Frisco

Hardly a night goes by when I don't dream. Unfortunately, I rarely remember any of these nocturnal adventures. However, I had a dream recently of which I can recall one bit. It involved an old flame from many years go. Modesty forbids me to give an exact account of what transpired in the dream but I can say that it mirrored a scene in Infinity Pool.

Even though it was the mid-1990s, this former girlfriend was something of a hippie chick. She was a big fan of jam bands, loved nature, preferred to eat organic food, and wore patchouli oil. I suspect that, if she hadn't lived in Madison, she would have lived in San Francisco, or at least the Bay area.

At some point while we were dating, she took a trip out there and I think I still have the postcard she sent me. Haight-Ashbury was like her Santiago de Compostela, a pilgrimage site where she could indulge her fascination with and delight in late 60s hippie culture. It was where the Grateful Dead had lived just down the block from Jefferson Airplane and people made merry while tripping on LSD. There was a communal vibe so there was always a couch or floorspace to crash on. If things got bad, you could always find help at the Haight Ashbury Free Medical Clinic.

There may not have been much left of the hippie dream in the San Francisco of the mid-90s when my girlfriend made her trip, but it seems to be perhaps all but gone now.

Her appearance in my Cronenbergian dream happened around the same time I'd been reading and hearing about the San Francisco of today. At first it was a trickle of brief mentions that the city's downtown is now home to vast acres of empty office space as thousands of workers continue to work remotely never having returned after Covid lockdown. And then I encountered people like Michael Shellenberg bemoaning the large homeless encampments, public drug use, and all of the consequences of those things.

Even as I type, the news tells of a rolling gun battle there, that federal aid is forthcoming to help San Franciscans combat the fentanyl epidemic there, and of a downtown movie theater closing. I cannot personally vouch for the state of San Francisco but it looks pretty bleak from where I sit.

Raffish dreaming and woeful tidings from out west means I've got the Golden Gate City on my brain. Thusly I've decided to take a few detours to fondly remember my old girlfriend and the city before its current problems descended upon it.

(Begin with "If you're going to San Francisco, put an Anchor Steam in your glass".)