"We don't live here because it's simple"

* * I haven't posted in ages! I could blame it on my trip to San Francisco, or on an advertisement I've been working like crazy to finalize, but it's possible it's also because I've become addicted to 'Friday Night Lights.' Don't tell. * *

I flew into San Francisco on Wednesday afternoon and had a pile of work to do. Unexpectedly, the ForestEthics office remodel is still underway, leaving me homeless and office-less in in SF, which felt kind of spooky.


I had packed super light and expected to take BART and MUNI over to Will's house on Bernal where I was staying, but he picked me up at the airport. 'We've got work to do!' he texted. Alas, no time to soak up the public transportation.

And he was right. There's was much to get done. The hot sun and the heavy jasmine scent made me want to go for a walk up Bernal hill and sniff all the flowers and the richness, but I buckled down. By five o'clock in the evening, it was time to take the bus across town to meet up with Matt over in the Haight. Falling into the classic SF tourist trap, I trusted the heat of the day and left without a sweater or a scarf or anything — a bold move that was rewarded with no retribution by the fog. It stayed warm all night, a complete rarity. If you haven't lived in San Francisco, you can't even imagine how serious I am when I say that. Warm evenings are recalled and discussed like sightings of exotic birds — people remember where they were when they happened.

So Will, Matt and I indulged in a long dinner at Nopalito while chatting about the mural we're commissioning for the side of our building at Haight and Market streets. We're fantasizing that we'll get the guy who did the seal mural below to do one for us, but he might be busy: he's got work in museums in LA, Sao Paulo and Amsterdam. Still, we're holding out hope that he's a secret treehugger.




Meanwhile, aside from seeing friends and colleagues, what I've been most excited about returning to SF to do is eat. I find myself daydreaming about Bay area fruit and vegetables and ethic food and boutique deliciousness. Our dinner at Nopalito scratched the itch: melon gaspacho, some crazy avocado squid tapa, and ceviche. It was so colorful and beautifully presented that I felt compelled to document:.

Once we'd discussed the mural from every angle and hit all the other critical issues of the day — vacations, books, love, fashion, whales — we walked a ways over to Cafe Noe, aka Stephen's house. There, we sat outside on the sidewalk, chatted with passers-by, and sipped on some seriously delicious grapefruit martinis.

We called it quits late into the evening and decided to walk home through the Castro and the Mission and up to Bernal. Walking is one of my favorite things to do in SF, and to get to do it on a balmy night, to take in all the lights and the smells and the happy people falling out into the streets to celebrate the strangely, delightfully warm night, was such a treat.




We ran across this cowboy graffiti in the Castro:

I've been thinking that some of the cowboys out in Montana are the accidental stuff of some Castro fantasies, and it seems I might be right. 

Here are few other shots from our walkabout:

Dolores Park, which is where I met Chris and therefore one of my favorite places ever.

Will's friend took over a parking spot on Valencia and created a 'parklet' with a succulent dinosaur in the middle.

This is right next to the seal mural. I love the colors.

What I'm most struck as I re-enter San Francisco is the constant noise of the city, the constant but low-level assault of the freeway sounds and the buses and sirens. It's so loud here - I get the 'hum of the city' thing much more now. And I'm also amazed by the variety of the smells - all the flowers, and all the humanity, from the nasty stink of pee in the gutter to the perfume of the person passing by to the occasional herbal odor from someone's goofy cigarette. There's just so much going on. I never really noticed before and now, I'm stunned by it all.


Weary from a long productive day and a serious walk, we were a block or two away from Will's house when we passed by a mother and her two young young children digging through the recycling for bottles and cans they could salvage for the recycling rebate. It was so late, and the kids were so tiny.

Moments before, we'd been walking by happy people delighting in fancy $13 drinks.

My ache for that mother mixed with exhaustion from the day's adventure and happiness at seeing my dear colleagues/friends.

'We don't live here because it's simple,' said Darcy of Heartfelt once in an email. 'We live here because it's worth it.'