August 29, 2002

What is it like to be in San Francisco the fourth week of July staying in a small privately owned hotel? It's looking down the street at the corner of Taylor and Post at a black blind man dancing a jig at the beat of his brain-damaged mind.

It's climbing the hill to Taylor and Pine as a mad, mad mamma comes boiling onto the walk, unable to defend her stool against the bartender's rage.

It's climbing Nob Hill, so steep your chin is as close to the concrete as your kneecaps. A climb so steep the change in your pockets rolls over in one corner and you can't pause to rest, or trust a smile of encouragement in a town of so many hustlers. (Ten thousand street people are activated and audited the first of every month by a $400 per head dole from the city.)

Late yesterday on a push to make a play so close to curtain that no time remained for dinner, I bought a pint of milk at the corner store. Fell full force in the climb to reach the theater and meet my friend. Had brown-bagged the milk to carry along to curb my appetite and thirst. Didn't realize the bottle looked like a "tall boy" beer until two long-haired gents carrying backpacks saluted, "Hang in there, buddy."

But please hang on for a blunder turning into a new experience. The hotel's play bill is incorrect. Tonight is dress rehearsal at the theater. Looking for the restroom, I walk into a downstairs dressing room — a long hall with benches and clothes hooks on the wall. If I run, they'll suspect I am one of those "tom peeping fellows," who ogle the theater girls all the way from the box office to the ushers to the stage. But no one pays the slightest attention, so I sit down and drink the bottle of milk.

What a sight the actors and actresses are in gray tails and gaudy dancing tights. Painted faces and abundant wigs vie for small face mirrors. Black mesh stockings and red and black ruffled collars are pulled and patted in place. Upstairs, dancers slide and stomp in unison, counting off a beat to a faint sound of music. Dust sifts from the ceiling from the impact above. Faded and threadbare curtains provide the only privacy for dressing. I sit tight, using the pint of milk as a prop. Signal to leave comes as a security cop arrives, bringing a big order of coffee and doughnuts. His glare is wasted on my back going for the street.

Next morning, the choice was sending my clothes to the Chinese laundry two doors from the hotel and staying in the room, or wearing a travel-weary wardrobe as wrinkled as a camel's dewlap. Too, descending the city's steep hills plunges toenails into socks, cutting dime-size holes that slowly strangulate the digital to the point of fatal gangrene. Closest supply of new socks to the hotel is an Australian store. Wool argyles imported from Australia cost fifty-nine dollars a pair plus sales tax, or 10 staple fleeces of Texas wool in the bale. No offer posted of trade-ins for used socks on such a fancy price. So I opted to send my clothes to the laundry and use the down time to darn my socks.

Laundries were just part of the services in the neighborhood. The hotel also owned the building next door. One tenant was Miss Donna, the fortuneteller. Not really a "Miss," the room clerk said she was paying the hotel damage for the aftermath of a big battle she and her husband pitched celebrating the Fourth of July. (Fortunetellers are very patriotic. Reading star charts links the seer to the field of stars in our country's flag. "Mr. Donna's" patriotism was probably questioned, thus causing the confrontation.)

Fortunetellers can help make short-term plans. Senior citizen discounts are hefty, as reading out the future takes only a small space in a crystal ball, or just a short hand of the Tarot cards. I suggested to my friend that we split a session. We were having difficulty deciding the best days to go to the coast and what nights to try for tickets to the plays and concerts. But before I acted, the front desk denied connection to Miss Donna's, unless Miss Donna trying to steal one of the hotel's vacuum cleaners counted as a partnership by disassociation.

Yes, being in San Francisco the fourth week of July is watching a wisp of a drug-crazed girl dance in floppy boots into the headlights of fierce traffic to hail a cab for the theater crowd. A town of inconsistencies where Tony the shine man opens his theater stand at 8 a.m. to close as the box office folds for the night. Click, click goes the reel next door at $165 for a front row seat; a final pop of the cloth and four bucks goes into Tony's poke. The cable cars screech a block away. Sidewalk evangelists pray for the salvation of the lost and the found. And the city roars into the night, split into human gaps as wide as the fault line causing her earthquakes.

August 29, 2002

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