Time ebbs and flows through the eras of our life without our consent. It would seem that life slips into a new era without us even realizing it, and we become spectators, tourists even, in our own plot. Driven by external forces rather than sitting at the controls.

This is where I have found myself in the first half of 2017. This is why I wanted to escape, even for just a weekend. My close friends Nick and Fiona, and the state of California were happy to oblige.

Why is this visit so impactful? Obviously, I wanted to see my best friends, and obviously I wanted to experience the city. But, at a deeper level, it seemed vital that I take the trip. Maybe that was putting too much stock into something as minimal as a weekend trip, but to me the trip was a breath of fresh air, a lifeline, a chance to connect with the people and things in my life that are really important again.

Some context: 2017 has been a nightmare since the start. I have been spread thin, cut lean by the ravages of 60 and 70 hour work weeks, a turbulent personal life, and a general feeling of disconnect. Sleep has been hit and miss, relaxation almost nonexistent. I’ve too often felt like a visitor in my own life, work and personal time becoming harder and harder to separate. And when I did get moments to myself they were either so filled with stress that I drank a little too heavy, or they were pure exhaustion and I would crash, dead to the world. I have been disengaged from the things that actually drive life forward, only occasionally feeling like a functional part of it, but never really living it.

This was no way to operate; like a flag in the breeze. So I set out to see familiar people in an unfamiliar place, to try to locate and hit the reset button.

I was looking forward to getting to San Francisco to unplug. As I told Nick when I got there, I have felt only tangentially tethered to anything important in life this year. The only prism through which I have evaluated anything is work, which has not been healthy. I think the purest and saddest manifestation of this 2017 reality I put myself in is this: Prior to San Francisco, I can recall precious few times I had one of those deep, perspective altering, totally immersive conversations that completely grab your attention and refuse to let it go. Everything has been surface level, small talk, banality in 2017, and I have existed in a space that is beyond strung out. I missed those stay-up-late, holy-shit-what-time-is-it conversations with smart people who have different perspectives on the world. The kind that not just make you think, but change the way you think. The kind I used to have with Nick, Sam, Taylor, Nic, and all the rest. Lifeblood, as it were.

Going to San Francisco was a return to the real world, a mental stimulant, a lifeline back to what is important and exactly what I needed. Is it sad that I had to leave my life to feel like a participant in it again? I am not sure the answer matters all that much. Just seeing Nick and Fiona, having the time to sit and talk with them about whatever subject arose was rejuvenation and catharsis in the same moment. Just having someone actively interested in what I had to say, and more important, why I wanted to say it was a gift. Not once during my entire visit did I wish I was someplace else. Not once during my stay did I feel mentally fatigued, bored, or let down, strung out, stressed, or otherwise disconnected. Not once did I feel like I was any other place than where I should have been.

The trip was everything that was missing, and I hope Nick and Fiona know how much it meant (and still means) to me.

Below I have some notes about the trip, broken up with some other external thoughts that came to me while I was there. The record of the trip is set in first person and in the present tense, the other thoughts in the past tense.

Day One

Initial Thoughts

Nick swung around the corner of the airport pickup, his full boyish grin matching mine. He was as excited about me coming out here to San Francisco as I was; a brotherly reunion, a chance for him to show me this new city, a return to the old days of just hanging around, talking, drinking and having fun. Absolute perfection.

Hugs, conversation, plans, all happened as we packed up my stuff and drove toward the city.

Nick was playing his agenda for the weekend close to the chest, he relished the secrecy of it, the fact that every item he chose for us to do was something new to me, and he wanted to preserve that “discovery” moment for each new endeavor, and let me experience it as he did — fresh and new.

In a theme that stayed true for the entire visit, Nick and Fiona would only tell me very small details about our plans so that I had enough information to dress appropriately. In practice, it meant that every new activity, destination, or day trip was completely new and foreign to me.

Thought Experiments at Battery Townsley and Hill 88

After breakfast we grab some water and head off across the Golden Gate Bridge (of course) and out of the city. Along the way Nick points out old neighborhoods, the history of different parts of the city — The Castro, Haight-Ashbury, The Mission, The Presidio — they all whip by in a blur, they all look exciting and new and unique and I wish we could stop at all of them.

