Helping Sonoma One Home at a Time – Duane Aslaksen
Duane’s Sonoma Journey
This is the third of three stories about Duane’s relationship with Sonoma.
🟩 I Visited Sonoma When It Felt Like the Middle of Nowhere – Chapter 1
🟨 I Found Sonoma Before the Crowds – Chapter 2
🟥 Helping Sonoma One Home at a Time (You are reading this story.)
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When my recording studio work began to slow down, I wasn’t looking for a new career. One conversation at the Sonoma dog park led to helping someone finish a backyard cottage. That project led to another, then another. Before long, I had become the handyman that neighbors recommended to friends. I never advertised. The work simply found me, and for years it gave me the opportunity to help people all over Sonoma, one home at a time.
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For many years my career revolved around recording studios. Building studios meant much more than working with sound. We were constantly renovating spaces, solving construction problems, and sometimes building entire facilities from the ground up. Along the way, I learned a wide range of practical construction skills.
As the recording industry changed, the studio work gradually began to slow down. There were more days when I wasn’t working, so I found myself spending more time in Sonoma.
Every morning I walked our little dog to the new dog park near the police station.
Like many Sonoma stories, this one began with a simple conversation.
One morning I met another dog owner who was frustrated with a project at their home. They were converting a storage shed into a small cottage, but the contractors weren’t showing up consistently, costs kept increasing, and the project had stalled.
I mentioned that I had experience with construction from years of building recording studios and offered to help.
That one conversation changed the direction of my life.
After I finished the cottage, that homeowner recommended me to someone else. Then another person needed help. Soon I was repairing rental properties, getting homes ready for new tenants, building small projects, and solving the everyday problems that homeowners inevitably face.
Without planning it, I had become Sonoma’s handyman.
The business grew entirely by word of mouth.
I never advertised. I never promoted myself. I simply tried to do good work, and people kept passing my name along.
Looking back, that’s one of the things I appreciate most about Sonoma.
Trust still matters.
Many of the people I worked for became much more than customers. They became friends. Some were longtime residents who simply needed someone dependable they could call. Others were older homeowners who could no longer handle repairs themselves. Every project was different, but every one was a chance to help someone stay comfortably in the home they loved.
What I enjoyed most wasn’t just fixing things.
It was getting to know the people behind each front door.
Every house had its own story. Every family had its own history. Over the years I came to know Sonoma one conversation, one repair, and one neighbor at a time.
When I first drove here from Marin, I never imagined that this would become part of my life.
I thought I had come because I fell in love with a woman.
Instead, Sonoma kept opening unexpected doors.
First music.
Then recording studios.
Then, through one conversation at a neighborhood dog park, an opportunity to serve the community in an entirely different way.
Sometimes helping build a town doesn’t mean constructing new buildings.
Sometimes it means helping the people who already live there take care of the homes that make the community what it is.
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Skills developed in one career can unexpectedly become valuable in another.
Trust and personal recommendations can build a successful business without advertising.
Helping neighbors maintain their homes is an important way of strengthening a community.
Some of the most meaningful contributions begin with a simple willingness to help.
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This story was created from a recorded conversation between Duane Aslaksen and Don Lundgren as part of Sonoma Stories. The story has been edited for clarity and length while preserving Duane’s experiences and observations.
