It's Just A City

[(In response to many posts, most recently this one. Until I read Choire's screed, it never occurred to me to regard pedestrian signals that count the seconds until red as a crypto-socialist plot. I just found them convenient.])

[A climate rarely too hot, rarely too cold. A physical setting certainly among the most lovely of the world's cities. Built in a way that encourages walking (and fitness, if you walk a lot) and public transport, rather than cars. Socially diverse, containing everything from exciting-yet-unstable freaks to dull-but-steady suburbanites, in every hue created by nature. Proximity to outdoor recreation and little farm towns. A short but fascinating history. Bustling, but not too bustling. Cosmopolitan, but certainly provincial.]

[I've been reading a lot of San Francisco-bashing all over the place these days, usually from writers who once loved the place, and have come to hate it.]

[San Francisco's just a city - if you don't live here, you can rest assured your hometown has fantastic stuff of which we can only be jealous. But it's a pretty great place: absolutely imperfect, and I can name the irritants just as easily as you can. However, there's gotta be something about it that made you put it on a pedestal in the first place. Maybe if one spent more time examining why one would pin all one's hopes on a city, of all things, one might do a little less (I can't believe I'm writing this) hatin'. Anything idealized will eventually disappoint.]

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