The Alley

There are many obscure alleys in the Mission.

Spencer is one of them.

It dead ends after only half a block of existence.

Trucks are advised not to enter the alley.

When they do, they are soon sorry.

The Mission has a sunny climate, compared to the more ocean-exposed parts of the city.

The alley in its sheltered isolation must be one of the warmest spots in the Mission.  

Idols

The long chain of California missions founded by the Franciscans in the 18th century had mostly decayed through neglect by the early 20th century. But then there was a big movement to spruce them up as tourist destinations. Now they flourish again, though perhaps more as historical than as religious sites. Photos are from the Carol M. Highsmith archive at the Library of Congress.

Mission Stencil with Poem

Stricken Proverbs


A full vessel is inaudible.

                    *

Every cliff has a glass edge,
every chasm a covering cloud.
Every lining has a hidden needle.

                    *

Many a sickle rakes the stubble.

                    *

A rip in space needs a stitch in time.

                    *

Time's flies wait to feast on no man.

                    *

Art longs for the brevity of life.

                    *

Never a nail in the blacksmith's forge,
nor a pen in the poet's pocket.

                    *

Home is where the heart can't live.

                    *

All Rome leads to are roads.

                    *

For the deep well: a long cord and a light bucket.

                    *

Where there's a will, there's a wall.


– by Jamie McKendrick (seen earlier here translating Valerio Magrelli)

Dawn Tower

 Another early walk – with dramatic light effects as the sun came up.

The photos below were all taken  at the beginning of the walk – daylight still dim and diffused. The little streets and alleys around Folsom – the part that is more or less in the Mission – have proved a happy hunting ground on several recent days.

Thanksgiving Diamond

There must surely be cities that swell up with visitors on major holidays, but San Francisco is not one of them. Or at least not in my neighborhood. The streets in the Mission appeared to be completely deserted this morning. And this makes sense. The local population is skewed, after all, toward the young end of the bell curve – kids who leave town to see their distant families (and thus make sure the streams of money from back home keep flowing unimpeded). Good to find the San Francisco Bike Messenger Association memorial mural (middle photo, above) – an exceptional piece of work recently completed by Lindsay Marie and Mongo Crust. WE THE MESSENGERS OF SAN FRANCISCO REMEMBER THOSE WHOSE SACRIFICES INSPIRE US TO PRESERVE THE ANCIENT CALL OF MESSENGER.
  

Honor the Game

At dawn on Sunday the streets in the Mission were wet and the sky looked dangerous, though no rain was actually falling when I went out.

A few days earlier I had seen the soldered numerals below at the entrance to an old apartment building off Folsom, but had no camera with me. Documenting them was, in my opinion, well worth an early morning expedition. And of course I found other things, too.

The painted images below are from an eye-level mural ornamenting one long windowless wall of a Mexican restaurant in the same neighborhood (one of the borderlands between the Mission and SOMA). 

It did not rain. The sky (as below) began to clear, in fact, and the sun even became partly visible. Looking up, I vainly longed for the illustrated book given to me some years back by my daughter about identifying categories of clouds (especially those streamer-like ones making faint vertical stripes in the picture's upper left corner) but as usual I was not carrying it when needed. 

HONOR THE GAME reads the lettering on the retaining wall. The view above happens to be of the playing field at Mission High, but all high schools have similar admonitions painted in big letters somewhere or other. Even as a child I was so put off by their hortatory tone that I always instantaneously rejected the message, whatever its merits. And my reflex remains exactly the same, all these decades later. Unevolved.