My Friend, Time
Honoring moments big and small in SF. Plus, Ted Lasso, Ed Sheeran and more.
There’s an inexplicable, somewhat unavoidable (and perhaps self-inflicted) pressure that comes with taking up residence somewhere new for a short while. I guess you could call it Friend of FOMO, but it feels slightly less acute. It happened when I “lived” in London for three months back in 2013 and then again just recently in SF. I use quotes because both times I had addresses to give to taxis or delivery services; places to unpack my suitcase and stock some groceries. But the walls I slept within did not belong to me; the mailboxes did not have my name on it. And so time felt fleeting. Borrowed, almost. Every moment, while still my own, mattered more than usual.
As such, in SF, I’d happen upon a lovely park with a quiet nook for reading, but also have to pee. Badly. Still, I’d think, maybe I should hold it in and hang around because will I really return to this pocket of sweetness?
Or it’d be an hour before sunset and the MUNI is right there to take me west to Ocean Beach. But I am tired and don’t have the appropriate gear to keep warm in that cooler part of the city. Still, there is this gnawing sense to go anyway. When will I otherwise?
I’d be at a café where they have my favorite choux pastry and even though I am not hungry, I feel like I choux-d taste it because will I come back another day? The same went for the coffee place with the ricotta cardamon bun and the labneh and olive boureka, and the cocktail bar that does drinks and brunch. Or the museum with the two interesting exhibits. Go for one, the other, or both? Is there energy? Money? An appetite? Time?
And yet, I’ve had more than most. More than a traditional vacation, that’s for sure. Because it wasn’t one. (Although, it did feel like a sabbatical at times due to the lack of traditional work I had on my plate, allowing me even more freedom and flexibility to explore.) Still, in my attempt to get to know San Francisco and the Bay Area over the last two months, I was balancing this Friend of FOMO feeling with also wanting—needing—to just be. To do as I do in Paris: write newsletters, lead caves, pitch stories, take spin or yoga classes, watch Ted Lasso, and Top Chef and Succession, swipe right (but mostly left), overthink, over-Gram, read novels, water plants.
It’s any wonder that I also managed to bike over the Golden Gate Bridge to Sausalito, drive up to Napa or down to Carmel or pursue an exciting assignment in Pescadero. Then there were all the hikes: Alone in Tennessee Valley. Alone in Point Lobos State Reserve. Alone up to Twin Peaks and Bernal Heights, and down to Lands End. There were hikes with friends, too, including an itty-bitty one in Menlo Park and a whopper of one from Mill Valley to Stinson Beach, as well as a couple of snow days in Lake Tahoe. I visited the UC Berkeley campus and Stanford, attended two Passover seders, Shabbat at a local synagogue, and a ballet recital in the ‘burbs.
The spaces in between all those noteworthy activities highlighted on my Instagram feed; between the typed out words and periods and commas that make up those sentences, hold so much more, though. Not just the details, sensations and emotions that each one of them bring up when I close my eyes and recall the moments in my mind: The moody marine layer that came in and out on one hike; the smooth, weathered rock I found on a beach during another. But the additional, perhaps inconsequential, unlistable instances that also took place before and after them. The ones that linked Sara the Do-er with Sara the Be-er. Sara the Visitor with Sara the Local. They’re like the soreness in my calves after a long hike: unseen, and certainly not planned, but no less there. No less felt. Like that night I went for a crumb donut at Bob’s post a concert nearby; or when I made a really great NYT recipe using sweet cherry tomatoes from the Fort Mason Farmer’s Market; or when I found myself scouring Walgreens after Walgreens (and eventually a Safeway) on the hunt for Aquafresh toothpaste; or when I fell asleep on a bench in Golden Gate Park’s Botanical Gardens, and then, an hour later, happened upon Hippie Hill at 4:20 and sparked it up; or when I ran into Girl Scouts selling cookies in early March; and saw seals at Fisherman’s Wharf after a cup of chowder and met a couple of Frenchies at a beer hall and practiced parlez-vous-ing; and, once and for all, figured out my burrito order: super veg, no rice, pinto beans.
Those empty spaces also contain the new friends and the bright orange poppies and the swaying palm trees and the shadows that the afternoon light casts against the Victorian houses, which always caught my attention whether there was energy…money…an appetite…Time. The big moments, the small moments, and even the Friend of FOMO moments, have felt both like yesterday and a year. Who does Time belong to anyway? Me, you, all of us, none of us. We are what we make of it, not what we don’t.
My Mom always says, “When you leave something behind, that means you want to go back.” But does it count if I leave things purposely behind? Not only that garden bench I couldn’t comfortably sit on because I had to pee or the pastry I couldn’t eat because I wasn’t hungry. But a small bag with a pair of sneakers, a sweater, and some SPF tucked into someone else’s closet because I couldn’t seem to fit them into an already-stuffed suitcase. All things that, without realizing it, contribute to existing comfortably, and naturally, in San Francisco. Like a visitor or a local? Only my friend, Time, will tell.
See you in New York and then, enfin, back in Paris, friends. Bon week-end! xx — Sara
Clickable
Writing and waiting tables: “you just keep grinding, turn and burn.” | Dirt
Zen and the art of process, Sarah Silverman-style. | The New Yorker
Drummer Meg White doesn’t want to talk about anything. | ELLE
But Drew Barrymore spills all the beans on daytime TV. | Vulture
The robots are coming for us. | WaPo
Fish Tales: The Little Mermaid’s Flounder is not a flounder. | Slate
Forget the dress, YES to calmer, quieter, smaller weddings. | Gloria
And yet, Beanie Feldstein’s camp-themed affair looked ab fab. | Vogue
Guinness World Records — still a thing?! | The Guardian
The worst men of SATC are… | Vanity Fair
Do you do dupes? | The Cut
These things happen to all of us. | The New Yorker
Watchable
Last week I watched AIR, the docudrama from Ben Affleck and Matt Damon about Nike’s monumental marketing collaboration with Michael Jordan, and it made me even more appreciative of their super solid advertising efforts over the years—including this recent one to honor the season finale of Ted Lasso, which we all also agree was the series finale, right? Either way, Richmond ’til we die!
On Repeat: Ed Sheeran’s ‘A Beautiful Game’
Speaking of Ted Lasso, this song played at the end of the episode and left me in a puddle of my own tears. Not just for its placement in this feel-good show, but because some of the lyrics hit home extra hard this week as I packed it up in California:
“Though we've not reached the end
We should take some time apart
Leave here with no regrets
Knowin' we gave our all
Oh, I cannot pretend
That this won't break our hearts
But we will meet again…”
Currently Overthinking…
…whether to swap my leather jacket for my rain jacket in a bag skipping NY, but heading to Paris (THANK YOU MIRA)…
Souvenir: Oakley Sunnies
It’s summer here in the northern hemisphere, which means many of us are wearing sunglasses more than usual, which got me thinkin’ about past styles, which got me thinkin’ about the wrap-around cycling sunnies worn by Justin Timberlake, Michael Jordan, and other athletes and known personalities. In addition to a decidedly cool, buggy look, they promised to block blue light in addition to UVA, UVB, and UVC rays. Did you have a pair?