Sept 17, 2006
I was sitting on the stairs the other day, looking through the old photos in my camera that I had not deleted. I was surprised at how far back the memories went. The pictures go all the way back to when I first moved out of my house. There are tons of photographs of the places in my house where I used to talk to my sister, photos of my baby dog back when he was still there and had so much energy that it actually got annoying trying to get a picture of him, photos of good times with old family friends, like the time we visited our old elementary school and thought about how those days used to be. There are photos of trips to San Francisco, and fun times we had riding up and down the Westin St. Francis’s elevator, old pictures of Christmas in the city with my family, a trip to the Getty, three beautiful cups of coffee on a night out in Santa Barbara, silly hats and old trains in Roseville, an ornate metal frog in a fountain on a warm sunny day, and most importantly the smiles of my friends.
When I look at those pictures, I think of the days gone by that have been captured. Those days where we used to go on trips…warm, sunny, carefree road trips to Sacramento, San Francisco, Huntington Beach, Orange County, and Mexico. And then I think about how things have changed. I’ve already moved, my dog isn’t here anymore, and I’m moving on to my third year of college. And with the third year comes stress – stress from added responsibility, stress from thinking about what comes after college, and stress from the changes that come with each new year. Things are changing, and we are slowly losing our innocence. Losing it to the madness that is finding out what we are doing with our lives, losing it to frustration that occurs when we realize that things aren’t really the way we thought they would be. Losing it when we realize that life is getting to be a lot harder than we had anticipated.
That innocence we had when those pictures were taken is reflected in our smiles – our excited, hopeful smiles that say we’re eager. We’re eager to dive into our newfound college lives, we’re happy, and we’re running toward our dreams. But somehow, some of that eagerness is lost along the way. We run into problems we’ve never had to deal with before, and we feel discouraged. Our childlike innocence fades. But I’m hoping that with the loss of innocence comes a maturity that grants us an ability to appreciate the beauty in life in a way we’ve never been able to before. I’m also hoping we don’t forget the friends who’ve been there with us through it all. Those friends who smiled those smiles full of innocence, hopes and dreams with us in the past. Those friends who’ve laughed with us on sunny road trips to far away places. We’re going to fall sometimes along the way, but I know we’re still going to build sand-castles and laugh and drink too many root beer floats along the way to adulthood.
And when we’re there, I think we’ll experience those beautiful moments where life seems to take on a sienna tint. Those moments where things fade into orange, glasses are raised, and you hear laughter.
Sex and San Francisco - One Femme's Take on Dating and Love in the City 