I, Drunkard

by Christine Curran

There are tiny weeds creeping up from the crack of cement on Leavenworth Street that rage proudly against urban indifference like Darryl. Darryl is a drunk who has just been 86'd out of the corner bar again. "Motherfucker!' he yells to no one in particular and I'm hoping he will avoid the Street Cleaners who are going to be plowing down Geary Street at any moment, like three-ton carnivorous rats. Luckily he's cleared the bus stop but now is rolling in the gutter and taking his chances.

A friend has expressed an interest to me in 'slumming in the 'Loin himself as his landlord put his building up for sale. Having lived through the days of Mission District counter culture hot spots like Kommotion, the Chatterbox, Firehouse7, Epicenter and blah blah blah in San Francisco's oldest neighborhood, he's a little jaded with what the Mission has become. There are property owners advertising share rentals at 1200.00 a month /room for artists, musicians, and writers. I wonder if these people realize that the artists, musicians and writers who came here in the late 70's and 80's because they didn't fit in elsewhere, would now be excluded by exorbitant rents and clubs that cater to the valet parking set.

The Tenderloin has, or had, it's own counter culture hot spots. There is Hyde Street Studios, where little known or cared about bands could negotiate recording space they couldn't afford otherwise including Digital Underground with Tupac Shakur, Les Claypool and Mike Patton of Mr. Bungle/Faith No More. There was The Luggage Store, where photographers, musicians, writers, actors and various performing artists could have a place to display, practice or perform -- whether working, homeless, disabled or just bored. The 181 Club stayed open all night and never asked you for a cover charge at the door if you couldn't afford it. There was the Sound of Music which featured punk bands that would play for free beer and where the floor, in some places, was two inches deep in spilled alcohol and piss. Some of the people you'd meet in these places were bonifide artists, musicians or "creative types", but there were just as many who were firemen, dockworkers, union organizers, delivery boys, bike messengers and office workers who were just trying to get together and enjoy each others crazy assed selves. Some had money, some didn't, some slept downtown in Bart stations or came over from the Hamms Brewery AKA "the Vats" in Potrero Hill "the Vats" were an abandoned brewery near where a Safeway shopping center, including a 24-Hour Fitness, is now, and were full of squatting skinheads, punks, bikers and freaks who were carving out their own society on the edge of everything. It didn't matter where you were from or who you knew, it just mattered that you were here!!!