My journals from February, 2000: Loving my first iMac, hating my first Cinnabon, interviewing at the San Francisco Chronicle, puking on the San Francisco Bay

Sailing on the choppy San Francisco Bay. Photo by Nathan DeHart

On Leap Day one year, I had a job interview at the San Francisco Chronicle.

That was cool.

Well, to be precise, on Feb. 29, 2000, I took a test at that newspaper to see if I was worthy of an actual interview, but to me it was super cool just to get a call back from the Chronicle, which was a newspaper I had grown up reading and admiring even before I started working in the industry.

I did pass that first test and landed an official interview (on the day their staff found out they would be merging with the staff of the SF Examiner!), but ultimately I was not hired at the Chron. I also did not get a job at the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, where I had interviewed the previous month, and I definitely did not tell my grandmother that I had quit my first newspaper job at the Vallejo Times-Herald before I had landed a new position!

But I still ended the month on a high, full of hope for my future in journalism, and full of gratitude that I was no longer spending several hours puking up pretzels on the San Francisco Bay while seeing nothing but porpoises on an all-day whale-watching trip:

Friday, Feb. 11, 2000

I went to The City, wanted to take the ferry but Stacey was working late so they asked if I could take the 6:30 one, which was a bus - crap. Chris had to drop me off at like 5:30 because he had to work at 6, and I sat in the terminal reading, walking. The coffee shop was closing so I paced, watched the big woman in the blue uniform talk with the coffee shop woman, get out her boxes of Chinese food and eat. 

Finally at 6:45 a city bus pulls up, and she couldn't give me change for 8 dollars and I sat and listened to a woman tell the bus driver, obviously they knew each other, about her medication, how she left her work in a huff and left her coat, out in the cold and rain, how the home she stays at has no good food, they don't cook what she can eat, and never have any "real breakfast food," how she wishes for eggs, bacon, maybe a sausage, how after room and board and transportation she only has 96 dollars a month. Damn. 96 dollars. I spend that much on one trip to Target. And how she thinks about putting a gun to her head. I guess my life isn't so bad.

We made excellent time. The bus was only like five minutes late, but when I stepped out into the rain Stacey wasn't there. FUCK! FUCK! I stood in the rain, trying not to cry, went into the Amtrak station and called, walked to the main building where the phones are, pack of men camped out by the phones... finally I saw her coming across the street, "Oh, I'm sorry, the ferry came, you weren't there, I panicked, thought you meant the Embarcadero, ran there."

We jumped in a cab and went to Heather's work, The Faultline, had two lemon drops, great chicken, and garlic mashed potatoes and green beans and split a brownie, talked about men and shows and breast-feeding classes and it was pretty cool. 

Me and sweet Stacey.

[I have no idea why the heck we were talking about breast-feeding classes, as neither of us had a baby or were even pregnant.]

We went home after midnight when Heather got off, watched TV and Heather ordered a pizza from North Beach Pizza, it was really good, with the cheese on top, kind of different. I got no sleep, though, just couldn't fall asleep; the light from outside, worrying, the alcohol, I don't know. Just kept waking up. Then Stacey's alarm went off at 5, she finally got up at like 7, tearing through the house like a hurricane..

Saturday, February 12, 2000

I felt like shit, but was excited. We pile on the boat after a hefty trek to the dock and a stop for all the women to go to the bathroom. I find a warm, dry place inside next to the skinny tourist guy drinking tea, but go out to look as we glide under the Golden Gate, it was pretty spectacular.

Then it got so horribly bad... The sheet said to avoid alcohol and get plenty of rest and I had done neither, and though it had stopped raining, thank god, it was choppy, the boat weaving and pitching and jumping, and I started to feel queasy, started getting real ill, but I refused to be the first at the back of the boat. 

I waited and waited, and soon this woman in red ran to the back, and a while later I went, throwing up all the pretzels I had eaten that I thought would settle my stomach, thought my stomach was empty, but I threw up again and again, the guy William going back and forth between us, asking if we were all right, giving us paper towels to wipe our mouths.

At one point there were so many of us standing at the back of the boat we were elbow to elbow, trying not to barf on the person next to us; some humiliation at people so close, but the need to puke was stronger.

Soon it was just dry heaves. The guy next to me in bright yellow says, “Fun, isn’t it?” I look at him: “No.”