Nick’s first adventure for me is at an old army encampment called Fort Cronkhite and the surrounding areas. It’s a beautiful scene, hills and scrub and cliffs set against the sea, just on the north side of the Golden Gate and then westward until the waves start crashing against the rock. Here there are old barracks of the WWII era, there are surfers in wet suits to brace against the cold, there are children on field trips, and there is us.

We hike to old bunkers and batteries that face out over the cliffs and toward the ocean, created for coastal defense against Japanese invasion and impressive in a military machismo sort of way. Massive, 1 million pound guns pointed at the sea, ready to slaughter any and all ships that dared to appear on the horizon, never actually used outside of practice, are one of the main attractions, and the concrete bunkers that housed them are daunting. Dotted along the hills as we climb and climb are other abandoned bunkers for machine guns and munitions, and we happily deviate from the trail to explore them. Graffiti is plastered across nearly every surface available, trash and nature in equal measure strewn across the floors. We climb down the ladders from the top of the bunkers and marvel at the idea that they were designed to kill nameless intruders and think at length and out loud about alternate histories where they would have been used.

My favorite part of the hike is a bunker that has slipped in a landslide off of it’s foundation down several yards before stopping. It is off plane and tilted down the mountain, with a mighty rusted blast shield that had long since crashed down and over the window with permanence. We scramble across the hillside, as there was no trail to it, feeling like we have discovered something few others have seen. It feels slightly unsafe as this building is clearly not anchored to anything amidst the shifting land, but we enter the broken, cracked doorway anyway. The vertigo of the floor being on a severe tilt, and the fact that it is still largely intact compared to the other more trafficked bunkers is an eerie combination. There are still ceiling tiles and wooden walls constructed along the back of the bunker, somehow still together after nearly 80 years and who knows how many people. In the front room, under the massive steel blast shield that has closed itself years before, we find a single, central ladder to the top and outside. This titled, janky bunker is one of the highlights of the trip, and Nick and I spend a lot of time talking about how interesting it is once we are back on solid ground.

The ghost town of Hill 88

We press up the ridge line following the trail to an installation surrounded by chain link fence; an old Nike Missile Radar Station called Hill 88. During the Cold War there were long range missiles pointed out over the sea here. The Nike Missile system was set up to shoot down any Russian nukes, and they were stationed along the coast here, barely outside the city. Nick and I climb up on the old concrete radar bastions and survey the area. It has a breathtaking view, and the ghost town of empty buildings and abandoned helicopter pads is haunting, to say the least.

Not a bad start to the trip.

Everything is better with a little Fernet (even a million dollar view)

Nick and I venture back to town and start getting pretty hungry. Fiona is waiting for us, and we decide to go out and snag burritos. When we get back from lunch at El Farolito (according to some, a top 10 burrito spot in the US — I may count myself among that group now), we make our way up to the rooftop of the building Nick and Fiona live in, which has a truly breathtaking view of the city. Ugh, the jealously I have for their living situation is intense, to say the least. We crack open beers, set up some chairs, and enjoy the view. Eventually Fiona joins us with a bottle of the stunning Fernet Francisco, something I have been looking forward to trying for a long time. We sit for hours, burning in the sun, and drink the whole bottle. Life, the view, the head buzz, the friendships — beautiful.

Love comes and goes at Club Deluxe

True beauty lands right in front of me in the form of a Jazz singer that night. It could be the alcohol, but I seriously doubt it. She is tall, slender, older and carried herself with amazing grace and sensuality, and I wasn’t the only one who fell for her that night. Fiona was just as drawn to her, and we have an ongoing conversation about just how lovely the singer was throughout the night. At least for a moment, I am in love and I am alive again.

Parting Thoughts

It’s as if Nick and Fiona knew exactly what has been missing from my life when they took me to the roof of their apartment on that first day in the city. To sit, imbibe, indulge and download was as great a gift as they could have given me. We had actual, substantive, directionless and deep conversation for hours. It was more than stimulating, it was as though life was coming back to me again, or at least the meaning of life, which is the same thing; the point of life is to live it.

