Sunday, November 08, 2020

Dancing in the Streets

Walking up 18th Street in San Francisco early Saturday afternoon, we saw a flatbed truck featuring a life-size puppet being tossed around...
...while a percussion-heavy band played raucously in the back.
Pedestrians, both shirtless and elaborately dressed, cheered as they drove slowly by...
...while one young woman displayed her pleasure by twerking at passing traffic.
At the intersecton of Castro and 18th Street, a bicyclist with a portable loudspeaker...
...prompted a pop-up dance party...
...featuring young people in colorful outfits.
I was at this intersection 28 years ago, when Bill Clinton was elected U.S. President after 12 years of Reagan and Bush, and the overwhelming, joyful relief felt similar.
The bicycling DJ departed and was quickly replaced by a piñata game in the middle of the street...
...cheered on by the crowd.
Another DJ halfway up Castro Street began a set, complete with a stage...
...a langorous go-go dancer on a balcony above...
...and hundreds of masked celebrants enjoying the moment.

3 comments:

janinsanfran said...

Exactly. I couldn't help thinking of the Clinton celebrations ... God we're getting old. :-0

Rachel said...

Beautiful, Michael!

Civic Center said...

Dear Jan: We're not getting old. We are old, and institutional memory is a good thing as long as you don't get stuck in time. You haven't and neither have I so far.

Dear Rachel: Thanks. We never made it to SFMOMA because we needed to celebrate outside, so let's go next Saturday.