History is a thin thread of yarn stretched over a vast ocean of the forgotten.
As soon as I saw it I loved it. Lo que tú quieras oír - “What You Want to Hear” - is a short (and free-to-download) film by Spanish director Guillermo Zapata. It follows the story of Sofía who comes home [...]

At the City Council meeting when I stood up in front of all who had gathered and pleaded my case to not allow some jackass corporate developer tear down Miracles Cafe and put up a two-story business complex in its place, said jackass corporate developer assured everyone that the development would still be a community [...]

It had already been a month. On land. No flights. Which, for the past half year or so, is something of a record.
Steve: Are you sure it leaves from the downtown airport and not Rio Negro?
Me: Yeah, of course. Positive.
Steve: You double-checked on the website?
Me (looking around the website, unable to find anything): Yeah, definitely.
Sunday [...]

This may sound like a strange parallel to make, but going to the gym and listening to This American Life have always shared a particular trait for me and one that I have a hard time understanding.
Basically, both activities take up about an hour. One 24th of a day. One 168th of a week.
And, both [...]

I don’t complain. I’m allergic to it. Incapable. I don’t know how. I try. And I fail.
I realize that complaining, to a certain degree, is the currency of compassion. We sit, a coffee, a glass of wine, an apertif. You complain, I soothe. Then: I complain, you soothe. We relate, we bond, and we tell [...]

Each city had its own smell. That’s one way I know that the person I am today has changed from the person I was then. There was a time - let’s call it the end of last millenium - when the first thing I would notice after opening the car door was the city’s unique [...]

It’s sandal weather again, hallelujah.
Dropping off Mari at City Hall, coasting down San Pablo while Keith Jarrett’s 1970’s piano chops flow out of public jazz radio like a flirtatious girl on a first date.
The stretch of San Pablo from 20th to 40th is one of Oakland’s most blighted thoroughfares. Every block is bookended with a [...]

The habit was as common as it was annoying. Every day someone would walk behind the counter of the neighborhood coffeeshop where I worked. Behind the counter and into the kitchen. I would look up, exasperated, with a serrated knife in my hand that I wanted to plunge into my trespasser’s gut.

But not this time. [...]

The salt stuck to my skin like Gulf War I camouflage. My shoulders were red. Later, my legs would be even more red as would my feet save a white calligraphic ‘V’, kept pasty white by my Haviana sandals. The problem was that we had no destination and an adventure is not an adventure without [...]

I spent the last block of my walk to Peet’s in deep contemplation. Did I want a small (10 oz.) or a medium (12 oz.)? The difference was neither two ounces nor 15 cents; it was purely psychological. It’s like potato chips. You know that the small bag of chips is plenty, that you’ll feel [...]