Neighborliness --- Day 6/106

Walk: T. Joe's, Hi Tech Nails (ie, Monday errands)
Distance: 2.5 miles, Home Yoga

So Ciwt was just reading her monthly neighborhood newspaper about a couple of her neighbors. They have been here for fifty years and love, love, love our neighborhood.  (As does Ciwt). According to the article, when the woman sees somebody new move in, she takes her home baked goodies over and says, "Hi. I'm your neighbor down the street.  You must be frazzled from moving and need something to snack on..."  She also makes 'quiet distributions of home baked cakes on birthdays,' and the two of them make a point of 'wandering into neighborhood shops and talking to customers and salespeople.' They also make a practice of striking up conversations with other diners in restaurants," often inviting their new acquaintances to dinner at their house.

Ciwt is still reeling.  "Please, please, please don't let this couple come into a shop Ciwt is in or let them sit next to her in a restaurant."  Please.

Obviously, since they warranted a full page, laudatory spread, there are very different ideas of neighborliness out there.  Ciwt considers herself - and her neighbors agree - a good neighbor because she does things like pay all her building dues on time, pick up mail when neighbors are traveling, take in packages, interview service people when the building needs repairs.  Just general overseeing, accountability, pleasantness - and Privacy.  Sometimes - every great once in a while - her building has wine and breaks bread together - and we always feel safe to be totally open with each other about building, and sometimes personal, concerns.  But, other than that, we honor each other by letting people lead their lives and not sharing any information about them to inquisitive others. Or something like that; anyway she's often told how much her neighbors value her.

A lot of people live in cities for freedom and anonymity among other benefits.  At least that is what Ciwt assumes.  They come together - maybe bond - over common interests, not because they happen to live near each other. Or at least this is what Ciwt values. Not so much that she wants to be part of some cake bake, do-good church group or other old-timey 'neighborly' activities.

But others have different ideas.  She had a yoga student for instance, who pestered her about her age. To Ciwt this is private information which comes out when it seems appropriate.  But this student would hear none of it, went home to search for Ciwt's age on the internet - and promptly told everyone.  Ciwt assumes for the sake of 'neighborliness.'  (If I like you, I get to know everything about you - or something).

Some people, Ciwt guesses, want to believe we are all one big, neighborly family.  Certainly the people at her local newspaper must.  To Ciwt, these people are being insistent, intrusive, and therefore, Not neighborly.

But Ciwt is notoriously private.  And someone just played some tech trick to get into her private email, so probably she's particularly prickly at the moment. In any event, please don't let this couple find out her birthday - even though she might be be missing out on personalized handmade card and a huge "Surprise!!" party.

Old Park Homage --- Day 6/105

Walk: Fillmore
Distance: 2 miles, Small Home Yoga

Has Ciwt told you recently how much she loves Alta Plaza her little, nearby park?  It is two square blocks and part of a sort of chain of city parks approximately the same size. The thing that distinguishes Ciwt's park from the rest of the chain is its awfulness.  It is, knock on wood, safe, but it is crumbled and seedy.  And this is why Ciwt loves it.

This wasn't always the case.  Other parks have been beautified or at least repaired, and a few years ago Ciwt joined her neighbors in a campaign to convince the city that our park should be as well.* Meetings were held, landscape architects were hired, politicians were recruited, neighbors argued, votes were cast.  And finally a plan was settled on; all that remained was for the city to do its part and provide the necessary and promised funds.  Well, much time has passed and the city has only begun its series of 'meetings' (read: stall patterns) about approving funds for each component of the project.

Optimism doesn't run high.  The one and only project the city did fund was deep in the drought when it closed half the park for over a year, tore up authentic old grass and replaced it with 'drought free' grass.  The park was reopened, and within months the new 'grass' revealed itself to be pure and virulent weeds .  The city apologized, the drought free 'grass' is still there protected by some ordinance making it virtually impossible to replace.

Meanwhile - as Ciwt has looked at the improved parks with their fancy blue tennis courts, organized, colorful, and perfectly smooooth paths, their healthy manicured plantings and mown grass - she has become more and more fond of her park just the way it is.

The thing about her park she realizes is its realness.  The haphazard way it has weathered actually feels to her like country.  Real c

ountryside  just a black and half away.

