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Your San Francisco, California Dreamin' Time in Life


shootingstar

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For me, it was for lst few yrs. ..in Toronto after I finished  my studies and graduated. (Thank god.) It wasn't the 1960's.

It was the early 1980's onward for me. And I didn't need to wear flowers in my hair. My hair is too straight to hold in flowers.

I was exploring/enjoying a very large, cosmopolitan city and all its  neighbourhoods, holding down 2  part-time jobs, taking evening art courses and volunteer several yrs. for literary magazine for Asian-CAnadian artists and later  then, a national organization on race relations. It was a exploratory time for me:  big ideas, social activism, learning alot, inspired lots, new friends, ...but now in real  life not, in books. I guess I met some  guys, but none like dearie. He came into my life, after I bought my own home.

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San Fran is a cool place, NorCal has a much different vibe than SoCal.  But like anyplace it has its pros & cons.  Really expensive housing for one but they have great seafood up there.  They make a seafood chowder  I can’t find anywhere else.  It’s thick & creamy like like New England style but has tomato sauce too.  It is one of my favorites and I can’t find it anywhere else. 

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8 minutes ago, ChrisL said:

San Fran is a cool place, NorCal has a much different vibe than SoCal.  But like anyplace it has its pros & cons.  Really expensive housing for one but they have great seafood up there.  They make a seafood chowder  I can’t find anywhere else.  It’s thick & creamy like like New England style but has tomato sauce too.  It is one of my favorites and I can’t find it anywhere else. 

I've been to San Fran. twice. The last trip was a job interview (about 25 yrs. ago).. though at Berkley, U of  C. I enjoyed San Fran alot however lst visit was more extended family visit...meeting aunts, uncles and lst cousins that I never knew even existed. So unfortunately my memory of Golden Gate Park, a museum, etc., got distracted by family members.

I think my nephew is probably enjoying exploring with GF  there now. They both as CAnadians, have permanent jobs.  Just wonder if they will be there forever.

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My "California Dreaming"  stage was during high school.  One ended along side the other pretty quickly outside of boat life during university.   I used to love San Fran but much of the allure is gone.  It has become a somewhat disgusting sh1thole much like East Hastings in Vancouver.  Love the area, love the climate but not the city. 

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57 minutes ago, Wilbur said:

My "California Dreaming"  stage was during high school.  One ended along side the other pretty quickly outside of boat life during university.   I used to love San Fran but much of the allure is gone.  It has become a somewhat disgusting sh1thole much like East Hastings in Vancouver.  Love the area, love the climate but not the city. 

Well, one day I'll have to ask nephew. Not sure when he will be visiting Toronto again... Probably in the wealthier areas in SF, it's still fine.   As usual in any big city with high cost of housing... which is never good. East Hastings has gotten worse during covid...historic Chinatown is seriously vandalized even more often now. I don't foresee even after pulling out of covid, the area will get a whole lot better.

Oh yea, we were talking about great times in one's life of feelin' groovin', the world open with possibilities, love, adventure/exploration, big ideas.

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2 minutes ago, shootingstar said:

Well, one day I'll have to ask nephew. Not sure when he will be visiting Toronto again... Probably in the wealthier areas in SF, it's still fine.   As usual in any big city with high cost of housing... which is never good. East Hastings has gotten worse during covid...historic Chinatown is seriously vandalized even more often now. I don't foresee even after pulling out of covid, the area will get a whole lot better.

Vancouver's problem started with Expo 86 when low cost housing buildings along False Creek were either torn down or converted to high end apartments. That displaced hundreds.  The mayors of Toronto, Winnipeg and Calgary were giving their homeless bus fare and small amounts of cash to relocate to a warmer winter climate in BC.  Thousands came in and flooded the east end.  There has been an overload of homeless since and unfortunately, it has always been on the fringe of Gastown, Cosy Corner and Chinatown.  

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...no one should come here. Life just unbearable here. If the Grapes of Wrath and Dune had a bastard child, it would turn out to look like San Francisco.  *snork*

Back in the good old days, there was no homeless problem.  If we could just go back to calling them hobo's, it would go a long way toward a solution.

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12 minutes ago, shootingstar said:

Ok, let's hear about your craziness..

...I was a perfectly sane, stoner hippie for the first ten years after I got out of the Navy.  Went to college at U of Md, College Park, drove a cab in D.C. for money, left in '76 with all my possessions aboard a '48 Willys bus conversion. For a couple of years prior, I had managed the swimming pool at the Washington hospital center nursing school. Grew organic vegetables up north of the Twin Cities for a while living with a group, studied glassblowing and blacksmithing/farrier science.  Ran a blacksmith  shop for one summer over in Green Bay, in the living history museum.

All perfectly normal stuff, pretty boring. Nothing to see here, folks. Please just move along.

OK, maybe the Navy stuff was a little crazy, but I was too young to know any better. :blush:

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30 minutes ago, Page Turner said:

...I was a perfectly sane, stoner hippie for the first ten years after I got out of the Navy.  Went to college at U of Md, College Park, drove a cab in D.C. for money, left in '76 with all my possessions aboard a '48 Willys bus conversion. For a couple of years prior, I had managed the swimming pool at the Washington hospital center nursing school. Grew organic vegetables up north of the Twin Cities for a while living with a group, studied glassblowing and blacksmithing/farrier science.  Ran a blacksmith  shop for one summer over in Green Bay, in the living history museum.

