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I spent the weekend in San Francisco, with Yvonne. Never mind that it is now almost another weekend, I am only getting around to this now. It's been on my mind. Here is what I see exactly: A gently sloped hill, slightly right-skewed. The dead grass upon it golden against an ocean of sky. Buildings lego-ed on end in pinks and blues and whites. The orange bridge. She lives in Mountain View, which really is just Palo Alto. Palm trees and flowers. I am not used to such reliable sunshine. The place just feels like being on vacation, which I was, but not really - it was only a weekend. But the weight of home was displaced a bit. I could not un-bear it, but contemplated all the things in a new physical context. I could share it all with her as we drove in her car, or walked, or sat eating and drinking. She is the only one with whom I can be recklessly candid, fearlessly myself. That is a lessening of burden, certainly, but it was tiring to examine each piece of the load as it was shown and told to her. I think by the end I did feel more free. This weekend she took care of me in every way. Our three days were packed: The bridge and all the tourists on it. Lunch at a diner. A little walk in North Beach and that bookstore there. Stanford and the Rodin Collection. (I read about Hell's Gate. It said the figures melded into it represented humanity's enslavement by passion.) Manicures. Nola's for dinner. Berkeley for Breakfast. Henna. The very expensive little Haight-Ashbury. Good Vibrations. Asia SF, where the wait staff were all drag queens. Café Proust, by fate. Some independent web publisher party gone awry. Denied at The Justice League. A crappy little diner in Castro. Eyes Wide Shut. The best chocolate milkshake with banana, ever. Mm. Flying: I am not used to flying with the longitude, nor for such short periods. The trip south had more of the feeling of time travel than any trip running with or against the earth's rotation. Climatic changes are much more pronounced across latitude, lending even more credibility to the feeling of having traveled very far with very little effort. We saw a crashed Cessna by the side of the road, on the freeway near Berkeley. Everyone seemed to be fine. One guy was talking on a cell phone. The wings were beat up from the trees encountered on dubious landing, but otherwise, all was intact. On the flight home our plane had to "go around". We were braced for touch down when the sound of the engines thickened and the nose shifted upward. I saw all heads turn toward windows, a voice ask if we were going up again, a child crying. I was impressed with the smoothness of the transition. Now when I think about it, I feel exhilaration.

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