A Letter to Lucius the Cat

Lucius,

You came into my life starved for food, attention and love. Soon after I adopted you into my Fort Greene flat I thought I killed you with a dumb cane flower from Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Your chin swelled up to three times it’s size after you nibbled on the poisonous plant. I was racked with guilt, but you survived. 

You terrorized Mona the cat, came between my boyfriend Tim and I, but I never held it against you. Soon, we moved on up to South 1st street in Williamsburg, to a big old bedroom with lots of windows for you to watch the Puerto Rican schoolchildren across the street, blizzards, and an Ethan Hawke movie filmed on our intersection. During the muggy summer I melted ice cubes on your hot fur to cool you down. You hated the New York heat.

I had to leave you for months when I returned to California. I worried you would think you’d been abandoned again. I left you with an engraved collar that disappeared under our roommate Agata’s watch. Edward brought you to Oakland on an airplane. He was grumpy in the airport because you were so heavy. 

I snuck you into to the sunny studio on Laguna street in San Francisco, with big bay windows, in the art deco building where cats weren’t allowed. We stayed there 3 and a half years. I took a series of polaroids of friends holding you on the big magnolia-decorated vintage couch. The polaroids lived on the fridge - a permanent art installation.

Next, we moved to Dolores Street, to a Victorian flat with three 19-year-old girls, including my sister Melissa and her best friend Ari. You insisted I keep the door open at night so you could walk in and out of the bedroom. It made it hard to sleep with all those roommates. When painters put up scaffolding to paint the building, Liz left her window open, so you jumped out and jogged on the wooden planks, past my bedroom window, to the living room window, peering in from outside, looking matter-of-fact. I panicked and tried to get you in the house. You developed a habit of pawing at Ari’s head while she watched TV, then viciously attacking her scalp. She still loved you.

Next we moved to a 2 and a half bedroom Victorian worker’s cottage in Fruitvale Oakland. The house was surrounded by stray cats and chihuahuas. Occasionally large stray dogs wandered over from the pound, a few blocks away. We kept you inside. Stray kittens sometimes snuck in the back door to eat your food in the kitchen. You let it happen. You claimed the guest bedroom for yourself. 

Your last stop was the house I grew up in in Santa Cruz - the nicest place you ever lived. Two-stories, high ceilings, a porch to lounge on and watch the birds, including the neighbors’ fat chickens. Your new sister cat, the beautiful Fritz moved in around Thanksgiving with her person, Kimo. You were intrigued and sometimes picked on Fritz, but she knew how to stand up for herself. Once she scratched you good on your pure white nose, leaving a thin red scab that lingered for days. 

When baby Wilder came home we let you and Fritz explore the outside world. At first you were timid. You slept in the closet during the day. Then, one day, I looked out the window and saw your bright white and dark grey fur against the sparkling blond dry grasses on the banks of the lagoon. You were exploring, looking exquisite in contrast with the natural world. You looked like an exotic creature, a stuffed animal come to life. You sat still, facing the lagoon, ears twitching. I swooned.

A few days later I spotted you sitting on the church property across the way and watched you climb underneath a storage building. A short time later you emerged and walked down a zig zag path towards the center of the church camp. Brave house cat!

The last time I saw you, you slept between my calves. I woke up at 2am to attend to the baby and you hopped out of bed. You must have gone outside. I didn’t know you were in the habit of exploring at night. I knew something was wrong when you weren’t there for breakfast. I looked for you in the afternoon. Fritz was acting strange, staring out from the deck all day. She’d tried to lead my downstairs early in the morning. Did she see you? She knew something was wrong. 

Kimo found your body in the greenery between the ice plant and the lagoon, your midsection missing a crescent-shaped piece. Completely gone. Coyotes? Its the last thing I expected for you - a violent, natural death. You were grumpy, but you were a very domestic cat, like a big stuffed toy. 

We buried you under the redwood tree I planted as a child. I added your rainbow catnip toy that drove you mad with ecstasy and a bouquet of dried flowers tied with a green ribbon. Kimo took care of the details of burial. I couldn’t bear to see your lifeless body. 

A few days later you had to be reburied in our backyard. Animals had tried to dig up your grave. My mom brought a ceramic praying angel to place on your grave.

You brought me great joy and gave me love. Amused me and worried me. We lived together for ten years, from Brooklyn to Santa Cruz, from 25 to 35. I miss you every day.

