maupin to give his blessing to backers of Barbary Lane Communities when they asked him two years ago for permission to use the name. And those same concerns color his new novel, which follows six previous installments of "Tales of the City."

In "Michael Tolliver Lives," the gay and straight characters who once crowded into the baths South of Market or gathered for "singles nights" at the Marina Safeway are now deep into their 50s. They've survived the scourge of AIDS but are frightened by the first rumblings of mortality. Although they talk a good game about sex, food and pop culture, their youth has vanished, like a cloud of fine Colombian.