I hadn’t had conversations like this in some time, just bottled up in my own head, turned over, unspooled, and frayed out. I felt myself coming back to the light, my soul opening up to new and exciting ideas, different perspectives, an appreciation of their new life, new experiences, and how far they have come. It was thought outside my very immediate situation and day to day chaos, and it hit me like a breath of fresh air when you’ve been underwater for too long. We were drinking, yes, but I felt more intoxicated by the conversation than the depressants, to be honest. If I could have stayed on that roof for the rest of my life, I would have done so. It was a perfect moment, and I wasd sad when it had to end.

Day Two

Initial Thoughts

I like the idea of a park being called a park. Not in any sort of etymological sense, though I am sure you could deconstruct it that way. No, I just like word. You go to a park, you stop, you sit, you ponder, you run, you play sports, you exercise, you read, or relax. You park the rest of your life on the edges of the park and do something else for a while. No chores, no offices, no stop lights, just green and fresh and nice.

I like that you park your life, paused, even if only for a moment, and you go into the park to shoot hoops or sit and read or watch your kids play. There is a lovely symmetry to it. Who knows, maybe I am overthinking it, but that’s ok too, because in the park you can have time to just sit and think if you want to.

This trip feels like a visit to a great, urbanscaped park. I parked my car at the airport in Utah and parked the rest of my life with it, left town, got away, got time to think, breathe, be, exist.

A Walk in the Parks

We embark on a walking tour of some of the best parks in the city, and cover over 5 miles, countless hills, and even more splendid views of the bay, the city, the neighborhoods, the houses.

We start with some breakfast at their apartment and hit up a local coffee shop for some caffeine to cut through the hangover — a local spot call Verve, which easily lives up to the San Francisco reputation for coffee excellence. Then it is off to Deboce Park, a small, nearly pocket park for dogs, and we sit in the coming and going sun amidst the clouds and take in the scene. Dogs just collect from every direction, scramble, play, and run indistinguishable from each other, and the coffee sinks in. It feels good to sit and recalibrate. The three of us occupy a bench at the top of the park, petting the occasional doggo who wanders our way, and jump from topic to topic. Life is easy when it is dogs and coffee and sunshine. 

When the caffeine sets in and we feel like we are no longer suffering at the hands of last night we move on to Alamo Square, newly reopened, and famous for the row of “Full House” houses. Despite the hype, I immediately see why this park is so popular. It sits on an angle atop a hill, with a perfect view across the downtown. The view gives way to a thought:

The city itself sits in place, but the hills and angles and perspectives of San Francisco all let you consume it in a variety of different ways. Change your location and look at the same thing from an altered view. What does this say about how humans go through the world?

By the time such thoughts impress themselves into my brain, we are off to the next park and the next and the next.

The views from Buena Vista Park are some of the best in the city

We stop for a BBQ lunch and a local beer (ah, the local brews!) and it’s off to the next park: Buena Vista, home of the Summer of Love, headstones recycled into park paths, overrun trees, so many stairs, and wild growing plants. It’s a forest that exists right in the middle of the city, and the steps up and up and up the hill are exhausting. It’s getting hot now, in the afternoon, and the lunch and beer are slowing me down, but the hills seem to be no problem for Nick and Fiona — they are SF locals now, their calves attuned to the elevation gains and drops. They seem right at home. No matter, the view of the bay, the Golden Gate, the city (yet another angle shift) are pristine and totally worth the effort.

Then its downhill, uphill again, around the corner and up the rocks to Corona Park, and perhaps the best view of the day. I try to take it all in, appreciate the tour, the view, the city. It’s a lot to process, which, I realize, is the story of the city itself. There is so much going on at any given time, there is no way to ensure you experience it all. You have to take the experiences as they come and enjoy them for what they are. 

We make our way back to the apartment on foot, dress for the suddenly hot weather, grab some beers and head to Dolores Park, just like the rest of the city. Thousands of San Franciscans are out with us, the park is packed with people from every walk of life — parents with kids on the swings, stoners, millennials day drinking, burned out hippies selling drugs, a man selling coconuts that he hacks open and fills with rum, even someone selling LSD, and everyone in between. We drink our beers, we indulge and buy some of those hacked open coconuts with the rum, we burn in the sun and revel in the fact that we have nothing to do and nowhere to be and have slight buzzes going on.

