A Renunciation, A Pivot, A New Beginning

By Stephen Smith

Gods Eye

Approximately a century ago, in 1993, I arrived in San Francisco. As befits such a long-ago occasion, my memories of the time are fuzzy. I know I flew here, spent a few days in a stranger’s house (a friend vouched for me), and promptly found myself a room in the Mission, at Guerrero and 15th.

Unlike our blog hostess, Sandra, by 1993 I had already finished my quest for fame. My appetite for success had waned. I had been teased, sometimes rewarded, and ultimately shooed away from musical renown. I had been fortunate to make a few records on indie labels in the U.S. and Europe. I had toured the U.S. a few times with one band, and been flown to London for a few press shows with another. But, ultimately, I hit a wall. A few major labels (every band’s goal at the time) had expressed interest. One took a breakfast meeting with us, suggesting various promotional angles they would pursue. It seemed like it was in the bag. But when they ghosted us (a term we didn’t have at the time, kids), I had had it. I needed stability. I needed a future. I didn’t want to be subject to the whims of the industry.

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So moving to San Francisco was a renunciation, a pivot, a new beginning.

What does a person of moderate intelligence do to start again, with no particular skills and no particular professional interests? Law school, obvi. A classic stop on life’s journey for those with no real idea of what to do with themselves.

I was 26, on a fixed income of about $600 a month. That covered my $330 room, and left me enough to buy plenty of $1.25 rice and bean burritos at La Cumbre. Enough for a beer now and then at Casanova, as well. At the time, Casanova was more of what we considered a “Vietnam Vet bar” than the place it is today. There was a pool table. I was often able to hold it for a few games at a time. My roommate and I would occasionally go to Jack’s Elixir, as well, just a few doors down from our apartment. But that was spoiled a bit when he had to go to the hospital after someone there punched him in the eye, with a fist adorned with a very-three-dimensional pewter ring.

As I’ve said, my memory is fuzzy. I don’t have much in the way of stories from the 90’s, more a series of impressions. Of places like New Dawn, with the huge pile of potatoes you could get for breakfast, saving most for subsequent meals. Of Café Macondo, where a new arrival might sit with coffee, wondering why he was unable to strike up a conversation with any of the maybe-interesting people sitting nearby, but still coming back regularly.

My greatest regret about my 90’s in San Francisco is my failure to really take the City in. I lived in the Mission. I went to school in the Tenderloin. I rarely ventured out to other places in the City. North Beach was unfamiliar. I may never have seen Golden Gate Park. I lived a very circumscribed life. This may have had to do with the rigors of law school, it may have had to do with my relative poverty, but it was largely just my myopia. These days, my wife and I try to take in all of the City. An afternoon in the Sunset. An evening in Dogpatch. We don’t stick to things within a stones throw. As youth is wasted on the young, 90’s San Francisco was largely wasted on me. 

Stephen Smith is an accomplished constitutional law professor and author, as well as the kickass singer/songwriter band leader of The Morning Line. Follow him here.