Steve

In Osage Street The Mission Wednesday morning *** My San Francisco story includes at least two distinct chapters so far. In chapter one, for the first sixteen years of my life here, I sat in a room in the middle of the night, pushed buttons and listened to public radio programs. Five nights a week, […]

Gregory and Xeno

On the corner of 16th and Valencia The Mission Monday afternoon *** Xeno, Baby. Xeno was born in December, on the darkest day of the year. The air had that cold, damp, satiny gray brume that lets you know the North Pacific will be there far, far longer than any of us. Everything was still. […]

Armand

Orange Alley The Mission Friday afternoon *** Somehow, after writing about this city on a daily basis, I find writing about my own life here oddly challenging. There’s no point in writing about how much I love the city, I obviously do, even since I was a little kid, watching 49ers and Giants games on […]

Eze

Off 24th Street The Mission Thursday morning *** San Francisco. You call it what you want. It’s just as simple as that, period. I been here for 27 years; born at General Hospital and been raised here ever since. I told a friend one time “I’m going to buy a house here in the city […]

Nani

Lilac Alley The Mission Tuesday afternoon *** The City that I Love June 25, 2009 Man in cream colored suit, pedaling away one hand carrying a bouquet of stargazers. Ten-week old soft puppy Hello, welcome to the world You are so golden. A song I, yes, have heard before Drowning in the sea of love […]

Clare

Outside Pirate Cat Radio Cafe 21st Street, The Mission Saturday morning *** Mills College in Oakland was the only college located outside the Midwest I applied to, so naturally I chose it above all others. I left my hometown of Minneapolis in 1996 at the age of seventeen, arriving to pursue my degree and the […]

Autumn

The Women’s Building, Lapidge Street side The Mission Thursday afternoon *** Some cities are like love affairs, beginning with butterflies and thrills, then going through adjustments where you aren’t sure if this is the relationship you want at all, and finally to the realization that this force (or person, or city) has completely changed you […]

Ariel

Orange Alley The Mission Tuesday, late afternoon *** Some things I’ve had in San Francisco: A Dream Actually, I don’t remember the dream. But I remember exactly what happened right after it ended. I sat up, turned to my girlfriend and said: “The thing to remember is that even though the fact that someone as […]

Tucker

Inside the San Francisco Motorcycle Club Folsom Street Wednesday noon *** I first moved to the bay area in 1997. I was burned out at college, so I took a semester off and moved in with some friends in a house in Oakland. Before I went back east to spend my last year in college, […]

Brittney

Orange Alley The Mission Sunday morning *** As a child, when people asked me what I wanted to be, I said a writer. If they pressed further I’d say I want to write in a big city. Didn’t matter which one at the time–Chicago, New York, Los Angeles–I just wanted to be near the pulse […]