Who would want to be anywhere else, anyway?

Dolores Park is a dream, a sunny, bright, eccentric dream that I am supremely jealous of when I realize Nick and Fiona get to walk here whenever they want. Smiles, sunshine, beer, laughs. 

Hazy nights, hefty headaches

The night is a haze of food and drinks and laughs. We meet up with Fiona’s friend Jackie who has just moved to San Francisco from Salt Lake and has a SLC friend visiting as well. We make a funny group of SLC transplants and visitors, and the night is a boozy affair.

We venture from the lovely, exquisite Wild Hawk (complete with exceptional cocktails, flirty male bartenders and Chartreuse shots) to the Latin American Social Club for the strongest margarita of my life. The alcohol is really setting in, I am a mess on the shuffle board table in the next bar, Doc’s Clock, and pose for perhaps the greatest photo of my life (which can’t be shown in the public version of this story…).

Midnight pizza, a long, hiccup filled walk home, and I pass out on the couch after another perfect day. San Francisco is getting the best of me, perhaps because she is giving me the best of herself as well.

Parting Thoughts

It’s a beautiful thing, seeing and staying with friends that I have known for so long. We pick up right where we left off, as if we still see each other on a daily basis. There is so much history, so much knowledge about who we all are, so much love, that we get to experience conversation with a beautiful cadence that new friendships can’t match. Equal parts reminiscing about the past — laughs and heartache and events long gone — and in depth conversations and the present and future. The conversations are rich, deep, and wholly unpredictable, there is just so much material we can delve into.

The depth of the friendship unlocks an interaction that seems unique to the people involved. There is a comfort level there, an understanding built over years and years of confessions, failures, laughs, adventures and the simplest of all ingredients: time.

That safety, that lack of insecurity, the ability to let your guard down and just be exactly yourself exists rarely in life anymore. But being there with Nick and Fiona, who I have known for years, there is no fear. I can just be myself, they can do the same, and there is nothing we have to prove to each other.

Day 3

Initial Thoughts

When Nick and I lived together it was this really interesting and wonderful combination of two people who seemed to just know how to coexist. Both being individuals who value our private space and time alone to work on various projects, we found it very easy to both be home, but still on our own without bothering each other.

This domestic interaction was definitely part of why we got along so well as roommates for 3 years. But, really only small part of it, I think. Yes, that was important, for sure, but Nick and I both just like spending time with each other as well. We actively liked living with each other, actively liked talking to each other, hanging out aimlessly, getting brunch on the weekends, being parts of each others lives.

I do miss that.

But on the third day of the trip, Nick and I had an evening back at the apartment that was a total flashback to our days as roommates. Fiona had gone to bed early, the alcohol mixture took its toll, and Nick and I were left on the rooftop, drunk and watching clouds roll over the evening lights of the city. We filled the time with conversation until the chill got the better of us, and we had run out of drinks.

We ventured downstairs. But, sensing that we had some time to just hang out, the two of us, we stayed up even later. We watched nature videos on youtube (an old drunken standby of ours), we turned on the most recent episode of Silicon Valley, we watched some Colbert. In short, we did everything we always did when we would have a night to chill and nothing to do the next day.

It’s a relieving feeling to just be able to spend time with a long time friend and have no pressure to do anything, to fill silences, come up with something new to say. Nick and I both understand that there doesn’t have to be some agenda, we are both comfortable enough to just be, and that is a really subtle, but really important part of the friendship. Coexisting with Nick was and is easy, and it was nice to just have things be easy and pressure free, even if only for a moment in this otherwise cluster fuck of a year.

Best Laid Plans

We set out to venture across town to a breakfast joint, but hit a bit of a cultural roadblock. Quite literally, in fact: Carnival had descended on The Mission, complete with shut down streets, music, noise, parades, and a whole host of celebrations. Realizing that breakfast in that area of town was pretty much a no go, we set out to the Noe Valley instead.

