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As employment prospects in the Bay Area continue on their dismal downward spiral, I have to move to work. At the invitation of my old friend Brent, I packed up what’s left of my business casual wardrobe, shipped Figgy (my cat) off for some quality time with the parents and got on a plane for a 3–week contract job in San Diego.
Well, it wasn’t really in San Diego, per se. I was staying in La Jolla, which I heard was a luxurious beach vacation destination. Visions of poolside and beachy fun swum in my head. But instead, I found myself in the midst of a non–descript cluster of hotels, touristy restaurants and malls, with the beach over two miles away on the other side of some unfriendly cliffs. So much for fantasies of walking to the beach, or anywhere, for that matter. To add insult to injury, the office was in a business park in Rancho Bernardo, a half hour’s drive past golf courses, car dealerships and a Marine Corps Air Base (San Diego is a surreal place to be at the onset of war, by the way, but more on that later). Suffice to say, I was in for some serious culture shock.
Food?
In my book, there’s no better index of a culture than its food, and I do not hesitate to say that San Diego is all but a culinary wasteland. It would seem to possess the highest per capita concentration of self–serve chain restaurants anywhere. I've never paid more to serve myself at endless unsanitary buffets, whether meandering through throngs of over–fed, overweight senior citizens at "Souplantation" — how can they get away with that name? I mean, "plantation?" — or stuffing frozen meat chips into a miniature bowl at "Stir Fresh Mongolian Barbeque," I never spent less than $9 on lunch. In San Francisco, a decidedly more cosmopolitan city, I can get a tasty French bistro lunch in a cozy, charming setting with full table service, including tip, for about the same amount. I would never pay $9 a pop to eat Marriott quality food that I have to forage for, assemble and cart off across cavernous dining halls to a plastic table in the "garden" AKA, the parking lot. I know, I know, what did I expect? The rest of California is not like San Francisco. But I suppose some lessons can only be learned the hard way.
One more depressing food story before I get to the good stuff (and thank goodness, there was some). One day at work I overheard a woman saying she was going to stop on her way home for a fantastic frozen yogurt at...Costco. It saddens me that San Diegans have to stop at Costco for that staple of California fast food, a frozen yogurt. Now I'm certainly not above eating Costco food...WHEN I'M SHOPPING AT COSTCO. In fact, I have been known to accompany people to Costco just to get a $1 hot dog. But to purposely stop there on your way home, just to get a frozen yogurt is just, well, depressing. Sure, it’s less expensive, but doesn’t it kind of take all the joy out of the yogurt–eating experience? I mean, warehouse yogurt? Yuck. Let's just say that lately I've been romanticizing the small, the mom and pop, the homemade. Perhaps this is just some kind of perverse nesting instinct kicking in at a time when nesting is the least practical thing on the horizon. Hey, I love a 24 pack of toilet paper as much as the next person, but my time in SD certainly increased my appreciation for the idiosyncratic, the independent, the local — basically anything that doesn’t come pre–packaged in an airtight 20–gallon vat.
Granted, I was shuttling between the blank, beige interior of my corporate apartment (which, with its washer/dryer, spacious kitchen, gym access and two pools, puts my studio apartment in Hayes Valley to shame) and the equally blank, beige interior of a 6 x 8 cubicle with fluorescent lighting and air conditioning so strong it required a sweater despite 70 degree weather outside. Half in love with my new generic lifestyle, I know I wasn’t adventurous enough to seek out the hypothetical culinary idiosyncrasies of San Diego cuisine, so let that be a caveat.
I did have one near perfect dining experience in La Jolla. Oliver came to visit, and we made reservations at Roy’s. It’s a chain, but I had heard good things about the San Francisco Roy’s so we thought we’d treat ourselves and give it a shot. We were greeted and shown to our table by two absolutely Amazonian hostesses — they must have been sisters, and at least 6’ 2” each. As one of them walked away, I snuck a peek at her heels, which I imagined must account for a good 5”, only to be astounded that they were within the range of sanity — a mere 2”. At any rate, I was relieved to note that not everyone at Roy’s is insanely tall. The server and the busboys were of more reasonable stature, and although it felt a little rushed, we appreciated their courteous, swift and unobtrusive service.
We began with an excellent appetizer of BBQ pork short ribs. Chewy, dense and coated (not drenched) on the outside with a sweet and somewhat nutty glaze, they were accompanied by a heap of hot towels to ensure tidy fingers. For entrees, we had the butterfish (which had come highly recommended), covered in a tangy teriyaki–type salsa, on a bed of carrots, and accompanied by a sushi roll of clover sprouts and ume (pickled plum). I’d never had butterfish before, but it lives up to its name, literally melting in your mouth, oily but surprisingly un–greasy — kind of like mackerel but nowhere near as fishy. We also had a wonderful, wild striped bass in an orange blossom saffron sauce (again, lots of butter), with mashed taro, beets and broccoli. Yum! The fish was firm and tender and the sauce was absolutely lovely, a bit tangy, but mostly just buttery smooth and rich. The beets gradually bled into the orange sauce, creating an eye–pleasing color combination.
