Writer in San Francisco, CA
crisp blue sky creases against
skyscrapers. glass, steel, cement,
wood, warped, twisted into visions
of the future. a cry, fog horn bellow,
sirens, and the rushing hush of voices,
tires spinning on the pavement. a city,
breathing, alive under a crisp
blue sky.
Enjoyed this poem? Please like, share, or leave a comment below, I appreciate it! ?
It’s been a wild month. After a whirlwind of trips and apartment searching, I’ve moved to San Francisco. Now I’ll be a writer in San Francisco! At first, my boyfriend and I were planning on moving in 2022, but since rent prices were so low, we decided to move, and I’m so happy we did.
At the end of May, we took a week-long vacation to SF and visited all the tourist attractions. It was relaxing and indulging in our freedom after spending over a year inside during the Pandemic. We needed the break, and the change of scenery was an incredible relief. And as a writer, San Francisco is such an inspiring place full of the beautiful, ugly, and complicated.
When we went back to Salt Lake City, we were distraught, missing SF immediately. Thankfully, my boyfriend had been applying to jobs for a few weeks to see if he could snatch something up). And then, a few days after we got back into town, he got a job! We were stoked. I bought our plane tickets, and we flew back to search for an apartment. We were back in SF precisely a week since we left. During all this craziness, I wanted to flex being a new transplant, a writer, in San Francisco, but there was no time!
I’m also a Poet ? feel free to read one of my poems about San Francisco!
We moved into our new studio apartment a few days after that, and now we’re settling into our home. My boyfriend started his new job, and I can work wherever with my full-time remote job. Everything’s just effortlessly slipped into place, and I feel like the city has gently swallowed us up. I can’t believe that I’m a writer in San Francisco!
Compared to Salt Lake City, SF has more to offer us; it’s a better match for our lifestyles, interests, and the weather that we love (cool and overcast). Plus, for the first time, I’m finally living close to the ocean, something I’ve always dreamed about.
Are you a writer too? Are you looking for a beta or alpha reader to review your work? Learn about my services HERE.
It’s been over a month since I last published a blog post. Between moving and wrapping up my Internship, I haven’t had time to write and read my books. I’m aching to get back into the groove. And I’ve decided to break the ice with this introductory post to starting our lives in a new city. I can’t think of a better way as a writer in San Francisco to talk about our move than to blog about it!
What am I planning? Putting together my Pandemic Poetry collection that I will publish in a limited edition digital and print Zine. I’ll be mailing these to everyone who bought a personalized poem last year while I was unemployed. After this, I will open up the Zine for free downloads to the public. This is a lot of work, but I’m enjoying the process of putting it all together.
Read my published eBook zine “A Collection of Pandemic Poems” FREE to download and share!
At the same time, I’m editing my novel and selecting poems for a reading at the Utah Arts Festival. I’m excited to share my work, see people in the flesh, and mingle with other poets.
We moved to SF right as its opening up. The city is busier than when we visited at the end of May, and the traffic is insane. People wear masks out of habit or preference, and some places still require masks and social distancing.
It’s comforting to be in a safer city since the Pandemic was taken seriously here; SF is one of the very few places in the U.S. to have achieved herd immunity. I feel safer and more relaxed here compared to Salt Lake City. Being fully vaccinated since early May, we can take advantage of SF and go without masks.
It’s weird to switch from being home all the time to going out and being around so many people. I missed going out; I missed meeting people in person and being out there instead of experiencing the world through the safety of screens.
There is so much change sometimes I feel like my head is spinning. But these are all welcome changes, and I’m ecstatic to explore my new home city, write, and meet other writers.
Liked this post? Feel free to read I Love Living in San Francisco: A Writer’s Reflection or What’s Happening? Reflecting on Self and Living in San Francisco Want to connect? Leave a comment below or ? me at alinahappyhansenwriter@gmail.com ?
Poetry Practice: Choose a word and write a poem. Ideally this practice works best when you pick a random word every day and push yourself to write a poem.
Rolling thunderous clouds smother the tops of trees,
a brush of wind, a lingering electricity hovering in the
air. A crack, snap, as a wiry white finger touches earth.
A glittering of water, drops plunk, plop, tap tap tap
into a quietus roar.
This past month has been something else. I haven’t been posting as much as I process what’s going on in the world and my personal life. Big changes are ahead even though the past year is still revolving in the back of my mind. The U.S. is opening up, some people are vaccinated, and the Israel–Palestine crisis is reverberating throughout the world. It feels like so many are scrambling to return to life pre-pandemic but the world is not the same and there is no going back. What happens to those of us stuck in the past? Stuck in our political ideologies? What happens as we split in two, one focused on the past and the other focused on the future? These are questions that keep revolving in my mind as I prepare to move out of state, fully-vaccinated, ready to handle whatever comes my way. I feel like a sponge that is still soaking up everything that’s happened; can I decompress, process, and clarify the various thoughts that swarm inside my brain? What’s next? My upcoming Poetry Reading at the Utah Arts Festival in August. See my About page for more details.
A massive on-going blog post featuring all of my monthly Spotify playlists that I started creating back in 2017 featuring a variety of genres.
I’ve been taking a break from posting regularly, from writing and reading, to take in what’s happening. Until today, I even forgot this month is National Poetry Month. It seems so trivial compared to the events that are propelling us into another tumultuous year.
When the trial of Derek Chauvin began, tensions were starting to build. Then, on Sunday, Daunte Wright was shot and killed by a police officer less than a year since George Floyd’s killing and only miles away. Protests broke out the same day in multiple cities.
Dealing with the frustration and the sadness of this event while processing the trial’s updates is nerve-wracking. Hoping for true justice for George Floyd’s killing, and then only to have another Black man killed. These events are the kindling for a raging fire primed to spread across the nation.
To me, it feels like this is the start of another summer of protests. The same emotions and tensions are there, but now a compound interest of the events of the past year have the ability to birth events that will make last year appear tame in comparison (—add the growing frustration about the hate crimes directed toward the AAPI community. The nation will continue to ride these waves of unrest until real change happens. We cannot step back into the past; we have to move forward.
I feel a gnawing sadness mixed with irritation. This country is on the cusp of change, but it’s not safe to say if the change will be for the good of the people or reinforce the plague of systemic racism and economic oppression that have killed people for generations.
The poor are getting poorer while the rich are benefiting from the pandemic. The gaps are growing among social classes, which adds to the tension from the murdering of Black people by police, hate crimes, and the pandemic.
The pandemic is an infectious thread weaving it all together. With many places opening up, loosening restrictions, and ending mask mandates without the recommended minimum of 70-90% of the population fully vaccinated for herd immunity to work, there could very likely be another deadly wave like what we saw during winter.
We’ve already lost approximately 562,000 people. How many more will die? I think it is very likely with the low percentages of people either partially or fully vaccinated, this premature reopening could result in states shutting down again this year.
How will it be six months from now? Three months? Who knows, but this year isn’t going to be a quiet one from what I’ve observed.
I wrote this at the beginning of the week. Yesterday, there was another mass shooting, this time in Indianapolis. A 19-year-old man killed eight people, injured seven, and then killed himself. I wonder how many people have to die before we take responsibility for these killings, enact stricter gun laws, and provide more resources for those in need of help. We need to seriously consider why men are capable of these horrific acts of mass murder. How do these acts reflect on the condition of our society? Our country?
What do these killings say about us? It’s not just the actions of one person that resulted in the murder of innocent people, it’s our inability to take action to prevent this that resulted in their deaths. These deaths, from racism, hatred, pain, from the pandemic, these are on us. We have to take responsibility for what we’ve done.