The contrast from The Mission to Noe Valley is extreme, and it is hard not to think about the vast amount of gentrification here. The Mission is alive, sometimes grimy, but authentic, and largely influenced by Latin American culture. Noe Valley is, in a word, white. Gentrified, filled with white families driving upscale SUVs and hip shops with minimalist furniture or high end alcohols.

That said, the breakfast is excellent, the coffee helps to bring me back to life, and Nick, Fiona and I talk about our next plans. It could be worse. But the contrast is stark.


Imitation is the Whitest form of Flattery

We decide that the chance to see Carnival is too much to pass up, and head back down to The Mission on foot. The transition from gentrified to a cultural neighborhood happens slowly and naturally, and then all at once. You don’t notice it block to block, and then you find yourself in a completely different world within San Francisco, and it is beautiful.

The entire city seems to be out for Carnival, the parade, the music, the drums beating in rhythm until you walk past the next group, playing to their own beat. The cacophony is a lot to take in, which is probably the point, the more that I think about it. Each of these cultures, though related, have wonderful distinctions, and they display those with much deserved pride. The Mission is alive and vibrant. Noe Valley is just plain white.

The street is wide open to pedestrians, and we take the rare opportunity to walk right down the middle of the Mission and get a great scope of everything and the thousands that have turned out. It’s really something to see, and it is very much something that is absent from Salt Lake. Sure, there are cultural celebrations and such, but not like this, and on the whole they are small pocketed things, not city stopping affairs.

After a long walk down the middle of the Mission, we take a left turn into Clarion Alley, a local graffiti street that, as Nick described it, “illustrates the political pulse of the city”, and it’s immediately clear what he means. Both sides of the alley are lined, wall to wall, with full scale graffiti murals that are almost all political in nature. Rage against rising rents, tech bros, gentrification, Trump, white theft of culture — they are all on full display, loudly, in beautiful color, and confident voices.

Once we finish up and Carnival starts winding down, we tread back to the apartment, order up some burritos for the rooftop, and take a well deserved break for just about the first time all weekend. It gives me some time to collect some thoughts, write some of this down, and relax.


Tonight’s Agenda: Themed Food and Drinks

Once we are rested and recovered we wash up and get ready to go out for more drinks and some dinner.

Nick and Fiona take me to an area of town called Hayes Valley, which is admittedly pretty swanky, despite being right smack in the middle of some less reputable neighborhoods. Turns out the cocktail bar we were going to hit up is closed on Sundays, but their Plan B is an upscale cocktail bar called Absinthe, a name that is well earned.

Dark, wonderfully stocked, and authentically retro, Absinthe provides just the boozy pick me up that we all need (the long, alcohol fueled weekend is starting to take its toll on us physically). Phew, an Absinthe based cocktail starts things up for us again, and it is off to dinner.

There is a door on the corner of a white building in Hayes Valley that is unassuming and plain and we walk right up to it. I pull the heavy wooden door open wide only to see a strange knapsack curtain hanging in the doorway with a cut up the middle to let people through. Nick tells me to press forward, which I do, not knowing what we are going to find.

What is behind the knapsack curtain is this: an authentic German style tap house called Suppenkuche, complete with bench style seating where you end up dining with people you have never met before when they seat multiple random parties at the same table.

The food: hearty and delicious in a heavy meat and potatoes kind of way. It was exactly what it should have been.

The beer: exceptional. We have little idea what we are ordering, trusting the server to give us some recommendations, which turns out to be a great idea. The best part, though? They serve in liter measurements, everything from .5 liters all the way up to a 2 liter boot, or even a 5 liter stein. Nick and Fiona split the boot, I get a liter to start, and we try to drink as though we suddenly found ourselves in Germany (which is to say we had a few rounds…)

“Wir lieben enorme biere!” — Nick

After dinner and a lot of beer, we stumble out of Suppenkuche, and despite it still being light out, we are pretty drunk already. No matter. We make our way around the neighborhood in search of our next stop. True to form, Nick and Fiona have said nothing about what to expect, and I know better than to ask about it, for risk of spoiling the surprise.

We hit a seemingly empty street corner, surrounded by apartments on one side of the road, and a gray, metal sided warehouse on the other. We stop, and I can tell Nick and Fiona are excited, but I can’t tell what for.

