For the next few weeks, we’ll be observing an anniversary: 10 years since we left San Francisco and moved to Ann Arbor. I’ll repost articles Frank and I wrote at that time for our Ann Arbor blog, aSquared. Bittersweet, very definitely they will be, bittersweet.

‘[It’s aSquared’s First Birthday … we’re celebrating by looking back at events from a year ago … skip these retro posts if you’re not into sentimentality.]

‘Fog. Oh, the fog. Yes, indeedy, god knows I do miss that …

‘Things I’ll miss, #8

‘The fog. It doesn’t come in on “little cat feet,” as in the Carl Sandburg poem. It comes in like a crushing Genghis Khan army.

‘Friday night as I was on my way to Base Airbeagle, I walked along Kirkham and up the hill on Locksley—and the fog was so thick, it was exhilarating. You could see maybe ten yards in any direction, tops. The fog rolled over the neighborhood like a massive gray carpet being shaken by a giant pair of hands. The mist crashed against your face, driven by the wind. This wasn’t Cornwall or the Cotswolds, it was the Inner Sunset.

‘When I first looked for apartments in San Francisco, it was in the Inner and Outer Sunset that I looked, and I hesitated because I found the fog irritating, depressing, and forbidding. Now, I can’t think of any feature of San Francisco that I’ll miss more—and that I have already missed more living most of my week in Oakland.

‘—Posted by Frank at 08:40:29 | 4-Aug-03’