And we rolled and rocked through “The Pumpkin Patch” and headed to the Farrallones, which was cool, but we didn’t see shit, just a Harbor porpoise or two, up and down and up and down and nothing but grey sea, everywhere. The buoys teased you, and the logs teased, and the birds teased, but we saw nothing. And felt awful.

As the islands got closer and closer, William came up to me and the girl I was standing next to and said we were only like 20 minutes away, they would be cutting the engine soon, and invited us up to the cabin. She smartly declined, but I let him insist, “it will be a nice change of pace, break up the monotony, take a walk.” And I trudged after him, sliding and crashing into the back of someone's legs and pitching into the cabin, up to the cockpit where you could see the islands, but it was hot, and stuffy, and the music was loud, and the view up ahead went up and down, up and down, and I felt nauseous again immediately, tried to hold it in as (the naturalist) Susan came up. William said, “Why don’t you give her a lay of the island,” and she looked at me coldly, paused: “I’ll address the whole group.”

“That's OK,” I said, wishing I could explain that I hadn't asked for it, I didn’t even want to be there, and when I turned and started yanking on the door, the captain said, “Just let me know if you need me to open that door,” and he opened it for me and I barely got my face over the railing and spit came up warm and wet in the paper towel in my hand, and William came out next to me, “I guess that wasn't such a good idea.”

Just let me be, aye, I kept thinking, God, this is bad enough without the guy hovering. 

And finally the engine stopped and we floated around the islands, she told us some pretty interesting stuff about the people who lived there, the egg harvesters and the scientists, but still didn’t see shit, and the boat made a wide arch around the islands; I kept measuring the size of the islands and their position, right, left, center, to make sure we were going back, and scanned the grey seas without moving for the whole two hours or so back. Staring straight ahead, joyous when I saw the bridge, begging it to grow bigger as my cold hands gripped the rail and the boat rocked me back and forth, my hips hitting the metal, blisters growing on my hands, but I didn't throw up again. I felt slightly nauseous, just waited for the boat to stop; shivered in my cold shoes with my wet toes and prayed for it all to end.

I so looked forward to it, six hours of whale watching, getting away and out of myself, to feel like a kid, to feel close to my mother, to get away from everything, and it was all so awful.

As we pulled up to the dock, Susan told us how it was a great day anyway, and to come back and do one of their other trips, and I don't know if I'll get on a boat again; just grabbed my stuff, headed off the boat and willed my stiff cold limbs to walk as fast as they could to get to the ferry. 

My feet hurt, they were wet and cold, and I was still nauseous but I shoved in almonds and pistachios and drank water. I was probably dehydrated, no water or anything for hours, and all the vomiting.

I got to Pier 39 and stood in line for the Vallejo ferry, waiting for the other boats to empty out. One took like 15 minutes, people just didn't stop coming out, there was more and more and more... finally I got on, I was so fucking tired and just wanted to call Chris, talk to him, tell him how crappy I felt.

I found the phone, couldn't get it to work. It only took credit cards; you had to call, then slide it in, "Error 37, error 6," just this damn recording, I could have screamed, punched it, cried.

But I sat, wondering if I could pay the guy two rows up to use his cell phone, or the girl next to him, or the other girl in front of me. They all had phones, talking on them, picking them up when they rang. God, I was envious, I just wanted to talk to Chris."  

Sunday, February 20, 2000

I am writing this on my new iMac. Partly because I want to, but mostly because the keyboard on my old machine is acting up again. Poor thing. It has been replaced, rendered obsolete. 

[My old machine was one of the original Macintoshes that my step-grandmother had upgraded to Mac Plus before gifting it to me. I used it all through college, where I first learned to hook up to the Internet and check emails from home!]

Chris using my old Mac at our desk with the cat.

Quite nice, this little thing. I love the little click of the keyboard, the feel of the keys. Listening to my Bob Dylan CD, sitting with my cat. He comes right in, can't figure out why I am spending so much time in here now. He's trying to find room between the desk and me to sit on my lap. I don't blame him, it's been so cold in here lately. Course now there's all this cat hair everywhere...

All right day today. Got online a few times, added some bookmarks for job sites. Nobody has emailed me on my new email, though. I was so crabby today, everything Chris was doing was annoying me; eating chips too loudly, crunching his apple, leaving the paper towel rack empty, rushing me before we went to Trader Joe's...

