Walking the City

A walk today mainly in the fabled city of San Francisco...

In this unusually cool Summer, venturing out of the pad for me can be tricky. But I was determined not to loll around town--I needed some diversion. I often use a back deck at my home to gauge how warm it will be when I hit the street. It can deceive because it is wind-protected to the North and sunny. You can see downtown San Francisco like an arrangement of various geometric shapes in a drawing book. Saturday I could see that although the fog was looming behind it, it did not besiege the City as of mid-day. Nevertheless, in addition to long-sleeved shirt and black trousers I wore a lined wool shirt-jacket and my trusty black beret. People outside the bay area generally don't realize the precautions one must take her in mid-summer.
Down through the great twisting oaks of campus to Center street BART. I had been a little off my game due to a low-level bug that seemed prevalent lately--post-nasal drip, spaciness, and a stomach quease. But walking and seeing people were revivifying after a groggy wake-up. I had decided to have four puffs before leaving rather than wait until I neared my destination. It makes the train rides more interesting and I man-upped for a fun day.
A direct train dropped me at the Embarcadero station in short order where I descended again to the Muni station to await the phantom "N Judah" street car. It's borderline meta-reality is attested to by the fact that the robotic voice that periodically announced expected trains never mentions it. Yet it is quite a busy central line. The screen with information on the trains read that one was due in one minute--but I suspect it was at least a minute gone when I arrived. Odd but after a longer wait one came and I got a seat for the familiar ride.
You emerge into half-remembered daylight along the serpentine cliffs of the Old Mint. Then the tracks head along the populated streets. It passes the small hilltop park that I recognized the minute first I saw it from a Robert Frank photo in his book The Americans. In the photo a black couple reclining in the grass look at the camera with suspicion.
Another subterranean stretch goes by and there was Cole Street-- time for me to disembark. Many shiny happy people were also making their way toward the storied Haight-Ashbury as they have since time immemorial or at at least 1965. The brightly-painted shops sold a lot of very similar stuff to the psychedelic era shops; and the sweet young people walking around look much as they did when all of it was new. Naturally there are quite a few crustier, hard-luck or devil-may-care types too. They followed in the wake of the original flower children and stayed. It all went pomo along the way with a tough looking hippie-punk colony now floating at the edge of Golden Gate park across Stanyan street (& other sorrows).
My goal, and it seemed very well-timed and accessible, was Amoeba records on Haight street by three o'clock. There the prolific and charming singer song-writer Conor Oberst and his Lost Valley Band were about to play an in-store set. I sailed in into the hectic Saturday shopping and live-music scene at this huge enterprise in a former bowling alley, fashionably on-time. I knew the lay of the place, which has an actual permanent stage for these shows, and quickly got my spot in the last row of records off to the right of the stage. I had seen Gomez, Kelly Willis, and Richard Thompson perform here, others slip the mind.
I had also spent a few minutes with Joe Strummer here on my birthday, July 28, in 2002--we were both Leos of the same vintage. I missed his set with the Mescaleros that day, but I got a real heart-felt charge out of seeing him again. I had met him once before also at a record store. He and Paul Simenon of the Clash had showed-up at Berkeley's Tower records to sign records dressed like hoods. They had remained rather stone-faced behind mirror shades and seemed put-upon to be there. It was just before the first show by the Clash in the U.S. at the Berkeley Community theater, an incredible triumph. Following it I saw every West Coast tour the band did (except for the US festival) and they got better musically, but they never topped that first show for sheer excitement, just raw punk energy. I had used all my favors getting a lift home after the show that night back in January 1979, so I had to miss the one the next night. They played unadvertised as "the only band that matters"at a great punk venue in San Francisco, Temple Beautiful. Of course, the consessus in the demi-monde was that the second night was the one you really should have seen.
Amoeba had helped them out by discouraging Joe's fans from asking him to sign Clash items while they ignored the Mescaleros. But when I arrived they'd just had several hundred meet and greets and were tenderized. Joe was tender at least. He signed the Clash's Complete Control single sleeve and when he saw I had also brought an even earlier 45 sleeve by his band the 101ers, he wanted to sign that one first. The waggish one of the Mescaleros asked why didn't I get Joe's new CD putting me on the spot. I admitted I had just made rent and was skinned, that it was a grand a month per person to live here. "Sounds just like London...why don't steal it?" I told Joe that the producer of a Kerouac homage CD that he had contributed to had contacted me for my expertise on the subject. When he sent me an advance CD he said he thought maybe Joe's cut, an electro-rhythm behind an old home tape of Jack Kerouac reading, might not have worked. I told Joe that I had replied that it was the best track in the collection.
After all it was the only one with Jack's voice on it. Joe said he thought he did a pretty good job on it and I agreed. "It's appropriately spaced-out music for a spaced-out reading."
Before cutting out I gave Joe an original color photo of him playing with the Clash that someone had been selling as a postcard in a New Wave shop back in the day. He said, "Look at that shirt, I had just painted it." It was wild with slogans and Jackson Pollock red streaks. He signed another copy of the photo for me, fondly I thought.
Joe died later that year. God bless him. His eyes grew kinder over the years. He was unmistakably a big soul.

Well, this walk will continue in a future session...