My High School Reunion

On October nineteenth I wrote that I got off work at around 5 and I had already texted my friend but I noted that he wasn’t always easy to find I just went to 16th and hung out with one of the bartenders on Clarion until he showed up.  I introduced them and we went to Sycamore and had food and beer.  We went to Uptown and I saw one of my favorite regulars there.  Later my friend and I tried El Rio and Virgil’s but settled on the Cukoo.  We sat in the back for a bit and then sat in the bar.  There were these super drunk girls.  After we left, I rode home and I was asleep at 2.

The next morning I went to Java Beach and had coffee.  I made jokes with the barrista and had coffee.  When I left I noted that there were some unattended bikes.  I went home and updated my anti-virus and then took the exams for PG&E.  I talked to pops, who had just returned from driving mom to Sac—she continued to Reno.  My sister and father had gone to the park to the car show.  I got to see the kids.  I left for the Uptown then.  There I talked to the regulars and then headed to the design center for my High School Reunion.

I rode 17th and parked across the street.  I got my name tag and hugged Ada.  I went to the bar and had a free drink.  I talked to a lot of people I hadn’t seen for a long time.  One of them, who lived in New York, insisted everyone have a whisky and I asked her to sit with me but there wasn’t a seating portion of the night.  I went and had some food then I returned to the group.  Later I went for more food.  I walked around then.  I saw these two business women from the South Bay and talked to another classmate that now works for MLB.  He said to go upstairs.  There were a few more people that I knew there.  One of them worked for the Port it turned out.  I then talked to some good old boys and a classmate I sat next to freshman year.  She and I talked for a long time.  I got food and on the way I saw a bunch of ladies who I know now have kids.  One couple I noted were my classmates in grammar school but one of them had gone to our rival High School.  After talking to him I discovered he was a coworker.

I ended up back in a conversation with the lady I had sat next to in freshman year.  When we went for photos she stood behind me.  I was surprised to discover that she preferred my company so we ended up walking to the bar together as the party started to break up.  Once there I noticed that quite a few of us had had too much to drink but for the most part things were awesome.  One single mother had to tell me her life story.  A lot of people said they had moved to Lodi or Stockton.  My friend from New York was the life of the party.  I talked to the class stoner for a while and learned that another classmate had (finally) come out of the closet and had a successful career in West Hollywood.  I said bye when the bar closed.  I received a message later to saying that they were still out.

On the day that I wrote this I had a pretty bad hang over and it took about four hours to recover.  I had to take a few Advil to get better.  I had another couple at 42nd and Irving with a V8.  I filled my tires and then rode the Wiggle to Valencia.  I had a little trouble at Market.  I texted people from the reunion and then stopped by to see my artist friend on Clarion.  I sent a photo as a tweet to a friend and had three cups of coffee at Blue Fig with another twitter friend.

Later I wrote that I walked to Borderlands and sat with my friend for a few hours.  I read the paper and had tea.  A lady sat next to me.  I talked about a bunch of stuff but mostly about the internet of things and its implications for a nonprofit I had visioned out as Access 101.  My friend asked how this pertained to my paper on car centrism.  This was where I launched into my discussion of car centrism and equity and how the disconnect between the advocate and activist is a false one since you can be paid to be car free.  I explained that car free and inequality define a pair of spectra.  The idea of paying people to be car free is defined as a car free work culture and taking an equitable approach to a car free work culture should simply be a matter of charting our car free classifications with predictable results: low income car free at the low end in certain places and high income car free in others.

We talked about the coalition then and at some point how incorporation is the best method of deploying any kind of action plan.  I noted that we went to the Latin American Club.  I noted that we likely talked about the coalition and how the departures of the membership and volunteer coordinators in 2011 had left a void.  I described Everett Rodgers’ work and we tried applying his theories to Facebook.  Then we talked about the void or vacuum that volunteering leaves since value accrues at the director level and volunteers get no ownership.  I noted the barrier to entry should be low like a login.  I pointed out the organizing volunteers may allow for the extraction of value before the utility of their actors is lost when there are internal purges.

I noted that there was some guy sitting next to us trying to start a conversation but we left.  My friend indicated that he might go to the Riptide.  I went to my bike.  The lights were gone.  I went to Chihuahua and then got a text from my New York friend on BART.  I dropped the bike at Embarcadero and then caught the N.

This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.