We run across the street toward the warehouse and a nondescript door with a bouncer in front of it. He takes our IDs, opens the door and tells us to enjoy.

My eyes, pupils still minimized from the outdoor light, don’t quite register what I have stepped into. As they start to adjust, it becomes clear to me that we have just walked into something like the set of the Pirates of Caribbean ride at Disneyland. There is a waterfall, nautical themed decorations in every nook and cranny, a bar menu of over 40 tiki style drinks, barrels, rope, port holes, everything.

Fiona tells me we are in what is called Smuggler’s Cove, and I realize we are in one of San Francisco’s famed hidden Tiki bars. This pretentious former cocktail bar employee is extremely excited, and we rush forward to see what the menu has in store for us.

The whole Smuggler’s Cove operation is completely over the top in the best possible way. Right down to the drinks, which are excellent, it is done with the theme in mind. The fact that we were exceptionally drunk as a result, also super cool.

If we look a bit drunk, it is because we are

Once more, with feeling

When we finally make it back to the apartment, we drunkenly all acknowledge that this is my last night in San Francisco, and as is custom for the visit, head to the roof. It’s chilly, the clouds are rolling over the downtown buildings, and we drink some more fernet and just enjoy the moment.

Parting Thoughts

This city seems to exist on a fabric quilt of culture, people, history, and vibrancy that changes from street corner to street corner. Today we walked from a fairly gentrified, family friendly neighborhood for brunch to the heart of the Mission and Carnival. The changes don’t shift in extremes like in Salt Lake City, but blend together and the city changes before you even realize it. You are in and out of so much that is happening, it is impossible to keep your finger on the pulse of the city. Rather you must resign to the fact that you will never be able to keep up with it, that it will continually offer up new and unexpected experiences, you need to just be along for the ride.

Day 4

Initial Thoughts

I woke up earlier than Nick and Fiona on my final day there, and the fog laid as heavy upon the city as my hangover upon my head.

Water. Advil. Lay back down; I went through the typical hangover motions.

But I couldn’t fall asleep again.

I looked at my clock: 7:07 am. Nick and Fiona wouldn’t be up for a while. So I got up and went to their bay window which overlooked the entire San Francisco downtown, at that moment less a city and more a blanket of white that was punctured by the tops of skyscrapers (so aptly named here), pulled out my book and journal and started writing this down.

A thought rang out across my consciousness: I seriously would love to move here.

There are some job applications that could go out there, some calls I could have, and I would like to think I would take them seriously. But who really knows...

Thoughts about taking a risk, packing up and moving out here, following a gut feeling, doing something crazy all flashed across my mind. The idea of something new, a fresh start is intoxicating (maybe I am still a little drunk). The risk averse part of me shot them dead. The excited part of me resurrected them again.

Anxiety about everything and nothing crept in, adding to the pulsing headache. I started to write furiously, as if I was attempting to stay ahead of the anxiousness, getting it out on the page so it can’t bottle up inside me. That could be a fool’s errand, I see now, in that it gives those feelings a permanence and physicality that they didn’t have before. Maybe, by writing about it like this, I am actually manifesting these anxieties into existence? I saved such thoughts for a more sober version of myself.

My mind strays: I wonder what Nick and Fiona think of me right now… They are some of my closest friends, but being out here and then having to go back to SLC leaves me with a terrifying thought. I have this fear that Nick and Fiona see me like this:

Then I realize that such a thought is more internal than external, and it’s a fear of self reflection, which is actually much worse.

These are the 7 am hangover thoughts you get when you stare out at a city caked in fog, trying to find the way through your own fog.


All of the Lights

Fiona and Nick wake up quite a bit later than I do, but I have had a productive morning in their absence. We quickly decide it is time to wash up and get some breakfast to break through these hangovers, and Nick seems excited to give Universal Cafe a try again. Stifled by the Carnival of yesterday, I can tell he really wants to take me there. We pile in the car, navigate the hills and trains and people and hit an industrial part of town for some grub.