For dessert, we had the chocolate soufflé, which is Roy’s trademark and takes so long to prepare that it must be ordered when you order your entrees. A warm chocolate cake with a gooey center, the soufflé is served with vanilla ice cream and raspberry sauce; it’s a somewhat predictable combo, but satisfying in that homey way. When it arrived at the table, I wondered if it was going to give Nobu’s Bento Box — an extraordinary gooey centered chocolate cake served with green tea ice cream and a topping of sweetened green tea leaves — a run for its money, but I suppose I should’ve known better. Its chief shortcoming was in the quality of the chocolate – it had a bit of a Duncan Hines quality about it, a little more generic than I expected. Then again, that sentiment pretty much sums up my whole stay in San Diego. The only appreciable flaw in the service was that our server brought the check before we had finished eating dessert. Combined with the rushed way in which we were seated and ordered drinks, it became obvious that Roy’s is more interested in high turnover than a top–notch dining experience, but unless you’re a stickler for service, it hardly detracts from the food.
Other culinary notes: A misremembered recommendation landed us at merely so–so Alfonso’s Mexican Restaurant in La Jolla, which in this land of excellent Mexican food seemed like a crime beyond comprehension. Some generic, if passable Chinese food was had. Roberto’s Taco Shop came highly recommended, but was ruined for me by the smell of cologne permeating my fish taco. Uck. A night of sub–par udon was ultimately redeemed by a visit to Bronx Pizza, which actually lived up to its name with some real New York style (thin crust, tasty sauce, greasy greasy cheese) pizza. You know, a piece of pizza you can fold in half while hot grease puddles on your paper plate. Mmmm…
A Consultant’s Life
Beyond the culinary shock, I also found myself in the midst of a new social/cultural milieu — a transitory community of young, male, high tech consultants. I had some prior knowledge of the consultant’s life — my brother did some time on the road for PeopleSoft a couple of years ago — but I had no real first–hand knowledge of this peculiar species of late 20th, early 21st century young man, especially in the high concentrations that I encountered on this trip. I felt like I had run away and joined an odd sort of fraternity.
One day at lunch, eating my homemade turkey sandwich, a herd of such boys, ahem, young men, walked by, announced that they were going to Boston Market and did I want to come? My feelings about Boston Market aside, I had absolutely no interest in joining them, even for the company, and I couldn’t help feeling just a little bit sorry for them. They’ve formed a new kind of ad hoc bachelor society; a community founded on a bottomless fount of sports and pop culture trivia, bitching about work and quick–witted personal jibes. Stranded in the remnants of the new economy, you can hardly blame them for banding together to form some semblance of community and companionship far from their various homes. Not that they aren’t all interesting, witty and perfectly intelligent people in their own right (and I’m sure they would be perfectly righteous in their rejection of my pity), but I can’t help thinking that this manic contractor's lifestyle of traveling and eating out and living and working in beige anonymous spaces — temporary offices, temporary apartments, temporary cars is really just a way to postpone the inevitable: maturity, reality, compromise. Although I suppose it is already a compromise to put your life on hold for a paycheck (don’t I know it). Still, I can't help thinking there's an element of Peter Pan syndrome, an indefinite postponement. It's ok to accept substandard food, nondescript offices, transitory living situations, long distance relationships, as long as you can tell yourself that it's only temporary and that things won't always be like this. There's always plenty of time to get serious. Perhaps it's because I’ve set the alarm clock of my own life to “snooze” one time too many that I had no desire to join in the reindeer games this time. Or maybe it's just that I'm a girl and don't appreciate being called a "wench" and hearing jokes about visiting the strip club just because someone ended up with all the ones when they divvied up the lunch bill.
Vacation Time
On the other hand, I enjoyed the solitude, the anonymity, the peculiar
blankness of my stay in a way I hadn't expected. I had expected to be
bored out of my skull, racking up the long distance charges, writing 10
emails a day to everyone I know. Instead, I found myself in hermit mode,
content to cook a modest, tasteless dinner and curl up in front of the
TV with a pint of ice cream. I barely cracked the covers of any of the
books I brought. And being free from my own personal computer I had
nothing but the office issue PC at work and an ancient, borrowed laptop
— gave me a sense of freedom I hadn't experienced in over a year.
I had forgotten what it's like to work a job 8 hours a day and then just
leave it behind when you go home. As a freelancer, every minute is a minute
you could be using, if not to work, than to work on getting more work.
It is not a lifestyle conducive to thought and quiet reflection. But then
I think, no routine is conducive to quiet reflection, and perhaps the
best way to have some time to oneself, and to really get a chance to THINK
about anything is to do something different, like move to an anonymous,
impersonal apartment/office/rental car life for 3 weeks. The catch is
that anything becomes routine after awhile. When I complained about exhaustion
after my weekend trip back home, Brian, one of my temporary co–workers
simply remarked, "You get used to it."
