There’s a sign that hangs from a crooked chain link fence at a vacant lot on Van Ness. I pass it on my evening walks. In green letters on a washed-out yellow background, it says “LISTEN TO THE HAPPYS”. I think the sign is wooden or metal, though it looks like cardboard. I assume it’s a promo for a band or something, but I like the idea of having a case of the happys – or something like that. It, the sign, is one of the many things that reflexively makes me smile. Every. Damn. Time.
Yesterday (and today), someone turned up the volume on the sunshine. Yesterday, it was in the mid sixties and gorgeous. Ironically, I love and hate these types of days. Or more accurately, I love these types of days, but I dislike the deficit mentality that stalks me like a masked vigilante – teasing and chiding me for wasting a single drop of this weather. Because I want to “make the most” of days like this, I often find myself paralyzed by indecision on just how to go about my “most-making” business. Do I walk to the beach? To Golden Gate Park? Sit by the water and read/write? Walk over the bridge to Sausalito? Go to the Chinese New Year’s Parade? Head out to the Headlands and hike? Any one of those things would be lovely. These are good problems to have.
Then, when it nears noon and I haven’t committed to anything, and I haven’t gone for a run or done much of anything “productive,” I become acutely aware of time slipping away. I get frustrated with myself and my time-wasting ways. In those moments, I try to listen to my body and my mind. I ask myself “what do you want to do? What do you feel like doing?” Unfortunately, my body and mind respond with a shrug. They seem happy to do just about anything. And it’s not that I’m trying to pick the perfect or best activity and it’s certainly not that I’m worried that my choice will be a dud. In those moments, I try to tell myself to take a step – any step. Make a decision and go with it. There are no wrong choices.
Yesterday, as I fought with myself about wasting my morning, I began to wonder how I came to believe that making the most of a beautiful day means getting outside for as many hours as possible. And this is where I had to acknowledge that I might be working from a deficit mindset. I’m not used to having this many nice days, and it pains me to waste them or spend them in less-than optimal ways (like cleaning the apartment, doing laundry, etc.). Doing a quick web comparison… on average San Francisco has 259 sunny days per year, Philadelphia has 207, and State College has 178. San Francisco also gets about half the rain that Philly and State College get – and none of the snow. In terms of temperature, it seldom gets below 45 degrees or above 70 degrees – year round. It’s not that I want to take this weather for granted, but I am thinking that maybe I need to adjust my definition of “making the most of it.” Maybe dial it down a notch so that a good day is measured by some time outside – not necessarily ALL the time outside.
I also have to consider that I’ve always been a sun worshiper. I was a feral child. The summertime stick ball days of my youth were spent outside from sun up to sundown. We played in the woods, we went to the pool at the apartment complex next to us, we played sports or went to the playground at the school, we rode bikes and played manhunt and fished and chased down ice cream trucks and jumped off swing sets. At recess, we ran out on to the playground or the blacktop screaming for joy. I’m not sure I ever grew out of that. When I see a nice day brewing, I want to be out there in the worst way. I can remember a time not too long ago when I’d be returning to the office from a midday meeting and the sun was out and I’d feel very tempted to play hookie and stop at the state park that was along the way.
As predicted – there were no bad options yesterday. In jeans and a t-shirt (because the weather allowed it), I went on a 12 mile round-trip city walking excursion. I walked to and through Golden Gate Park and then went to the beach where I watched another glorious sunset.
At the park there were people out roller skating and listening to live bands and DJs. Sun bathers lounged on the lawns and in flower gardens. People played volleyball and grilled and sat around in circles like they were tailgate the arrival of spring. This is when it occurred to me that the national and local narrative about the decline of this city might be based on an elevated baseline or a failure to notice all of the great things going on. Nearly everyone I saw seemed to be happy and having a good time. And much like the weather, if people out enjoying the sunshine is the normal state of things, any decline in quality of life is going to be seen as problematic. This is when I want to grab the naysayers by the shoulders and shake them awake – yelling at them, “Listen to the happys. Dammit.”
On my return trip to my apartment, I walked through the city. I took a slightly different street (30th) than I would normally take. Like most streets here, it had a hill. As I got closer to the top of the hill, I could look left and see the ocean in that dusky, twilight, blue-mauve glow that happens as the last light of day fades. Maybe half a block further up the hill, I could look to my right and see a massive, full, orange-ish moon rising over the city skyline. In about another half block, having crested the hill, I could see, straight ahead, the bay and sparkling hillsides dotted with houses and the warm glow Golden Gate Bridge. I wish the pictures could do justice to the spectacle. The blurry blue light next to the moon is the Salesforce Tower.
Morning frustrations aside, I had my breath taken away a few times throughout the day. I saw lots of things that made me smile. The first note on my phone yesterday was about the humming bird buzzing in the Magnolia tree outside of my apartment window and the last note was about the views from the top of 30th street.
When I initially sat down to write this, it was mid-morning yesterday. I was frustrated with myself because I had gotten up late and was wasting a perfectly fine day. I knew I needed to get out and do something. Feeling paralyzed by indecision, I was wishing I had a friend or partner who could make the decision for me. I’m still adjusting to a lot of things: slowing down, a flood of sunny days, planning less and being in the moment more. By the end of the day, I had to give myself some credit for wingin’ it. In my past life, a trip to the beach would have involved taking a chair and a bag and a towel and a book. It would have meant paying attention to the time so that I could avoid shore traffic on the way there and on the way back. Yesterday, I urban-hiked to the beach and showed up with what I was wearing, my phone, and my earbuds. I took my shoes and socks off and found a spot not too far from the ocean. I sat in the sand and didn’t care about getting sandy. It wasn’t crowded the way the Jersey shore gets crowded and a lot of people were there on their own. Which was another thing that struck me – this is a pretty good place to be on your own.
Throughout the day, I had in my head the Tony Hoagland poem I had shared here the other day. The last lines of which read, “Now you sit on the brick wall in the cloudy afternoon, and swing / your legs, / happy because there never has been a word for this // as you continue moving through these days and years / where more and more of the message is / not to measure anything.” I’m trying to get out of my old and gluttonous habit of trying to maximize my joy. I’m trying to measure less against what’s come before or what my come next. I’m trying to spend more time listening to the happys.