Where are they today?
I’m walking the streets of San Francisco and the memories are tugging me down to the ground and saying GOOD LORD what happened? Who were you then? Who are you now? I remember vividly coming of age in this city. I recall turning the corner of Kearney and Columbus and running smack into Herb Caen and him writing about it the next day – he with the sparkle in his eyes which caused me to smile ear to ear and him saying, a pretty girl smiled at me today. I remember the Tosca, getting kicked out of Vesuvios, Hunan Homes for mui shu, and then I passed Kho’s – the tailor and drycleaners and there behind the counter was the woman whose children were always with her, he’s 20 now she says, OMG he looks just like his father, like Kho and she says, you think? everyone says that but I don’t see it, where did you go? Where didn’t I go I tell her, I moved to New Orleans to be by my mother who was ailing, she passed this last year, I adopted a boy, I left my husband of 16 years, I … well, I am okay now. I say you look exactly the same. She says thank you, on the outside, but inside I’m different, I’m changed, I’m stronger than the woman you knew. I said, me too. Me too.
