Oh my

This truly lovely ode to my neighborhood was pointed out to me by noradeidre, and I am most grateful. It comes at a fortuitous time. (Though I dispute his assertion of North Beach being resigned or well-behaved. It's still bawdy and disreputable, just in a different fashion.)

It's also the anniversary of the repeal of Prohibition, which is probably why they have a tribute to North Beach up.

The full text of the article is under the cut.

( It was the end of the continent; they didn't give a damn )

We know the pot of gold is bogus, but we still keep going there. We've been doing it for years -- as young men, not so young men and now not young men at all. We keep heading to North Beach, keep turning left on Churchill Alley out of the Broadway tunnel, even though in those 30 years we have never yet once hit the jackpot, felt the supreme high, made the scene, danced the dance, met the chick, seen the best minds of our generation doing anything, let alone walking through the Negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix.

But it doesn't matter. There's always next time. And when you finally begin to understand that there ain't going to be no next time, that this is it, that's OK. You don't need North Beach to give up its secrets because you know them all. Because you're on the corner of Grant and Green in this sad old Italian valley beneath its two guardian hills looking down like kindly old paisans, and the waves are lapping down at Aquatic Park to the north and the filthy numberless alleys of Chinatown lurk to the south, and the glasses in every bar are full and Broadway is stupid jammed with John Dos Passos sailors and the Palmistry sign is reflected in the upper windows of Vesuvio and the parrots are flying above Washington Square and the Mason Street cable car rattle-clatters onto Columbus and you're at the dead center of town, the bull's-eye, where you've been a thousand times before and where you will always return, where you left your heart, and where you found it.
-- By Gary Kamiya

And I responded to the article. How could I not?

I forgot to mention Fernet, though.

North Beach, where the men are boys and the women are strippers

At least, that's the impression you'd get if you only came in to my neighborhood on the weekends.

The other North Beach, the one I live in, is a place where everyone is familiar, even if you just met them. Where you're taken care of if you need it. Where there's always a dice game going on. Where you can go insane from all of the heavenly aromas emitting from the bakeries and the coffee shops and the Italian restaurants. Where there's big-band jazz at the Savoy every Saturday and a brass-band funeral almost every day. Where you'll be left alone if you want to be, and welcomed with open arms if you want that. Where you can hear the seals barking and the foghorns at night. Where you can climb a hill and watch the city go by and be in your own little world.

That's my North Beach, and I love it.