Frisco on high

Bernal Heights Park, SF

San Francisco! Greg and I get chinese food at a place that Bill Clinton had take out – twice, they brag – and then climb up the hill to Bernal Hights Park. As we circle ’round the grassy knob, a falcon flashes across the sky. I grab Greg’s arm – friends of mine are getting used to this, maybe – look! The pointed wings, the fast movement. We stop to talk about the life stuff that friends with only a few hours try to squeeze in, at the top of the hill, where a chain link fence toped with a layer of barbed wire protects a cluster of antennae and a few scattered trees. A shadow catches my eye and I look up to see the kestrel fly to the fence not fifteen feet from us, bobbing its tail distinctively. Red tails ride thermals in the distance, the Golden Gate Bridge just emerging from some clouds beyond them. The sun is hot, and the air is cold, and my time in this city is limited. It’s time to head north, leaving summer and the south behind. Into the trees. Into the past, that has become the future.