What if those eternal city meetings really do come through with funds?  Perfect paths can't possibly have the same charm as her park's present ones .  And what if the drought free weeds are gone and new trees grow straight instead of how the wind shapes them?   Or the natural old grass grew consistently green and was manicured by machines rather than people and dogs? 

Or off-leash dogs weren't allowed at all like they aren't in other parks?  Or the drainage was actually absorbed instead of demanding tricky navigation on the sidewalks? 

And Just Imagine if there were cute little indoor places in the park where San Francisco's natural (and adored by locals) weather could be ignored! 

Ciwt now realizes if all those 'improvements' happened to her park, she would be crushed.


 

 

 

*See CIWT 3/56, 3/274, 3/309

In SF with RLS --- Day 6/104

Walk: Callie Errands
Distance: 2 miles, small yoga

Just for openers here are a few of the writers who esteemed Robert Louis Stevenson and thought him one of the finest writers ever: Mark Twain, Jorge Luis Borges, Henry James, G.K. Chesterton.  At the top of the contemporary list of ardent Stevenson fans is Brian Doyle, an honored and prolific Portland, Oregon based writer.

Boyle took on the task of re-enfleshing Stevenson during his months living in a rooming house on Bush Street here in San Francisco waiting for Fanny, his passionately adored mother of two, to be free of her profiligate husband. From December 1879 until April 1880, nearly destitude and sickly, Stevenson roamed the streets of the young city breathing it in and, writing furiously and sending manuscripts back to his native Scotland in hopes of earning money to support the family he would instantly have when they married.

Capturing a literary genius is task enough, but Boyle raised the bar by setting out to do it in a voice emulating Stevenson's.  As someone - probably many - pointed out to Boyle, if you're going to do that, you better bring it. And, Boyle does.

She thinks. Ciwt actually never has read Stevenson, having relegated his A Child's Garden of Verses to tots, Treasure Island, Kidnapped to young boys, and Jekyll and Hyde to Frederic March (who won the Academy Award for the role).  Wrong on all counts: each of those books is considered a literary masterpiece. And if Boyle's voice is even close, she can understand why.

The storytelling is extraordinary.  Every small, everyday moment of life is risen to the level of immediacy that fills the reader with the delicate but deeply human and joyous adventure of being alive. And, wow, if you love San Francisco, your heart will be warmed and touched by Boyle's love letter to the city.

Pets --- Day 104

Walk: Union Square
Distance: 1 mile, Home Yoga
                   
       
                                               

Accent: Purple --- Day 6/103

Walk: Fillmore Errands
Distance: 2 miles, Smallish Home Yoga

Ciwt is paying attention to little succulent gardens around town.  Thinking of maybe having one or two of her own.  They look particularly nice with purple.  N'est-ce pas?

Say Ah --- Day 6/102

Walk: Union Square Dentist
Distance: 1.5 miles

Ciwt's New Motto: A girl just can't have expensive enough implants.

Breath on the Mirror --- Day 6/101

Walk: Union Square, SFMOMA
Distance: 3.6 miles, Home Yoga

Remember the funeral scene in Charade when Lee Marvin put a mirror under the corpse's nose to see if he was really dead?  Ciwt felt a little like that today when she went to SFMOMA to check out if the Matisse Diebenkorn show really was over and off the walls.  Happily for her (but not Lee Marvin), Yes.  

Ciwt actually likes museums just after an important show has closed.  It is a true after-the-ball feeling. Almost no one thinks to come view art that day, so the buildings are hushed and virtually empty. Except for the 'wrecking' and crating crews- and, hopefully later the cleaning crew because museums are usually pretty beat up from the huge crowds during the last days of a show.  

Overall, Ciwt gives Matisse Diebenkorn a B+ for all that terrific art with an A for attracting visitors.  The show was packed from the day it opened until closing day - which happened to be on a holiday, so Ciwt can only imagine the scene yesterday. If, instead of being a direct M-D comparison,  the show had been presented as a marvelous happenstance of one artist in search of a teacher encountering a great artist going through a transition, Ciwt would likely up her grade to A for the whole show. That would have been a more interesting, full and accurate art story.  

Oh well, too late now: No breath on that mirror.

Memorial Day 2017 --- Day 6/100

Walk: Errands
Distance: 2.8 miles, Home Yoga