I love you Lucius. 

Your human forever,

Madeline

Modern Pilgrimage Part One: Setting Out (I Left My Heart Sutra in San Francisco)

In this five-part series guest blogger and filmmaker JL Aronson writes about his Fall 2012 pilgrimage to Buddhist centers in California and beyond. Follow his journey as he meditates his way through the West. Find out more about JL here. See more photos from JL's pilgrimage here. Happy reading! - Madeline

Meal Procession, City of 10,000 Buddhas, Ukiah, CA
Photo by JL Aronson

In 1883, approaching an average man’s middle age, the great Chinese Buddhist Master Hsu Yun (Empty Cloud) embarked on what would be his most elaborate and lengthy pilgrimage. In honor of his deceased parents, the accomplished monk traveled thousands of miles on foot, prostrating every few steps, crisscrossing China, Southeast Asia, and even visiting Llasa, high up on the Tibetan plateau. Of course, no trip could last so long and meander so far on filial piety alone. At 43, Hsu Yun must have blended his earnest gratitude with a healthy dose of curiosity. After all, there were no travel blogs, no Tumblr pages, not even a Rough Guide to aid one in imaging what lay beyond the horizon. And as a Buddhist practitioner with great faith and great determination, Hsu Yun would have wanted to experience the precious, liberating Buddha-dharma (teachings of the Buddha) with as many backdrops as possible.

Venerable Master Hsu Yun (1840-1960)

And so it was that I, too, set out on a pilgrimage of sorts this past autumn. Some key differences that bare mentioning: First, I am not an unencumbered Buddhist monk and so, whereas Hsu Yun wandered for years on his journey, I had to limit my own travel plans to several weeks. Secondly, Empty Cloud bravely risked blizzards, rains, bandits and his own body’s limitations by insisting on walking throughout the pilgrimage. I choose modes of transportation not yet available to the 19^th century Chinaman. And while Hsu Yun meandered throughout many parts of the Asian landmass, east of the Himalayas, I limited my trip to that enchanting and spiritually rife region of my own landmass: California (plus a couple stops in Oregon).

I’m an East Coaster by birth and upbringing, although I lived in Northern California for four fascinating years during and just after attending university there. I loved California and the Northwest, and considered staying after college, but New York City, the Sun of my suburban satellite youth, was beckoning me with its dynamism, directness and specificity. I was never able to shake the feeling that left coast people, their culture and their cities, harbored a vague and uncertain core, unknowable to outsiders; perhaps even unknowable to themselves. It seemed like a place where people made things up as they went along, and adulthood was an always-open question. Of course, this was one of the things that attracted me about the West Coast in the first place. The positive side was that anything felt possible and everything was worth exploring. I’d done my own shape shifting in the cauldron of those years, swapping musical tastes, hair styles, hair colors, intoxicant preferences and college majors with gusto. Once satisfied with that process, and confident enough with the results to start applying for real jobs, I said goodbye to all that and headed back East.

One thing I didn’t invest enough time in exploring while I was on the West Coast, however, was religion. It was on my list of things to do, and I would try meditating on my own from time to time, but somehow really exploring this matter kept getting bumped by other distractions. I’d always been fascinated by faith and did poke my head in a few Californian doors, but never with a Buddha behind them. This was curious because, although I’d grown up Jewish, I’d been introduced to Buddhist philosophy and meditation when I was still in my teens and it resonated with me more than anything else I’d encountered. I was vaguely aware that the Dharma lurked just around the corner but I lacked whatever motivation was needed to even crack open a phone book to find out exactly where. 

Nevertheless, when I was in my mid-twenties, while living in New York and starting up my career as a documentary filmmaker, a series of events led me to my first meditation retreat. And then another. And another. Slowly but surely, Buddhist practice became a significant part of my life. I was almost equally bewitched by the different styles and methodologies offered by various schools of Buddhism as I was by the calming and centering effects of the meditation itself. And as I became more familiar with the history of Buddhism’s emergence in the West—and particularly that of Zen, the school that I gravitated towards—I started taking note of how many epicenters for that development were in my old stomping grounds. 

