This week it has been raining. Not a lot, but a little each day. The skies have been dark and down pouring, light and drizzling, clear and foggy with winds and calms and some stars poking out last night as I was walking past Huntington Park on Nob Hill. This catches my attention; I never see stars in the sky anymore. I was on my way back from dropping off a car (from one of the local car share companies/organizations) after dropping off a friend.
On the way back to the garage I had a few minutes before my car was due, so I crested the hill, over the cable car tracks (you can catch air, not that I necessarily recommend doing so), saw the beam flash from the lighthouse on Alcatraz across the dark water.
Late night San Francisco is a place of dangerously fast moving cabs running red lights and generally terrorizing the denizens of the dark. But not the one in front of me on Polk Street. That cab is moving slowly and with intent, scanning the bars and clubs for an outstretched hand and another fare.
Still a few more minutes until my reservation is up. I should have been in bed a couple hours ago; I could have put this sedan away and gone to sleep right after dropping off my friend, but I hate to waste my alloted car time. Next, a stop at the 24 hour supermarket for the toiletries I forgot to buy earlier when I walked to the pharmacy. Three giggling girls are at the checkout counter and the cashier is doing something to make them laugh. I see he is twirling a toilet plunger before dropping it into a bag and handing it to one of them. If I had been behind them in line I would not have been able to resist asking what happened that made them buy a plunger in the wee hours of the morning. I mean, I pretty much know what happened, but maybe the story would have been more interesting or exotic than just that. At this time of night, who knows what might happen.
The store’s parking lot exits on a one-way street, so I find myself going down, then over, then up, then back to California Street to glide into the garage. I am exhausted and delirious and happy and content. The wind and drizzle hit my face, my sweatshirt flaps behind me in the breeze. Three blocks, two stairs, one elevator ride, two locks, one stop in the bathroom and a crawl into bed.