All perfectly normal stuff, pretty boring. Nothing to see here, folks. Please just move along.

OK, maybe the Navy stuff was a little crazy, but I was too young to know any better. :blush:

In all honesty, my life took turns after formal education.

Then with dearie  it took more turns. I doubt my friends nor family would have predicted I worked and lived in 2 different provinces outside of Ontario. But no exciting overseas living.  Cycling lifestyle adds a more unexpected twist for alot of people who knew me well. (Totally boring ho-hum here.)

 I sold my Toronto home and  left a full-time decent paying job with a major firm, with dearie's help packed my possessions to live with him in Vancouver when he retired.  So I did move for love. So I left a Toronto job, with no job offers slated in  Vancouver at that time.

But all my moves were thought out...... unlike you where you seemed to follow a destination, an idea that looked intriguing.

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2 hours ago, shootingstar said:

Well, one day I'll have to ask nephew. Not sure when he will be visiting Toronto again... Probably in the wealthier areas in SF, it's still fine.   As usual in any big city with high cost of housing... which is never good. East Hastings has gotten worse during covid...historic Chinatown is seriously vandalized even more often now. I don't foresee even after pulling out of covid, the area will get a whole lot better.

Oh yea, we were talking about great times in one's life of feelin' groovin', the world open with possibilities, love, adventure/exploration, big ideas.

San Fran is such an urban sprawl, it has its nice areas & bad.  Do you know if he’s in the city of San Francisco or one of the neighboring cities?   

I almost took a job in San Jose once and spent a lot of time up there for work.  But that’s not really San Francisco. 

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30 minutes ago, shootingstar said:

But all my moves were thought out...... unlike you where you seemed to follow a destination, an idea that looked intriguing.

...I did very well academically through my high school years, which ended in '67. 

The whole country seemed to be flying apart in '67-'69. and honestly, career planning seemed to be an afterthought to survival.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

"It was the first time I had dealt directly and flatly with the evidence of atomization, the proof that things fall apart: I went to San Francisco because I had not been able to work in some months, had ben paralyzed by the conviction that writing was an irrelevant act, that the world as I had understood it no longer existed...That was why the piece (Slouching Towards Bethlehem) was important to me.

And after it was printed I saw that, however directly and flatly I thought I had said it, I had failed to get through to many of the people who read and even liked the piece, failed to suggest that I was talking about something more general than a handful of children wearing mandalas on their foreheads.

...I had never gotten feedback that was so universally beside the point."

Joan Didion  (in the forward to the book of the same name.)

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26 minutes ago, ChrisL said:

San Fran is such an urban sprawl, it has its nice areas & bad.  Do you know if he’s in the city of San Francisco or one of the neighboring cities?   

I almost took a job in San Jose once and spent a lot of time up there for work.  But that’s not really San Francisco. 

I think he's probably living in a  'burbs city.  Meta headquarters is located in San Mateo.... his employer. I found it weird he was required to relocate during covid..it is a tech. firm.  His GF  grew up/family in Vancouver. If she's not homesick for VAncouver, then she's taken too much for granted. It  would be way more beautiful than Frisco. (How  Canadian I am. :whistle:)

Metro Toronto is huge and sprawling. City of Toronto is surrounded by its multiple suburban cities, north, west and east.  Can't go south or you'll fall into Lake Ontario.  Wilbur and Rattlecan live way out on the fringes in their 'burb city outside of  City of Toronto. I know they love their corner of their world.  My family are scattered within City of Toronto...there are some great /liveable neighbourhoods which rated well..gentrified over time.

So nephew is used to this  ....a historic core city with sprawl.  He probably doing alot more driving.  May he keep fit. 

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I'd guess the years right after college.  I moved to Dallas and so did a number of my friends from college.  It was almost like life in the dorm, except we all had jobs. I didn't make much, but it seemed like a lot after having no paycheck.  Eventually people got married, or moved away or got more demanding jobs timewise, but that was a pretty fun time.

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2 hours ago, Kirby said:

I'd guess the years right after college.  I moved to Dallas and so did a number of my friends from college.  It was almost like life in the dorm, except we all had jobs. I didn't make much, but it seemed like a lot after having no paycheck.  Eventually people got married, or moved away or got more demanding jobs timewise, but that was a pretty fun time.

I think that's the whole point is after studies, is to enjoy a few years, where there is a job or 2, but more important, time to explore life, etc. It doesn't require a ton of money if one has the right attitude. 

I found it amusing another nephew who just landed a summer job with Amazon Vancouver....now he has to scramble to find a rental place with another buddy in Vancouver. Uh...yea. How expensive for  students.  His mother, my sister, flapped her hand, oh those boys will figure it out.   She has no clue where the boys are looking for rental. They'll have to learn... :)   It won't take these young men to learn fast..they do come from Toronto. 

Meanwhile I know nephew will be outdoors outside of work, enjoying Vancouver. I'm sure they'll go kayaking, hiking, etc. nearby...it's just too bad I can't be there.

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