Jane and I had just emerged from Bulrusher, the enormously satisfying play currently on offer at the Berkeley Rep, and autumn was in the air, an amiable citizenry was upon the streets and, unbeknownst to us, a BART train was all but waiting at the station to take us home to Glen Park. The play deals with issues of race in a town where there were few issues, racial or otherwise, and at a time when the level of violence was lower in much of the land, including the land depicted on stage. Mendocino County, the southern part. In 1955. When the Anderson Valley was not beset by wineries. And the town of Mendocino was not yet such a thing. And the Navarro River flowed with a constancy that weaves the whole production into a delight.

Thus primed, Jane and I wandered homeward along Shattuck Avenue. I was shot and beaten by three guys in Berkeley. Three black guys. And if the level of racial tension has improved at all since 1968, this moment, this evening I was prepared to believe it. Yes, some things do get better. And whether this perception was accurate or not, right then, well, it seemed true. It even seemed harmony could prevail upon the land. Such is the power of live theater. Live anything.

It was almost two years ago that I joined Jane for a Monday afternoon Bobby McFerrin event at Berkeley’s Freight & Salvage, once a pleasant folk club on Telegraph Avenue south of the University campus. Now transformed, through massive investment and civic support, into a large nightclub. That gets some very big acts. And is right across from the Berkeley Rep.

That was a dismal day. It was cloudy. The restaurant we tried to have lunch in wasn’t open. But then lots of things weren’t open. It was the pandemic. It was a latter stage, when COVID-19 wasn’t killing so many people. But it was killing business. With people masked and afraid of public gatherings, it was killing spontaneity. And on that day downtown Berkeley seemed sad and sinister.

But it didn’t today. Today is good enough. And somehow, at this moment, today feels like a pleasantly long time.