WELCOME TO SAN DANTE
Have you been here before? I didn’t think so. I didn’t recognize your face when you pulled into the Speedway for a fill-up and I never forget a face, friend! Did you come for the big wedding? Boy, that Abcde is really something, ain’t she? Four weddings and zero marriages. Who knows, maybe this one will stick, huh? I’ve got a fiver on it, and if it does, I’ll be one rich man. Oh, Directions? Sure. I’d be happy to steer you back to the freeway, but If you don’t mind me saying so, you look like death warmed over. Relax -relax, I meant no offense! I just thought you could do with a refreshing drink, what with the heatwave and all. What are you dressed like that for anyway? Nevermind.
Hop out of that fancy looking car you’ve got there and grab yourself a cold one out of the cooler. Don’t be shy,! One beer ain’t gonna kill nobody your size, big fella. Have a seat over here, we’ve got central air, you’ll cool off in no time. Yeah, I know your directions - you’ll get ‘em, but I’d like to warn you a little bit about the town first. Not everything here is green grass and hot ass.
You’d never be able to tell now, but this yuppie haven was once a charming and tranquil ode to Victorian architecture until America’s well-healed éclat’s transformed it into an all-inclusive getaway in the early 1950s. Now all that remains are the outer husks, a brick and mortar cyborg with all the inner workings made of advanced parts and foreign technology. Look here, all up and down the waterfront: Suites of mixed-use storefronts, brimming with cycle shops, flower boutiques, health spas, quaint cafes, Korean BBQ, and other over-priced hotspots, tailor-made for the wealthy greenhorns who come mucking around on holiday- present company excluded. Even the locals seem settled into a familiar smugness, the edifice of an acoustic busker who only has one song in his repertoire, a plucky yet ultimately disappointing rendition of Under the Bridge by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, popularized by freshmen nihilism, and Djarum cigarettes.
Can you smell that? The July air is a welcoming perfume of wild jasmine, of toasted sweet corn, freshly brewed coffee, and the salty Pacific breeze wafting in off the beach. All of it strategically packaged and sold as a New Age paradise, an incessant Lilith festival. You know I hear that’s where the Clarks got most of their dough; selling handmade souvenirs out of the back of their van while their old man sang his way across the midwest. After that oddball passed away, it was Abcde’s idea to brand everything because I guess looking like a homeless beatnik has become trendy. Now she’s got Import merchants stationed every fifteen feet trying to hawk prefab tie-dye shirts and trendy synthesized hemp jewelry proving yet again that the American economy relies heavily on convenience. Why trek all the way down to the boardwalk when you can get it here? Just $19.99 each or two for $30.00, what a deal!
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There are of course names for places that lose their soul somewhere in between the ideals of capitalism and aspiring hotel moguls with delusions of grandeur and the phrase “tourist trap.” certainly does come to mind. Like New Orleans, Las Vegas, or any of the neighboring coasts right here in sunny California, the entire district is a hub of white-collar debauchery, and if there is a profit to be had, here is where it’s made. The streets are cement beaches; infested with drunken colligates shelled in epilepsy inducing trinkets, and plastic beads, while the actual beaches host a variety of glistening, half-naked bodies slathered in coconut-scented tanning creams and body paints. Look at that one tugging at the seat of his trunks! Sand sure does find it’s way everywhere, doesn’t it?
I know you’re just passing through, but if you get tired of extracting bottle caps from the souls of your spats, try climbing the four-hundred-and-three steps to the peak of Glover street- that’s two hundred-and-forty feet above the alabaster coast. If you make it to the top, you’ll walk right into the parking lot of Sheppard’s Pawn, PX and Bondsmith, or what the locals dubbed the PXB, It’s where you’re headed anyway, right? Be careful on the last flight. The wood is getting spongy, and good old Mike has been in a property battle with the city of San Francisco over whose responsibility it is to repair them. You know him, he’s not doing the public any favors.
That do-it-yourself camouflage paint job was his idea too. Every spring he’s out there with about half a dozen stinky aerosol cans like our ozone ain’t got enough holes! It’s no wonder why people constantly mistake it for a VFW. I don’t know how he stays in business, the whole place is generally regarded as a social pariah, both in the quality of its patrons and the unconventional colors of its foundation. Nobody expects a rich girl like Abcde to live in a shithole like that, and I think that’s the way she likes it. Yes, our local celebutante! from the age of six, Abcde Braxtynn Clark has headlined every tabloid from Bop Magazine, to Vanity Fair. Since her first win as Mini Supreme Queen in the National American Miss Pageant finals, and then she went on to guest star on the late-night comedy circuit, continuing to make a name for herself as a controversial media personality, socialite, model, and fashion consultant to the stars on modern trends and cosmetics. She’s been great for tourism.