It would be way overstating things to suggest that the faregates of BART resemble in any way the gates of hell. But on either side of them, coming or going, there is the definite feel of the fourth canto of Dante’s Inferno, vis-à-vis, purgatory. This is a wonderful city. It is also a city that has seen quite a few upheavals in its brief history. So, one has to be patient. I plan to die here. So might as well make the most of it in the meantime.
And it is a mean time. Taking the bus down Mission Street on the way to Shabbat services, I stare at the passing scene. Blight. An awful lot of it on this street. And there is also hope. I don’t know what else to call the presence of the beautiful new C.G. Jung Institute of San Francisco. These folks used to have a beautiful old brick mansion in Pacific Heights. They sold that building and deliberately came down from the heights to the not-quite-lower depths of Mission and 22nd St. Where the joke, the inside joke among Jungians, was that the former home of Anna’s Fabrics was on the way to becoming Carl & Anna’s Fabrics. And in full disclosure, and unabashed kvelling, I will add that I am now on the board of the Jung Institute. And I must point out that there is also a very nice cinema, a multiplex that serves booze and reasonably good food and some wonderful movies…less than a half a block from the Institute. Thus, Urban Living.
And…back to the Institute…some of the psychoanalysts who frequent the place are leery of the neighborhood. But that’s part of the process. Part of being in a city, any city. Choose your Canto.
Where was I? Oh yes, on the 14 Muni bus heading toward Shabbat services and staring out the window at the procession of hopes and fading dreams that constitute Mission Street. So many places are boarded up. Mission Chinese, where I have eaten once, has barely parted its metal gates. The effect is like a Soviet stage curtain, barely open. Lung Shuan, the name of the predecessor Chinese restaurant (I think) is still visible above the door. The food must be very good, or have been very good once, or thought to have been very good by some critic who no longer works at the Chronicle (the city’s fading newspaper). This look of quasi-dereliction resembles that of a woman so beautiful and sexy that she doesn’t bother shaving her legs. I want to go there as soon as possible.
I am glad that I turned up, à la Woody Allen, for services at Sha’ar Zahav. But I really couldn’t connect with anyone. And it’s largely a people experience for me. So, now I am heading home, and hoping for a good transit day at the very least. Down the elevator from street level. Through the ticket concourse. Down the elevator to the platform. Where I have lucked out. A train is waiting with its doors open. A string of red lights all along the platform indicate that this is one of the new, spiffy trains. The ones that are quieter and infinitely more desirable than the 20-year-old predecessors. Being a self-styled city guy, my body senses the timing. The doors should have closed immediately behind me. My BART counter is ticking. No action. And sure enough, as I roll back out to the platform, I can hear the announcement. Something is fucked up somewhere. And I’m not going to sit here and take my chances.
Because I am up and rolling from the elevator to the redoubtable 14 R Muni bus. Well, the bus stop, of course. But because my timing is so brilliant, the actual bus appears. It sweeps me up in its motherly Muni arms and speeds south or west or both. I like the idea of bus rapid transit. Yes, rapid. The 14R will skip stops all along its remarkable route. We will fairly leap from 16th to 20th St, leap again to 24th St. fly to 30th St. And then rocket to Richland Avenue. I am home in short order. And never mind the harrowing ascent of Roanoke Street, a cliff of sorts. All of which is forgotten when I roll in the door, my door.