A Girl...

Little Miracles

Since buying our house last summer, I've felt the relentless compulsion to be in, around, or at least near the house as much as possible. I leave the office early to work from the house. We spend weekends cleaning, fixing up, or buying things for the house. We don't do the socializing, concert-going, beach-cruising that we used to because we're too busy at the house, even if it's only to anchor the structure securly to the earth with the weight of our own two homebound asses. It reminds me of the first few months after I'd moved out of my parents' house into my first apartment, when the combination of being so poor and so much in sticker shock over the cost of Bay Area rent ($1150/month for 400 sq. ft. with no dishwasher or laundry facilities, and that was seven years ago and a bargain at that!) that when we went back to Salt Lake for the holidays that year, I couldn't stand to be away for too long because if I was going to pay $45 per day to live in that apartment, damn if I'd pay $45 per day to be 900 miles away from it for two whole weeks.

Eventually, I got over myself/became accustomed to the cost of living/rationalized that I wasn't paying $45/day to be there but to store my stuff there, and lo and behold, I discovered that yes, there is life outside [my] apartment and it can be pretty great a lot of the time, especially when spent in the company of good people and under a dome of absolutely perfect weather.

Which brings us to last weekend. We gardened (A LOT) and even planted the first of this year's crops (broccoli, torpedo onions, and five kinds of tomatoes!), and Simon even spent two whole hours cleaning every last inch of the media room all by himself. But! We also got out of, away from, beyond the tractor-beam pull of the house and all its niggling projects, and relaxed, rejuvenated, and reminded ourselves of all the many and varied ways one can spend one's time that does not involve a Swiffer or a Garden Weasel.

I spent Saturday afternoon with my long-lost photography group (they have been meeting whilst I have been flaking) at one of my favorite spots in the city--Crissy Field, an early 1900s airstrip-turned-park that runs along the bayside beach of the Golden Gate Bridge. (I've been there many times before.) A good portion of our outing covered the path that Simon ran and biked during the Escape from Alcatraz triathlon he completed a few years ago (aka before his back spazzed out), and strolling in familiar tracks was the kick-in-the-pants reminder I needed to keep living in the present (and sometimes reliving the best moments of the past) instead of focusing only on the future--on what I want, on what I don't yet have, on what I will be doing this time next year, next month, next week. Yes. Got it.

On Sunday we attended picnic that, while I hesitate to call it an "Easter picnic" due to the lack of, oh, practicing Christians in attendance, I feel I must call an "Easter picnic" because it included (a) one huge-ass ham, (b) cupcakes topped with Peeps (dismembered; mine had a pink bunny head), and (c) one of the best examples of Jesuslike (Jesusesque? Jesusian?) charity I have witnessed since at least Vatican II.

While we were picnicking in the park with our embarrassment of foodstuffs (the core group of invitees are chefs at a local chic-chic tapas bar), a resident hobo toddled over to our table and started in on the habitual "spare some change" jingle that all locals know by heart. And while I'm sure that our group of liberal Democrats sympathizes with the plight of the downtrodden, and never forgets to give generously to the food bank at Thanksgiving, it looked for a second like no one was even going to acknowledge the guy let alone dig into skinny-jean pockets and art-fair purses for loose quarters and dimes. We avoidavoidavoid not because we don't care (I hope) but because we are shy, scared, embarrassed, for ourselves as well as for them. We want to make our donations in pen on paper at tax time and hope that the universe will balance out our charity with one, or two, or a dozen, fewer street beggars lurking near the train stations and cafes and, worst of all, the ATMs. We want poverty and homelessness to be eradicated, but, truth be told, we also just want it to go away.

So this obviously homeless guy wanders over to our picnic and avertavertavert go the gazes of thirty-odd people save the one dude who walks over to the uninvited guest, hands him a paper plate and some plastic utensils, and tells him to have his way with the feast. You should have seen this guy's face. You really should have seen this guy's face. To top it off, while the plate is sagging ever more under the weight of ham and mac and cheese and salad and chicken and ravioli and spushi (sushi rolls made with Spam *gak*) and cupcakes with Peeps on top, the homeless man feels a tap on his shoulder and finds that he is also being offered two cold cans of Budweiser--one for himself, and one for the friend who is watching the miracle go down from across the park. Now, I can't say I approve of the give-the-bum-a-beer approach, but then I am sort of a prude about certain things, so that's that, but the point is that he took his food (a modest amount for someone who had not eaten in who knows how long), walked over to where his friend was waiting, set his plate down, walked ten feet over to a hedge and pissed into it, and then sat down and had himself a fine Easter lunch. When Simon and I left the picnic about a half hour later, we saw the hobo again, kicking around a soccer ball with the guy who had given him the beer. This is the sort of story I hope you heard at church on Sunday.