Turns out to be an excellent call, and it raises my spirits instantly. From there we drop off the car and hop on the J train and go all the way downtown. This is the first time we have ventured anywhere near the San Francisco I’ve visited on other trips, and we turn a few corners after emerging from the subway amidst the sky scrapers and find ourselves in Chinatown.

All we can see and marvel at is just how much stuff is for sale here. Trinkets, heirlooms, major (and kitschy) statues of swordfish that are taller than we are, fidget spinners, food, toys, electronics, candy from all parts of the world. Who buys this stuff, we ask ourselves while trying to make sure we don’t stop and make an unnecessary purchase ourselves.

Interesting, lively, foreign, and yet right in the middle of town. It’s a great spot. But ultimately, it is a detour on our way to the other destination, one that Nick and Fiona have been excited about but haven’t told me outright. Just allusions and hints.

We turn corner after corner, the anticipation growing, and I am wondering with each turn what they are taking me to. We hit a wide open street, a V shaped building occupying the odd road split in front of us, and turn up the hill to the left toward an unassuming, even dingy black building that you would otherwise pass by if you didn’t know to head straight for it. But Nick stops at the door and says, “welcome to the City of Lights Bookstore”.

It’s a marvel of a bookshop, winding and twisting incoherently around the irregular confines of the structure of the building. Their collection is massive, categorized beautifully, and smells exactly like a book store should: musky, heavy, and sweet from all the pages of paper stacked around us.

The history of the City of Lights Bookstore is a long one, but the spark notes version is that it was started in the Beatnik era of American writing, became a mainstay for writers like Kerouac and poets like Ginsberg (who published Howl through the bookstore, which in turn was the defendant in the landmark obscenity case that followed).

This is truly a highlight of the trip, and if not for Nick and Fiona trying to keep us on schedule, I would stay for the entire day. It just feels like an important place for literature, the history of it, the dedication of the owners, its place in the city. I love it.


Local Brews

I could have stayed in the bookstore forever, but Nick and Fiona had another trick up their sleeves, and we head down to the wharf and the center of the tourist section of San Francisco. Nick and Fiona deliver their apologies about going to a touristy part of the city, but there is no need. I have loved every part of the trip, and trust their judgment.

We stop by an installment of the brewery Fort Point, a newer operation that makes truly outstanding beers that we have been drinking all weekend. Their story is pretty cool, as they only make beer for San Francisco at the moment, and do all their own deliveries. The beer, the branding, the authenticity, it’s all fantastic, and I see why Nick and Fiona love them so much. We get a pint, we stop and take in the trip and just talk some more.

Before heading back to apartment to pack up, Fiona buys Nick and I some Fort Point t-shirts, and we all discuss how wonderful the weekend has been (and how fucking tired we are as a result).

After that it’s the banality of packing, the trip to the airport, and the flight home, etc.

I am beyond glad I came.

Final Thoughts

Maybe this whole fucking thing is an exercise in sappiness, but I don’t care. The trip, or more accurately, the chance to see important people in my life and spend time with them doing interesting and fun things, was vital. On a personal level, I don’t think it matters if this writing experiment is successful or not. The trip was. That’s all I need. 

If there is one thing I have come to realize over the course of a tumultuous 2017 it is this: what I choose to do for work is important, yes, but the people in my life, the friendships I have made and love, they are the defining parts of my life. They sand down my rough edges, pick me up when I fall, are excited when I succeed and supportive when I fail, push me to places I would have never thought to visit, be it intellectually, mentally, and physically.

These relationships seem to be a better barometer of life than anything else I have come across, and I am willing to bet the house that they will continue to be that way.

The fact that I became so disconnected from these relationships with these friends is to my shame. 2017 has been a nightmare in many ways, but my feeling of isolation was entirely self inflicted. These friends are still here and always have been, and it was me that pulled myself away from the same level of interaction over the past 6 months. I convinced myself that it was “to chase an opportunity at work” and some of that remains true. But to have let it supplant itself as the most important thing in my life. What could be more important than this? Is a job worth not feeling connected to my life’s great influencers, the people who have had the biggest impact on who I am besides my own family?

Fuck no.

I went to San Francisco to escape, even if only for a moment. Instead, I was brought back to reality.