It was nice to sit outside after the mall, so fucking crowded and him looking for a tie to match the color of his shirt, "No, that's too light, no, that's too dark." I wanted to scream.

"You wanna go somewhere and wait?"

I was starving, so I went to Cinnabon, but the cheapest thing they had was a minibon for $1.79, and I had like $1.30, so I wander off and find an ATM, take out a 20, order a minibon and watch him pick out the tiniest thing ever, like an inch in diameter, for a freaking dollar 79? Geez. And it was disgusting. Dripping with frosting and butter and sickly sweet. I was sorry I ate it, I should have just thrown it away.

He went to work [Chris had a second job at a pizza place then to help pay off his credit card debts] and I said, "Just look at it like this, you won't have to put up with me tonight," and he said, "No, you mean you won't have to put up with me." Well, yeah.

But I exercised, watched "Felicity," ate my asparagus raviolis with my asparagus and salad, and now I feel all right.

Tuesday, February 22, 2000

I feel pretty good today, Was pretty crabby again, though, barking and impatient with Chris. Everything he does seems to annoy me.

I emailed (DT) at the Merc and sent off my stuff...still waiting to here to hear from Santa Rosa, been a week since I called to check, so now three weeks.

So I mailed off the package and got most everything else done today, good workout... got the food shopping done, in the pouring rain, and ordered the adapter for my printer last night. I should be all set soon, can print out new resumes here! I think the only thing I didn't do was practice my guitar.

I'm still waiting to hear from my grandmother about meeting in The City...

Nothing much else to report, I suppose. Figured out how to get the toilet to stop running, just turned the water off at the pipe, but now you have to turn it back on after you flush, Chris never does.

Me being here all day has turned me into this crabby hermit rat, or like gollum, mad at everyone, hating to be disturbed, impatient, wanting to be left alone and go on my computer, listen to my book on tape, watch TV. I'm watching too much TV and craving too much junk. Too much time on my hands. I'm never productive when I have too much time on my hands.

Thursday, February 24, 2000

Man, is it cold today. I am moving the space heater to wherever I go today, in here where I set up my printer. Shew, that was fun. Of course I no longer had the printer software, I think I tossed it out, but even if I had it, it was on floppies, so I couldn't have used it anyway.

So far, my printer has cost me over $100 to set up. I wonder how much a new printer would have cost me?

Well, I downloaded the software, installed it, and it works fine, but now I'm plum out of paper. At least I'm learning a lot. 

 

Well, yesterday I had a pretty nice day. I headed toward Point Reyes, but ended up driving across 37 to 121, heading up to Napa. It was beautiful, so green; big, white low puffy clouds, no rain.

I passed "The Fruit Basket" and saw signs for artichokes, so I pulled over, bought some nice, jumbo artichokes for 69 cents and some tomatoes. Lovely.

I kept thinking about going to Genoa's Deli, so I headed to Napa and got a smoke turkey sandwich, listening to "Primary Colors" and finally feeling free and calm.

But the panic and fear is settling in. I'm almost 30 and what am I doing with my life?

Do I want to go back to the boring and tedious copy desk? Do I want to do all that commuting?

But I need a job. I need to start working. I will do it in small, workable steps. Do not get overwhelmed.

step one: find a job.

step two: pay off credit card debt.

step three: rebuild savings.

future steps: find happiness: travel, new location, friends, interests, activities, work.

Saturday, February 26, 2000

Wow, the Chronicle called me Thursday. it's hard not to feel a little bit of awe, but I'm also very excited. I set up a test for Tuesday. They give you a 90-minute test before they go through the trouble of interviewing you, I suppose. 

And Monday I'm meeting my grandmother in The City. I'm already lying about my job, telling her I haven't quit, better to call me at home. "Where are you calling from? Don't you have to work? Did you give your notice yet?"

Tuesday, February 29, 2000

Just went and saw "The Talented Mr. Ripley" with Mary. Man, we've been trying to see that movie for ages. Met her at her hair stylist on First Street. "I'm hungry," she said, bless her heart, so we went and ate at the Szechwan restaurant, yummy chicken and snow peas and asparagus with beef. Sat and talked before the movie instead of after.

