San Francisco, CA

There is something about cities which, after a long day spent at the beach, really makes me feel as if we're done for. How can we possibly continue in this arrogance of nature, of the importance of the earth and the ecosystem, knowing precisely the consequences of all the havoc we're wreaking on the planet and not giving a damn? Thinking we're smart enough, we're just witty enough to outsmart the earth, to grow from it independently and without its support? We terrorize the landscape and call it advancement.

At the beach I spent nothing, ate breakfast, took a two hour nap and woke up next to the waves, the fog beginning to break. It becomes that same meditative silence that doesn't need to be broken, a silence to which any interruption would prove inferior. Unnecessary. Do we try to make ourselves necessary? Does our conquering make us matter, is that why we feel it signifies progress?

In the city we sat at each stoplight backed up in traffic, got lost in a maze of one way streets, and ended up in a parking garage for which we paid $12 for 2 1/2 hours on top of the $8 each matinee pricing for a movie which turned out to be not worth the trek. And what could have been? $20 and a good 4 hour investment of time doing nothing, sitting through traffic and feeling somewhat important because obviously something is going on for all these people to be here, we must be important, doing something, going somewhere.

Too cynical? I'm sure. But such a stark contrast begs attention and on an empty stomach, caught in the fourth red light cycle of the same one city block, watching the fog intersect the sunset in the spaces between skyscrapers, there isn't much to be hopeful about.