I spent the weekend in one of America's grand old cities, San Francisco, wandering from Nob Hill to Union Square, to North Beach, Chinatown, Fisherman's Wharf and Ghirardelli Square. The city was alive with the energy and movement of people seeing the sights, dining at street side tables, packed into the fabled cable cars like sardines. The locals sat in their favorite spots, reading books or listening to music on their I-pods. The tourists, all marked by the camera they were carrying, snapped photos of everything in sight--the beautiful skyline, architecture, busy streets, cable cars.
With all the people shopping and browsing, cars seemed so ill suited to this busy inner city environment, just something that actually impeded the flow of energy there. But after a four block descent from Nob Hill, down fairly steep hills for breakfast, the last thing you want to do is climb them again. So I found myself in what looked to be a 30 minute line to board a cable car, a five block uphill ride that would have cost our party of four $24. until I suggested a $5 cab fare would be a better choice. Cars do have their uses in some capacity, but I found myself wondering why anyone would want to take a personal automobile into the heart of a city like this, where parking is virtually impossible to find and you spend more time riding the brake than the gas pedal. If we could find a way to get us quickly from one city to another, and then set up more efficient ways to move pedestrians about, we might be able to say goodbye to our beloved cars, along with GM and Chrysler. Our own car sat unloved in an expensive parking berth the whole day, useful only when it came time to change locations and head out of town to Sausalito. In thinking about our situation now as a nation in the fire of decline and transformation, the fate of the car will soon be decided. Yet at the moment we are "wandering between two worlds, one dead, the other powerless to be born," as Matthew Arnold wrote. What will replace our cars? Are we even thinking about it, let alone designing and building that new transportation system? How long will we wait to begin the enormous task of building a new world on the ashes of the old? Our whole infrastructure is still set up to accommodate cars and credit card carrying shoppers, both in evident decline.
During the visit we must have passed all of 500 stores selling gifts, clothing, food, antiques, and Asian artifacts, and I wondered how long it would take a person to simply visit each store in Chinatown. I have always been drawn to all things Asian, and was simply thrilled to be immersed in a place where dragons and tigers glowered from bamboo wall hangings, while other paintings depicted elegant ladies sitting beneath ornate parasols in their traditional Chinese Qipao dresses. I have long stared at the delicate strokes of Chinese calligraphy, wondering at the hidden meaning, and ascribing to each character some hint of the deep mysteries of Buddhism and Taoism, religions I have studied for years. At long last I had a native speaker of Mandarin with me to actually tell me what all the wall hangings were saying! Looking longingly at a beautiful red banner, I learned, to my chagrin, that it simply read "Merry Christmas / Happy New Year!"
We wandered into 5 or 6 stores, barely 1% of the places I saw on just a few of the busy streets. How did all these businesses survive? One store had a carving of jade carp priced at just under $5000, and I wondered how long that item had been sitting there--possibly for years, unsold. While there was clearly no sign of the dread "recession" in the heart of San Francisco, I wondered what the city life would be if all the tourists, about 50% of the traffic, were removed. Were we to be a nation of tourists, taking pictures of each other while the larger infrastructure of our society slowly came unraveled around us?
Yet there was so much life and energy in the city--so much art and creativity, a dynamic flow that had everyone smiling, walking, talking, gawking about with the wonder of what human beings had created there, an eclectic mix of cultures, languages, art, cuisine, and craftsmanship. There was history, modernity, magic in the city, and I felt it strongly. And yes, I knew to a certainty why Tony Bennett could sing that he left his heart in San Francisco--for I found mine there that weekend, born again and glowing with the light of early love. And something told me that the same sweat and desire and life that had raised up this beautiful city would survive this period of change and transformation, and build something new and equally wonderful. We may be feeling our decline now, but there is yet a spirit and inner strand of courage and creativity that will see us through. As Tennyson wrote in his epic poem Ulysses:
'Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks;
The long day wanes; the slow moon climbs; the deep
Moans round with many voices.
Come, my friends. 'T is not too late to seek a newer world...
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are,--
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.'
With all the people shopping and browsing, cars seemed so ill suited to this busy inner city environment, just something that actually impeded the flow of energy there. But after a four block descent from Nob Hill, down fairly steep hills for breakfast, the last thing you want to do is climb them again. So I found myself in what looked to be a 30 minute line to board a cable car, a five block uphill ride that would have cost our party of four $24. until I suggested a $5 cab fare would be a better choice. Cars do have their uses in some capacity, but I found myself wondering why anyone would want to take a personal automobile into the heart of a city like this, where parking is virtually impossible to find and you spend more time riding the brake than the gas pedal. If we could find a way to get us quickly from one city to another, and then set up more efficient ways to move pedestrians about, we might be able to say goodbye to our beloved cars, along with GM and Chrysler. Our own car sat unloved in an expensive parking berth the whole day, useful only when it came time to change locations and head out of town to Sausalito. In thinking about our situation now as a nation in the fire of decline and transformation, the fate of the car will soon be decided. Yet at the moment we are "wandering between two worlds, one dead, the other powerless to be born," as Matthew Arnold wrote. What will replace our cars? Are we even thinking about it, let alone designing and building that new transportation system? How long will we wait to begin the enormous task of building a new world on the ashes of the old? Our whole infrastructure is still set up to accommodate cars and credit card carrying shoppers, both in evident decline.
During the visit we must have passed all of 500 stores selling gifts, clothing, food, antiques, and Asian artifacts, and I wondered how long it would take a person to simply visit each store in Chinatown. I have always been drawn to all things Asian, and was simply thrilled to be immersed in a place where dragons and tigers glowered from bamboo wall hangings, while other paintings depicted elegant ladies sitting beneath ornate parasols in their traditional Chinese Qipao dresses. I have long stared at the delicate strokes of Chinese calligraphy, wondering at the hidden meaning, and ascribing to each character some hint of the deep mysteries of Buddhism and Taoism, religions I have studied for years. At long last I had a native speaker of Mandarin with me to actually tell me what all the wall hangings were saying! Looking longingly at a beautiful red banner, I learned, to my chagrin, that it simply read "Merry Christmas / Happy New Year!"
We wandered into 5 or 6 stores, barely 1% of the places I saw on just a few of the busy streets. How did all these businesses survive? One store had a carving of jade carp priced at just under $5000, and I wondered how long that item had been sitting there--possibly for years, unsold. While there was clearly no sign of the dread "recession" in the heart of San Francisco, I wondered what the city life would be if all the tourists, about 50% of the traffic, were removed. Were we to be a nation of tourists, taking pictures of each other while the larger infrastructure of our society slowly came unraveled around us?
Yet there was so much life and energy in the city--so much art and creativity, a dynamic flow that had everyone smiling, walking, talking, gawking about with the wonder of what human beings had created there, an eclectic mix of cultures, languages, art, cuisine, and craftsmanship. There was history, modernity, magic in the city, and I felt it strongly. And yes, I knew to a certainty why Tony Bennett could sing that he left his heart in San Francisco--for I found mine there that weekend, born again and glowing with the light of early love. And something told me that the same sweat and desire and life that had raised up this beautiful city would survive this period of change and transformation, and build something new and equally wonderful. We may be feeling our decline now, but there is yet a spirit and inner strand of courage and creativity that will see us through. As Tennyson wrote in his epic poem Ulysses:
'Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks;
The long day wanes; the slow moon climbs; the deep
Moans round with many voices.
Come, my friends. 'T is not too late to seek a newer world...
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are,--
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.'