For starters, there was San Francisco Zen Center (SFZC), easily the most famous and arguably the most influential source of Buddhist practice in America. Zen Center is located in the heart of San Francisco on Page and Laguna Streets, mere blocks from busy Market Street. It was founded in 1962 by Shunryu Suzuki and his students as the first Buddhist practice center in the United States, specifically for Westerners. Suzuki Roshi (the term roshi being an honorific for a revered teacher, usually an abbot) was also the author of Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind, a classic of contemporary Buddhist literature and one of the first books I was handed at that tender age so many years ago. I felt I owed a debt to this man, if for that early introduction alone.

Portrait of Shunryu Suzuki Roshi at San Francisco Zen Center
Photo by JL Aronson

Suzuki Roshi died of cancer in 1973, just two years after publication of his groundbreaking book. However, to give you a sense of the guy’s influence, consider the following: while still alive, Suzuki oversaw the establishment of Tassajara Zen Mountain Center, near Big Sur, and planted the seeds for Green Gulch Farm in Marin County, among other satellite centers. Tassajara was founded as the first Zen monastery outside of Asia and continues to train generations of earnest students throughout the year. A minority of those students actually become fully ordained monks or, priests, as they’re known in Suzuki’s lineage, but everyone who chooses to live there for either a few months or a number of years, follows the demanding monastic schedule. In the warmer months, Tassajara is open for shorter retreats. Weekenders can also take advantage of the site’s natural hot springs and numerous cabins for a Buddhist spa-like getaway. Once early-September arrives, however, the high mountain passes leading into Tassajara can be treacherous and the place closes to visitors. From then until some time in April, no one gets in or out, emergencies excepted.

Unfortunately, my pilgrimage did not coincide with Tassajara’s “guest season” so I was unable to see it with my own eyes. I did, however, manage to spend time at Green Gulch and Zen Center itself, so allow me to begin where it all began.

Hosshin-ji (Beginner’s Mind Temple) San Francisco Zen Center - 

300 Page Street, San Francisco, CA, designed by Julia Morgan, c. 1920

Photo by JL Aronson

SAN FRANCISCO ZEN CENTER

Zen Center’s flagship is a 1922 beaux arts complex perfectly suited to its task. The building was designed by famed architect Julia Morgan for the Jewish Emanu-El Sisterhood of San Francisco, which used the site much in the same manner as a YWCA of that period: offering young women who were both unmarried and Jewish a residence with community and spiritual life in a possibly unfamiliar city.  The Zen Center functions in a parallel sense, albeit with fewer demographic restrictions. A photo exhibition, coinciding with the 50^th anniversary of SFZC, was mounted in the Center’s ample dining room and hallway showing time-bending images of the building’s Sisterhood years and news articles from the time that described the life there. 

Buddha Hall: Dharma talks and some services take place in the Buddha Hall at San Francisco Zen Center

Photo by JL Aronson

I’m a sucker for side-by-side comparisons that allow you to feel the past’s presence and, studying these pictures, I had a visceral sense of how the space had been preserved and transformed over time. The large study room, right off the main entrance, had been a place of armchairs and bookshelves where the women of yesteryear might have shared conversation and enjoyed the fireplace on crisp Fall evenings. It now functions as the Buddha Hall, where all formal talks are given and many services take place on a sea of tatami mats. Though some folding chairs lined the perimeter of the room, it was sparsely furnished save several statues and an altar by the hearth. Downstairs, on the basement floor, there had originally been a compact gymnasium with a built in stage, doubling as an event space for the Sisterhood. During World War II, Jewish servicemen stationed in the Bay Area or docked in its ports, came to the Sisterhood building on Saturday nights for dance socials. Suzuki Roshi turned this into the zendo where, in Soto Zen style, practitioners face a wall during meditation, turning their attention inward to the workings of the mind, allowing all internal and external distractions to fall away (or at least be rendered innocuous), one after another. Dividers were placed in the floor to add additional wall space—a modification that allows for a greater capacity in the zendo and also results in a limited functionality. For instance, depending on whether it’s time for sitting, or a talk by one of the teachers, retreat participants proceed up and down the stairs between the zendo and the Buddha Hall.

San Francisco Zen Center Zendo
Photo by JL Aronson

The best way to encounter Zen Center is to first visit on a Saturday morning. They offer an introduction for those new to the Center and/or to Zen, starting at 8:40am. You will not be alone. I was amazed to see several dozen people show up for the introduction and was told that they get on average 50 or 60 new faces every time. San Francisco is a city of seekers and over-worked wage earners. The seekers are always open and curious, while the workers are told to get with the program and mellow out. At Zen Center, they’re all invited to drop any expectations and goals and just be present with what is. 

