San Francisco Calling

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

It is one of those glorious, guiltily perfect Midwestern September days worthy of one last kool-aid stand and gallop down the slip-n’slide. My muscles twitch with the urgency to extract as much lemony sunshine out of the daylight before the wind picks up and the sky blushes pink. I consult my to-do list and decide to buy myself a new desk chair at Office Max. “The Executive Task Master” – named as creatively as kindergarten crayolas.

Mission complete, I reverse out of my parking spot with the car windows down and the lyrics to Tom Petty’s Free Fallin’ bursting forth from the baseboards. I crank up the knob in nostalgic approval, still flushed with the satisfaction and spontaneity of making an expensive purchase. It is the ideal summer tune, carefree and cocky, and I am flooded with the memory of its uncanny timing after skydiving with my Stanford dormmates freshman year.

I was sardined in the backseat of a Civic that reeked of gym socks and housed floor mats littered with Ritz cracker crumbs. The five of us were already high off our daredevil excursion when the song came spilling through the stereo speakers. As we drove the hour back to campus, the Australian guy shifted to put his hand on my knee and I scooted my arms forward to discourage the maneuver. I blushed at his brazen interest, secretly hiding my own giddiness that someone could so unabashedly fancy me. Still, I didn’t want to seem easy.

It was an empowering year for me. Not only did I make death-defying decisions such as jumping from a plane above an artichoke field in Hollister, CA, but I actually allowed myself to embrace fun. I had been a serious child, diligent and industrious. I measured my self-worth with parental approval, academic success, and athletic achievement. Failure was unacceptable. Excelling was essential. It wasn’t my parent’s expectation. It was mine. And that was almost worse.

I wore a stigma of severity in high school. I raised my hand in history class, conversed with the faculty, and figured blatantly ignoring guys I idolized would ultimately prove an effective strategy. Thankfully, I claimed enough friends to elevate my status out of the loser or nerd category. My other salvation was that I threw a vicious curve ball from the pitcher’s mound and never missed a volleyball serve. However, I was not a partier. I was not the chick you called up on Thursday night to transport a keg in her parent’s mini-van to the new spot in the woods that the cops hadn’t discovered yet. Heck, I didn’t even know about the woods. I actually had a deal with one of my more social friends that I would do her Spanish homework, if she would dish the week’s gossip at our lockers in the morning. Muy bien!

I let down my arms in college. I laughed hysterically, played pool until 2am on beer-stained billiards’ tables, hiked through the foothills, fell in love, ate sushi, drank Goldschlager, karaoked to Cher's Believe, cut my hair above my shoulders, wore bright-colored tank-tops, talked on tattered futons with my legs curled under me, and I wrote. I wrote a lot.

It felt strange and dizzy and delicious. I didn’t abandon all sense by any means, but I reinvented my identity into someone who was waiting to emerge but never could give the egg that last final crack. That’s why I long to return to California. Even if it’s only three days. I feel as though I can reclaim a version of myself that emitted beauty, radiated youth, exuded creativity, and most importantly, came before.

That’s why I want to go to San Francisco.
My heart used to beat there.