"I'm moving to Iowa."
The words hung in the air as his eyes twinkled beneath the bushel of long red beard that had marked him for so long, in my eyes, as the quintessential San Franciscan. A deeply bearded man clad in jean jacket, a man who worked tirelessly sculpting the gardens of folks who decreasingly entered their backyards, or believed in paying living wages to landscapers like him. I had known Brett as my neighbor, a shy but genuine man who welcomed me to the transitioning South of Market apartment building where I had moved into years ago.
At the time, Brett, who asked that his last name not be published, represented the "old San Francisco," and in many ways the "old SOMA," the one I had been hoping to understand and connect with more upon moving there. We had gone through the wars of the bedbugs, and other apartment related fiascos together. Over time I came to learn that he had been in San Francisco for almost 30 years (in SOMA for 26 of them), made moderate use of the gay clubs still remaining in the neighborhood, and even at one point hosted BDSM services in his apartment. In my fantasy of him at least, he worked as a landscaper by day, and a sort of male Geisha or comfort man (probably comfort wizard given his aggressively masculine yet charming red beard). Brett was someone who could be seen regularly enough at the local coffee shop reading more about agriculture or culture and writing in his diary. I couldn't believe the words he was saying to me, but at the same time, as I listened deeper, I saw the desire in his eyes to settle, to find something of reliable substance amidst a land of ever-changing footing. Of course I could understand.
Brett went on to explain, "My older partner and I want him to retire, and we are going to get married so we can finally afford it." The problem was, he said, that even with the benefits of a marriage license, the couple had virtually no chance of finding a reliable place to live together, even with the almost-retiree pulling in over $80,000 a year in his 70s.
"I mean now, we can get married anywhere," he said, eyebrows slightly arched, as if to do his best to recognize how immense that fact was. But something below the eyebrows expressed that this achievement was also somewhat, somehow tragic, that one of the things that has made this city so unique has now been made a standard practice in places like, well, Iowa. San Francisco was the place that made gay marriage possible, and now, even in lands that still won't allow Planned Parenthood clinics, this achievement has been thrust upon all communities, without the benefit of being geographically steeped in the deep social, cultural, and spiritual changes that were needed to make this change possible and accepted. How bizarre that the only city known internationally for asserting the rights of gay couples just doesn't seem to have room for them anymore.
"And we aren't the only ones," Brett said, knowing full well the impact the word Iowa was having upon me. "I mean, the thing is just that no gay married couples can afford to live here anymore, and we don't have to live here to get married. Married couples now are leaving in droves." He searched my eyes for understanding, expressing strongly in his own that this was OK. This, although perhaps unimaginable for organizers like the late Harvey Milk, was the inevitable course of things. This was the natural course at this point.
"It's not just the retirement either honestly, it's just ..." as he leveled his eyes at me in the most solemn moment I've ever seen him express, and in a manner uniquely sacred for a casual neighborly conversation at the local cafe. "San Francisco is just done. It was done 20 years ago. I mean, when I moved here, San Francisco was 20 percent black. Now it's like, what, 2 or 3 percent? [Less than 6 percent.] Besides, what we are getting in Iowa is three plots of land, each easily the size of our whole apartment building here, one of which has a house and guesthouse, all for $100,000. It's in a town of 400,000, and our place will be right in the middle of the downtown!"
I needed a cigarette, which was, at the time of this conversation at least, still legal, although decreasingly affordable in San Francisco. My mind was spinning. Is this really what has happened now? San Francisco has served its purpose only to be consumed by the very spirit of acceptance it once made famous? And for those who made it what it was? A sort of hollow victory. Hey, now you can have more of a traditional life like all those straight couples, and just like all those folks, now you can have legal access to settling down somewhere �" just not here anymore. There just isn't any room left. Maybe in Iowa.
The cigarette had reached its end, the ashes now resting on the filter, and the heat of the last puff woke me from my stupor. As I carefully extinguished my cigarette, placing it in the appropriate trash container, I realized that I was clinging to something that Brett himself had already made some sort of peace with. I recalled a new meditation I had recently learned in my adopted city: "Nothing to do. No one to blame. We are all in this together. Change is the only constant."
Alex Pascarzi is a San Francisco resident.