At 10am, a Dharma talk is given in which one of a number of the officially sanctioned teachers in Suzuki’s lineage espouses his or her interpretation and understanding of Buddhist wisdom. After this—weather permitting—everyone gathers for tea and cookies in the open-air courtyard that overlooks Laguna Street. Though the photos on the walls had given me a taste of mid-century life at 300 Page, speaking with a few of the long term Zen Center practitioners gave me an invaluable glimpse of what its been like to practice there over the past few extraordinary decades.

Learn more on their website.

One of the hallmarks and pleasures of SFZC practice is having options between the three grand practice centers. Each is quite distinct in their geography and emphasis while sharing a common overall style, liturgy, and even teachers. I found that the priests and many of the students all make the rounds from time to time. Even local practitioners living full, lay lives might do weekend meditation retreats at either the City Center, Tassajara or Green Gulch, depending on what’s being offered. 

Click here for Modern Pilgrimage Part Two - Green Gulch, Marin!

Farmers Market Goodies

Calendula 

I’ve been busy in the new year with two new jobs that have me waking up at 5am or earlier 5-6 days a week! Consequently, I’ve been lax in blogging about my adventures lately. One of my jobs is working for a Corralitos farm selling organic flowers and produce at farmers markets. Corralitos is in Santa Cruz county, near Aptos. 

Sunrise at Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, San Francisco

I drive to the farm while it's still dark out, stars twinkling overhead, pick up a truck filled with tulips, calendula, anemones, and sweet william, and drive to the market to sell the flowers. Setting up the stall is hard work. I haul tables, easy-ups, and many buckets of flowers, all filled with water. I go home drained at the end of market days. It's required that I work every Saturday and Sunday, which cramps my style a little.

Tulips at Market

On the flip side, people are generally happy when they’re at the farmers market, especially when they’re buying flowers. Most of the vendors are friendly too, so the atmosphere is positive. We can trade a few of our items for food from other farms. It’s been amazing to come home loaded with greens, fruits, eggs, and other goodies. I’ve started casually roasting beets and hard boiling eggs, just to have them on hand and to use them up before they go bad. I fill my house with flowers that didn’t sell at market over the weekend.

Breakfast made from farmers market goodies: poached eggs on sourdough toast
with braised beet greens, avocado and blood oranges.

In awe of my haul, I made this list last week of foods in my fridge from farmers markets:
     
     kabocha squash
     butternut squash
     radishes
     peppers
     kale
     broccolini
     fennel
     cilantro
     avocado
     blood oranges
     eggs
     greens
     mint
     sage
     apples
     mini potatoes
     coffee 
     beets

Anemones at market

I've been an avid farmers market shopper for years, so it's been great to learn how the markets work from farm to stall and pre-dawn to afternoon. For example, I've learned that markets secretly begin before their posted time. If a market is supposed to start at 9am, vendors will be set up by 8am, when the first shoppers of the day arrive. Certain markets forbid early sales, but most of them allow it. 

Please enjoy the photos below which I took at sunrise at San Francisco's Ferry Building while setting up!

Take-off at Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, San Francisco

Bay Bridge, Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, San Francisco

Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, San Francisco

Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, San Francisco

Abalone and Artichokes at Duarte's Tavern, Pescadero

 

Artichoke painting on Duarte's Tavern wall.
Photo by Madeline Horn

Duarte’s Tavern in sleepy Pescadero, half way between Santa Cruz and San Francisco, has been serving hungry and thirsty customers since 1894. Pescadero is a one-street town nestled between coastal redwoods and the ocean, with weather worn houses on rambling properties, surrounded by green meadows. A cemetery sits right outside of town, across a creek, waiting to be explored on foot. Pescadero, with its Victorian farmhouses, green pastures, the smell of the ocean in the air, is rural California at its best. Duarte’s delicious ollalieberry pie, artichoke ravioli, and abalone sandwiches, served by the same family for 118 years, reflect the bounty of the nearby sea and the surrounding agricultural fields.

