city
Definitely not the brightest I've ever done.
It was after nine pm, and I was alone at a Turk & Larkin trolley stop. The city was already dark, and the enclosure reeked of pee. Turk there is pretty narrow and is a bit claustrophobia-inducing. I stood on the outside of the stop and was thumbing the iPhone in the pocket of my fleece jacket.
I was nervous, yet I knew I was safe -- on the one hand it was a late evening in the Tenderloin, where the passer-bys mostly wore other-wordly expressions on their faces and haggard clothes on their backs; on the other hand, right across the street, a friendly Irish pub was lit brightly.
That evening I danced my heart out in an industrial studio overlooking San Francisco Central library, Market St., and a score of homeless men clustered around a BART station exit. Somehow it seemed a fitting continuation of the evening to be looking at a mural of a girl and a colibri bird across the street. There it was, right on the wall of the pub. I wanted to photograph it so very much, in spite of it being dark and me having an old iPhone for a camera.
I was so very out of place.
A man with a blue recycling container on wheels crossed the street toward my stop. Our eyes met briefly, and then he swerved towards the street garbage can on the other end of the stop. A short time later he started crossing the street again, in wide arcs, walking the roadway as if the recycling bin was his dance partner. I stepped onto the pavement, took my iPhone out and aimed at the mural. This is probably stupid, I thought -- after all -- I did remove my earrings a few minutes ago, lest they attract attention -- and what, the iPhone wouldn't?
I took the picture. And another one. One with a flash. They were all pretty horrid.
In a little while, the trolley came, I got in, rode it home until mistakenly exiting two stops too short of mine, smack in the middle of two large project developments.
San Francisco is quiet and beautiful in the evening. The fog was high, and the buildings which I passed in my car numerous times looked unfamiliar and magical when passed by on foot.
A pack of rowdy teenagers was getting ready to cross Geary; I crossed Divisadero instead, and soon enough was home.
It was after nine pm, and I was alone at a Turk & Larkin trolley stop. The city was already dark, and the enclosure reeked of pee. Turk there is pretty narrow and is a bit claustrophobia-inducing. I stood on the outside of the stop and was thumbing the iPhone in the pocket of my fleece jacket.
I was nervous, yet I knew I was safe -- on the one hand it was a late evening in the Tenderloin, where the passer-bys mostly wore other-wordly expressions on their faces and haggard clothes on their backs; on the other hand, right across the street, a friendly Irish pub was lit brightly.
That evening I danced my heart out in an industrial studio overlooking San Francisco Central library, Market St., and a score of homeless men clustered around a BART station exit. Somehow it seemed a fitting continuation of the evening to be looking at a mural of a girl and a colibri bird across the street. There it was, right on the wall of the pub. I wanted to photograph it so very much, in spite of it being dark and me having an old iPhone for a camera.
I was so very out of place.
A man with a blue recycling container on wheels crossed the street toward my stop. Our eyes met briefly, and then he swerved towards the street garbage can on the other end of the stop. A short time later he started crossing the street again, in wide arcs, walking the roadway as if the recycling bin was his dance partner. I stepped onto the pavement, took my iPhone out and aimed at the mural. This is probably stupid, I thought -- after all -- I did remove my earrings a few minutes ago, lest they attract attention -- and what, the iPhone wouldn't?
I took the picture. And another one. One with a flash. They were all pretty horrid.
In a little while, the trolley came, I got in, rode it home until mistakenly exiting two stops too short of mine, smack in the middle of two large project developments.
San Francisco is quiet and beautiful in the evening. The fog was high, and the buildings which I passed in my car numerous times looked unfamiliar and magical when passed by on foot.
A pack of rowdy teenagers was getting ready to cross Geary; I crossed Divisadero instead, and soon enough was home.