Went to San Francisco last night to see Gloria Steinem and Letty Cottin Pogrebin at City Arts & Lectures. Really interesting and inspiring… and made me want to do something. Not sure what, but just made me remember how important and crucial so many issues still are. It’s so easy to get enveloped in your own personal (melo)drama that you lose sight of the bigger picture.
City Arts moved to this gorgeous theater near Hayes Valley (though unfortunately not close enough to squeeze in a little shopping/browsing!). It was recently restored and is absolutely beautiful.
Yesterday was also the first time I ventured onto BART with Cassius. I’ve taken BART around the Bay Area all my life and am super-comfortable with it… but adding a dog adds a completely different level of stress! Some of the CCI trainers said that some dogs may be a little unnerved by the sound, and even recommended going beforehand to let them get used to it. Somehow, that didn’t happen (oops!). So we arrived about 10 minutes before our train was supposed to arrive, found our elevator (no small feat, one of my disability studies professors in grad school said that all the elevators at BART stations are in weird places because they originally forgot to add them in the plans!), and headed up to the elevated platform.
Cassius did superbly waiting for the train, even though the freeway noise is loud and this was a totally different environment. Luckily our train arrived and we found a seat, going against commute traffic is good sometimes!
Cassius did great on the loud, bumpy BART train, especially going through the Trans Bay Tube–which somehow felt even louder than usual! I could tell he wasn’t completely happy with this arrangement but was totally obliging and calm. The train home was a bit better for him as it was carpeted, poor guy kept sliding around as he lay there in the first train without carpeting!
We finally got to San Francisco (it only takes 25 minutes to get there, but it definitely seemed like longer last night!) and eventually figured out how to get out of the platform area without taking the elevator (too stinky!)-thankfully there are stairs.
Found the theater and found our seats. We had two aisle seats, and luckily we were the last ones to arrive so it was easy to get situated:
Cassius was great during the show (about an hour and a half, with no intermission). A few times he woke up, looked up at me, I gave him a scratch behind the ears, and he went off to sleep, contented. He did let out one vocal yawn, but I’m not sure anyone else heard it. I hope.
Headed back to BART, dodging sketchy-looking street dogs along the way, and caught a train as soon as we made it onto the platform. I was relieved as there was another dog who I didn’t quite trust down by the tracks, and I was worried for Cassius’s sake about waiting near it.
The ride home was sleepy and uneventful, and I think Cassius was so relieved to arrive back home!
Not that I had any doubt that Cassius would be rock solid in the culture and public transportation realms, but I’m happy we’ve crossed this milestone together! I love the arts and San Francisco, so I foresee lots of trips like this in our future together.
Natalie Abbott 