Then It's KCSM

Driving in the Bay Area.  Somewhere else, again.  I’ve rented a Chevy Malibu.  The residue of that brand name and that place itself lodged in my mind.  It’s something soft and blond and made harmless and embraceable with that last syllable.  The car though isn’t particularly distinguished.  I’m driving it.

We’re riding around the Bay Area.  Genuflect, drag, stand, genuflect, for 52km around the Mount Kailash.  Crawl round the holy circle shape.  The Bay is twice that many km, but you needn’t rough your knees.  Just reduce speed and then accelerate over and over.  There is Mount Diablo.  Genuflect.  The exit signs pass by and evoke memory of meeting after meeting from that time when this is where home was.  The time that felt old, when you were young.  When you drove all the time and weren’t happy. 

It’s a breathtaking type of driving, speeding along Rt. 101 when the traffic isn’t turgid at eighty-five miles an hour until you aren’t.  It’s a familiar ritual.  Not much different though locals bemoan the profound changes.  But you have, and you need to forget all your Beijing driving habits. Every opportunity does not necessarily mean, the other person will take advantage of it.  In Beijing you need to always anticipate someone doing something egregiously selfish.  You never drive eighty miles per hour anyway.  Courteous people finish last in Beijing.  I am more important than you.  I am always more important than you.

The radio is another Bay Area ritual.  KPOO in SF.  But the signal fades.  So then it’s KCSM, “The Bay Area’s Jazz station”  Said in a Clifford Brown Jr. voice.  None of the DJ’s seem to have changed.  Elisa Clancy in there in the morning.  Jesse Chuy Valera in the afternoon.  Kathleen Lawtan's distinguished welcoming.  Each person a confident mastery of the tradition.  Each DJ is utterly memorable and their respective longevities suggest a certain master craftsman like, guilded position, something that is their life’s work, or part of it at least.  It’s a weighty role and they tend to fill it nobly. 

And the discussion is of Bud Powell and his difficult, final years and we’re listening to the bass player from the session’s album.  I haven’t heard of him before.  I take note. Not every song every time, but in the main we listen to tune after tune that is working, tune after tune that is delicious as I drive.  And I get schooled, which makes you feel like you live in a civilization.

The Bay seems to need more hotels.  I can't see where AirBnB has stolen business from Starwood.  The hotel prices in the Bay Area are stupid.  I'm at a Sheraton.  I'm paying what I'd pay to stay in a top end property somewhere else.  I can not suspend disbelief and pretend I am paying for real distinction.  I'm simply bottom feeding in an inflated market. There is no elevator.  My bag is heavy schlepping it up to the special guest room they’ve rewarded me with.  They offered.  They offered.