Which leads me to observe (neither brilliantly nor originally) that movement itself is the thing or state of being that enables reflection and thought. The best ideas always come to me on the train, running, in the car. Of course, they tend to lose their luster once that getting–struck–by–lightning–in–a–seemingly–inopportune–moment feeling wears off. It's a combination of the clarity of thought and it's unlikelihood that makes thinking and traveling such excellent companions. I suppose that travel in general, or a change of scenery is good for getting some much–needed perspective. When you see how your life could be different, you are forced to confront who you really are. In my generic, temporary, too large apartment, fitting awkwardly into a strange bed, sofa, dining chairs, I am just me. Out of context. And I suppose that it's a sign of my increasing maturity that I am not unhappy about that. Or, as I told Brent one day on the way home, "Every night is Sharon night."
Of course I’m sure this newfound self–satisfaction
would’ve worn exceedingly thin after awhile. After all, woman cannot live
on ice cream and Mommie Dearest forever (although I wouldn’t
blame anyone for trying). I know I would miss the daily compromises, frustrations
and joys of real relationships with lover, family, friends, Figgy. San
Diego was just work masquerading as a vacation that was in turn pretending
to be work.
About Mommie Dearest, which I had never
seen before: my sojourn coincided with AMC’s "Beyond Awards" week, a week’s
worth of Oscar–winning films. Mommie Dearest on Tuesday,
The French Connection on Thursday, On the Waterfront
on Friday (Wednesday was Shane, but I’m notoriously intolerant
of westerns). I knew I had stocked up on the microwave popcorn for something.
I decided to use my newfound free time to brush up on my cinema history.
Never mind that on other nights I was more likely to spend 2 hours watching
back–to–back episodes of Law and Order or (the shame!) that
MTV sorority show.
At any rate, Mommie Dearest is an, ahem,
interesting movie. Without delving into the obvious “mother” issues involved
(well beyond the scope of this simple travelogue), I was impressed by
the fabulous sets and costumes, as well as the perfectly horrifying Faye
Dunaway as Joan Crawford. In telling a story from the decidedly disturbed
underbelly of the golden age of Hollywood, Mommie Dearest acts and looks
just like a glamorous old Hollywood movie, which I suppose nowadays it
is. My favorite visual moment is the scene where Mommie Dearest first
receives the infant, Tina Darling. As she carries Tina upstairs, Dunaway,
appropriately dressed in a flowing Madonna–blue robe, stops and
stands on the landing; cradling Tina, she is perfectly framed in the arching
window behind her, just like a stained glass virgin and child. It’s foreshadowing
of the most obvious kind, but I appreciated the visuality of the moment,
its totally silent and chilling beauty.
AAAV (Acronyms Are A Virus).
To turn for a moment back to work: I was struck by how almost everyone at my temporary workplace communicated largely in acronyms. Whole conversations would take place in the cubiculated ether around me and I had no idea who was speaking or what any of them were talking about. “Did you ECR the DB with the CRW?” I am not exaggerating (although the acronyms have been changed to protect the guilty). I imagine a secret society somewhere awarding prizes for the fewest number of actual words employed in a single sentence. An acronym underground, if you will. Shop talk. Efficiency. Myopia. Again, getting out of your own context helps you see how other people are mired (or anchored) in theirs.
War
Speaking of new contexts, I don’t believe I’ve ever been anywhere so conservative as San Diego. I’ve certainly never spent time in a place as thoroughly saturated with military presence, a strange place to be at the onset of war. I regularly heard jet fighters flying over my apartment complex; saw Marines jogging on the golf course. Local news coverage in SD is virulently pro–troops — lots of footage of tearful wives, children and families embracing, accompanied by maudlin commentary like, “Tearful families say their farewells, with no idea when they will see their loved ones again.” It’s easy enough to see through biased TV coverage — it panders to the vanity of its audience, tugs on the lowest common heartstrings. But like the Gulf war before it, I didn’t expect this war to reach any deeper than the pixels on my TV screen, at least not during my temporarily suspended existence in San Diego. Although the city played host to several anti–war demonstrations, I must admit, when the war began, I just wanted to finish my project and go home. I will also admit that I was there to work on a U.S. government Web site, so I should not have been surprised to hear that some of my office mates were reservists who were subsequently called up for active duty. As someone who has always been rather careful to ensconce myself safely within the comfortable bubble of the Left, it was odd, to say the least. I found that as much as I wanted to be callously judgmental about their choice to make themselves a pawn in our government’s prideful aggression, or to stare at them as some kind of freakish aberration of human nature, I also felt strangely sympathetic. I’ve never known anyone who was about to go to war. To think that one day they were working in the cubicles next to me, and the next they might end up in bloody desert fatigues on my television set, gave me pause. I hate to think that San Diego has tempered my good leftist impulses, but it did make me see the war from a more personal, individual perspective.
Despite my harsh criticisms, I was actually rather ambivalent about returning home from San Diego. It was a vacation of sorts, and who wants to return home to 3 weeks of unanswered mail, paperwork and bills? But I think it was a little more than just a practical dread that made me drag my feet ever so slightly on my way to the airport. Part of me actually ENJOYED the blandness, the sameness, the routine. In large part, the severity (though not the substance, certainly) of my critique of San Diego is probably a last ditch effort to stave off not only the ultimate encroachment of the self–serve chain restaurant, but the growing realization that I am more conventional than I am willing to admit.
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