Duarte’s is a favorite meeting place for my family, which is spread out between Santa Cruz and San Francisco. Last week we celebrated my grandmother’s 96th birthday at Duarte’s with champagne, swirled cream of artichoke and cream of green chile soups, seafood, and pie a la mode. It was fitting that the restaurant has been around longer than grandma, a claim few local haunts can make.

Jagger, Natalie, and Grandma Janet celebrating 96 years with a long shoehorn
Photo by Madeline Horn

Duarte's Tavern is located at 202 Stage Road, Pescadero, CA
Phone (650)879-0464
www.duratestavern.com

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Shopping and Nibbling at the Treasure Island Flea Market

Vintage doorknobs
Photo by Madeline Horn

                                         
Vintage dresses, Bob Marley brand sandals, gourmet food trucks, handmade soap and Pendleton coats can all be found at the Treasure Island Flea Market on the last weekend of each month. The trip to Treasure Island, which is officially part of the city of San Francisco, provides a refreshing vantage point of both San Francisco and the East Bay. Treasure Island's dramatic location right in the middle of the bay is accessible through an exit off the middle of the 8-mile long San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. The flatness of the manmade island gives the sensation of being nestled in the water as you gaze across at the Transamerica building.

Giant dancing woman sculpture on Treasure Island
Photo by Madeline Horn

A variety of vendors sell at Treasure Island, including vintage dealers, clothing designers, artists, and junk hawkers. As flea markets go, Treasure Island is fairly small. You can wind your way through the vendors in about an hour. Clothing and jewelry are in abundance. I would have liked to see more vendors selling jumbles of random old junk, which are my favorite booths for finding hidden treasures and oddities at most flea markets. However, you can buy new socks and stylish hand printed T-shirts, which kind of makes up for it. This market is good for gifts.

Vintage delights
Photo by Madeline Horn

The Chairman Taiwanese bun food truck
Photo by Madeline Horn

Food Trucks: Adjacent to the vendors sits a sizable row of food trucks, from gourmet doughnuts to giant sausages. Winery booths offer wine by the glass and bottle. We ate at the Chairman truck, which was delicious. Andre, my boyfriend and flea market date, and I ordered the exact same thing, coca-cola braised pork bun sandwiches with savoy cabbage and preserved yellow mustard seeds and coconut waters to drink. The bun sandwiches come steamed or baked, and we opted for baked. The juicy sandwiches were prepared with attention to every detail. The buns are fresh and slightly sweet, filled sandwich style with moist flavorful pork and a cabbage cilantro slaw and giant mustard seeds. Yum!

Fashion truck!
Photo by Madeline Horn

Mobile food, mobile fashion, mobile libraries, I love them all! I was tickled to spot my first fashion truck today. My favorite mobile memory is of the California Department of Forestry trucks that would set up at county fairs in my childhood. My dad is a forest fireman, and has been known to don the Smokey the Bear outfit, so we would spend lots of time at the "Smokey" trucks, set up like a home inside, where kids could practice stop, drop, and rolling. Part of the exercise was touching a door that heated up, as a warning that there was fire on the other side. 

View towards San Francisco
Photo by Madeline Horn

Treasure Island History: Treasure Island was built as a Works Progress Administration project in the 1930s for use as San Francisco's first airport, but it never ended up as an airport. Instead, the island hosted the 1939-40 World's Fair, with international pavilions and light shows. Post-World Fair, the island became a naval base, until it was sold to the city of San Francisco and made accessible to the public in 1997. Despite feeling like the abandoned military base that it is, the island now has residents. We love urban decay, so two highlights were a shut down bowling alley and decrepit tennis courts.

An the Go garlic noodles food truck
Photo by Madeline Horn

Andre was hungry for more food after a waffle with whip cream and strawberry appetizer, then a pork sandwich, so he ordered a combo from An the Go of garlic noodles and a lemongrass beef skewer. Both were quite tasty. He pondered ordering some gourmet doughnuts, but thought better of it and purchased some very stylish boots instead. 

New boots
Photo by Madeline Horn

With views, gourmet food at affordable prices and excellent shopping, for tourists and locals alike, Treasure Island Flea Market is a delightful way to spend a Saturday or Sunday. Admission to the Treasure Island Flea Market is $3. Parking is free and the market is accessible by MUNI bus 108 from San Francisco. Visit the website for a list of show dates. The market takes place on the last Saturday and Sunday of each month from 10am-4pm.