The movie was quite good, beautiful scenery, beautiful actors; good scenes, suspenseful, very long and involved, but it kept your interest. I like Anthony Minghella, he makes gorgeous movies.

I went and took The Chronicle test today. It was supposed to be raining, I was dreading the walk. Maybe if it was real bad I would take a cab, but like a sign, it stopped raining just as a I headed out the door. I got the paper as I got on the ferry, praying for it to stay sunny, got off an went to Starbucks again near Market and the Embarcadero, but I passed like five on my way there, two less than a block apart. I realized that part of Mission was probably not the best place to be walking, so on my way back I went down Market.

It was weird walking into the building. Empty, except for an old man at a desk in a big lobby, with three televisions going behind him. He said I had 15 minutes, sit and wait and he would call her at 5 til.

Sure enough, as I watched a silent Leeza show and the news of John McCain, he picked up the red phone at exactly five til and said I could go up to the third floor. It opened to a receptionist and SL was there. I put out my hand, "I'd shake yours, but I'm sick."

The newsroom was pretty empty, looked much like Santa Rosa, but she put me right next to her office, which was right next to one of the only women working there.

I set to work on the four stories, one about an Antioch jeweler's wife who was kidnapped, Clinton Christmas shopping, horrors of the Bosnia-Croatia war and a business story. It was all right; had to write certain size headlines, each letter given point values, etc. 

The last page was peoples' names, San Francisco people, the first name I recognized but couldn't place it, knew he had been elected to something... and when I got home I looked on the Internet -- new president of South Africa. Damn. Willie Brown was spelled Willy, Barbra Streisand was spelled wrong, they had Queen Latifah and Tony Morrison, all those I knew, but I wasn't really sure of Slobodan Milosevich or Boris Yeltsin. I think the first name was spelled right and that Boris Yeltsin just resigned. I hope so. Well, at least it was better than that damn Santa Rosa one. What, they don't have spell check?

I left and was feeling pretty good, a middle-aged man in a gray suit and fedora came running onto the elevator. When we got off he stepped quickly to the door to open it for me, but as soon as I got out of the door and was standing at the light, a man moved over in front of me and I stepped back, not hitting or touching anyone, but I hear this loud, snappy, "Excuse me!" from an older woman behind me. I mumbled, "I'm sorry," and move over. Damn, that was rude.

And yesterday was a fiasco. I got on the ferry at 10:30, walked to the dock and tried to figure out where the bus would drop off grandma, the nearest ones I could find were all at the Hyatt. I should have stayed there, but we said the Carl's Jr so I circled, and circled, walked round and round; up the stairs to the bathroom, back through the restaurant, round the block, to the phones. Finally I sat and had a chicken sandwich, "the one without cheese," and the guy was nice enough to give me another water when he saw I dropped a penny in mine as I grabbed my tray.

I called home again and caught Chris, he though she probably got the days wrong.

"What are you going to do?"

"Wait for the 3:30 ferry."

"Want me to come get you?"

I knew I should wait, but I said "Sure, meet me there at 2:15." 

I hung up, walked over to Carl's Jr and two minutes later grandma walks up with some guy; she gave him a dollar to take her to Carl's Jr, she for got where it was, and another dollar when he brought her to her "beautiful granddaughter."

[Grandma's report of that day: "Can't find Carl's. To homeless man. Took me to Carl's. Justine there!"]

I ran to the phone, tried to catch Chris, but he had left, so we headed to the ferry building, sat waiting as grandma ate her cake, drank her tea, Bought a banana, but she only wanted the cake.

Chris pulled up, right on time, and I felt so bad. "Oh, it was a nice drive, no traffic."

So we went to Liz Claiborne, and she spent way to much money on clothes for me. I should have just gotten the skirt, a long, black skirt, but I brought out the pants, too, and then she wanted to buy me a scarf. I feel bad. She didn't want to spend that much. 

But it was nice, and I wore my skirt today, wore the pants tonight with the scarf. It was really lovely. Mary was surprised. "Your grandmother bought that for you? She picked it out?"

When I got home, Chris was waiting, cooking up a big dinner. "Are you hungry?"

Made pork tenderloins, his own twice-baked potatoes, and asparagus. He's so much better at the housewife thing. I just hate it. It balls me up inside, makes me all tense and pissed-off.