Forever Isn't Over Yet

There’s nothing like a stroll down Columbus on a hot night -- crowded pavements, men in shirtsleeves and t-shirts, women in sundresses, people arguing in English, Italian, Chinese, French, German, Spanish, every window thrown open, the diners inside talking to strangers on the sidewalks, music and light spilling out. Il Pollaio is one of those long-lived North Beach restaurants too often overlooked, a modest joint with a limited menu. But damn, what they do serve is good. We had plates of roasted, moist, perfectly seasoned half-chicken, spicy fennel sausage, and fresh combo salads. We talked politics a bit, M and our houseguest, K reminisced about college life in Champaign, and while they talked sports I counted the number of times I heard either “Hillary” and “Obama” in the conversations at other tables. (Eleven. One slight anomaly – the name “Con-do-leez-a” pronounced with emphatic precision by an older, sharp-faced man leaning across his table and gazing fiercely into the eyes of his dinner companions, a couple of slightly younger guys in baseball caps. I couldn’t hear the rest.)

( Read more )

Suddenly, after several days of unusually cool weather, it became hot. I mean that in the San Francisco sense. In the East Coast/Midwest/Southern sense it's pleasantly cool, but in San Francisco, if you can go outside after dark with bare arms and feel no urge to run inside to fetch a sweater, it's hot. At the film last night, I had to run about making sure all the windows were wide open, and even then some people left before the discussion because the room was too close.

M and I walked home afterwards through streets that were a little more crowded and lively than usual. A warm weekend night in San Francisco is almost like a snow-day in the Carolinas. Everyone seizes the day. Girls in short dresses and bare shoulders clicked past in their high heels, men walked with their ties loosened and their jackets slung over one shoulder, doors and windows were open so that music and light spilled out a little brighter and louder into the streets. Sometimes restaurants on Hyde street will turn themselves inside out, moving most of their tables onto the sidewalk, and I'll bet Twin Peaks was crowded. Normally when people go there at night for the view, they park, hop out of their car and stand there shivering in the wind for a long as they can stand it before running back to the car. On a warm, windless night, the lookout point is packed.

At about 2:00 this morning I woke up nude on top of the bedclothes and looked over the edge of the bed to see that I'd pulled off my pajamas and dropped them in a little pile on the floor. Our cat had abandoned his usual spot on our bed and was lying on top of them. When he saw me he let out a warning "mrrr" -- he was lying exactly where I'm likely to put my feet when I get out of bed -- and turned over on his back to stretch luxuriously, smiling up at me as if to say, "Isn't this wonderful?" Cats get drunk on warmth.

So now it's a blazingly beautiful day, with only a faint pale haze of our usual fog to the west, and not so much as a speck of white in the shore beyond the Golden Gate. No surf at all, that I can see. I've not gone outside yet, so I don't know whether it's still hot, but here in the apartment I can comfortably wear a sun dress from my southern days. It would have been a good day to go down to the Farmer's Market, but I'll probably just settle for a quick run to Whole Foods and a good workout on the hills. Maybe I can wear, not only one of my colorful skirts, but my favorite straw hat, and take my vanity out for of one of our increasingly rare walks.