It was a long day today, and I am pretty well wiped out. I need to get packing and go to bed, as I fly out to California in the morning.
I was born in California, and even though I’ve now lived far longer in New England than I ever lived in California, it always feels a like going home when I visit. (It certainly doesn’t hurt that my sister and then my mother moved back there, either.)
The Golden Gate Bridge is one of my personal icons, a symbol of a place and a time of my life. (Funny to realize that it was the first bridge I ever crossed, as I was born in San Francisco, but lived in Sausalito.) I remember crossing the bridge many times as a kid and teenager, and always being a little thrilled by it.
When I go out to visit these days, it’s rare that I cross that bridge. As my mother and sister live in the East Bay now, the Bay Bridge is the one we most often take. But I always seek out the Golden Gate Bridge from afar when I can, even if it’s just a glimpse from the airplane.
This is a painting of mine from back in the days when I took painting classes. It’s based on a dream I had when I was 4 years old. In the dream, my mother and sister and I were fish, and swam across the San Francisco Bay from Sausalito. It was a rather complex and very bizarre dream, involving Coit tower and an improbable system of elevators. Somehow I remembered many details of the dream up through my mid-20s when I painted this. The memories are much fainter now.
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This post was brought to you by nostalgia, a glass of red wine, and mental exhaustion after a day of doing laundry and nagging children to pick up their toys.
P.S. I just noticed that all the links from my happy song post were broken. I fixed them. Didn’t I say I need to be packing?
collecting tokens 
Wow, I love the painting with its dream description!
Being from the Bay Area myself, I am also rather fond of the Golden Gate Bridge, but my favorite San Francisco iconic structure is Sutro Tower.
I hope you manage to get your suitcase packed. Safe travels! And if you don’t read this until after you arrive, Welcome (back home) to California!
Cool painting! I’ve had that weird elevator dream a lot. Wonder what it means…
that’s a wonderful painting!
This is astonishing.
Have a safe trip.
I love that painting. You captured that surreal dream state so well as well as the perspective of a child. I love the layers you achieved, and the way that despite all the big elements in the composition, the goldfish rule at its center.
I still vividly remember one dream from when I was about 7. Strange how some just stick with you.
Hope your flight and trip go well!
That’s a very cool painting. Whimsical and colourful. I like.