                                           
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Explore the History of Your San Francisco Neighborhood

San Francisco Harbor 1851
photo courtesy of Sparkle Tack

I highly recommend this Wicki on San Francisco History, which readers can contribute to. Great for anyone in love with our lovely city on the bay. Visitors to the site can choose to explore by neighborhood, decade, population, or theme. Visitors can also take "tours" of the site. As the public transit nerd that I am, I especially enjoyed the "Transit History Tour."
http://foundsf.org/index.php?title=Main_Page


Explore away!

Remembering the 1906 Earthquake and Fire, with Survivors!

1930s Fire Truck

At 5:11am the firetrucks and ambulances sounded their sirens.

Today is the 106th anniversary of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire. I marked the occasion by waking at 4am to join the survivors parade and gathering at Lotta's Fountain on Kearny and Market streets in downtown San Francisco. It was still dark as night, but that didn't stop a crowd from forming around the shiny copper fountain, the center of old San Francisco. 

Mayor Ed Lee was there, along with Supervisor Scott Wiener, but what got me out of bed was the chance to see earthquake survivors. George Quilici, born April 26, 1905, Bill Del Monte, born January 1, 1906, and Winnie Hook, born February 14, 1906, all attended to commemorate the earthquake. Two of the survivors rode in an open-top historic car. They looked fabulous and had to share a blanket to keep warm on the chilly morning. By the end of the festivities, Winnie wore the blanket over her head. 

1930s fire truck

 The crowd dispersed shortly after 5:15am, some going about their day, others attending the Lefty O'Douls survivor breakfast, and others, including myself, making their way to Dolores Park to re-paint the Magic Fire Hydrant. The hydrant gets a fresh coat of paint each year on April 18th. This year, the organizers accidentally purchased silver spray paint instead of gold! The crowd mumbled about it, but it didn't dampen anyone's spirits.

Winnie Hook was the first to spray the hydrant. Next, descendants of survivors got their turn. Finally, anyone with a connection to the earthquake was able to step up, spray the fountain and tell the crowd a story. Each painter received a certificate for their help. As you can see below, the hydrant turned silver today, oops! The fire chief said that she would come back later today to repaint it gold.

Around this time, the sun was rising over Dolores Park. It was a fabulous way to start the day, honoring the survivors, and the memory of the victims and the heroes from that day 106 years ago.

We sang San Francisco at Lotta's Fountain. The tune can also be heard nightly at the Castro Theatre where the organists end their sets with the song right before the films begin.

San Francisco

It only takes a tiny corner of

This great big world to make a place you love

My home upon the hill

I find I love you still

I've been away, but now I'm back to tell you:

San Francisco

Open your golden gate

You let no stranger wait outside your door

San Francisco

Here is your wandering one

Saying "I'll wander no more"

Other places only make me love you best

Tell me you're the heart of all the golden west

San Francisco

Welcome me home again

I'm coming home 

To go roaming no more!

Blue Bottle Coffee

I toured Blue Bottle Coffee's warehouse in Jack London Square on an Oakland Food Industry Tour arranged by the Society for Industrial Archaeology. Blue Bottle founder and owner James Freeman, who led the tour, said he doesn't like the name Jack London Square, so he calls it by its classic name, the Produce District. The rest of the world still calls the area Jack London. In fact, Blue Bottle's factory was a long-time produce warehouse and quite a few produce wholesalers continue to do business in the area. The smell of coffee was intoxicating. I learned that all their coffee is organic and that they cook their delightful pastries on sight. Mr. Freeman is married to the pastry chef, who has her kitchen in a corner of the warehouse. 

Blue Bottle's Oakland Factory

If you would like to taste the glory that is Blue Bottle Coffee, they host free and open to the public cuppings on Tuesdays and Sundays at 2pm each week. Located at 300 Webster Street, Oakland. 

http://www.bluebottlecoffee.net/

Other locations include:
The Ferry Building in San Francisco
Mint Plaza, 66 Mint Street, San Francisco
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

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Admiring Murals in the Mission District

Mission District paper cut-out piece

Balmy Alley piece

I'm so happy to live near the mission district. I love the murals, and I became inspired to take photos recently on a beautiful day. I ended up dining at super cute St. Francis Fountain, highly recommended for yummy eats!

St. Francis Fountain, 2801 24th Street, San Francisco, CA

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