The tower has long been a neglected landmark, we all know this. In my life it has hovered above my entire seventeen year stay in San Francisco. I have never lived outside the Sunset, and it is our mascot, for good and not. Friends lived just beneath it at the top of Clarendon, and one came down with a brain tumor and died of it 7 years later. Coincidence? Probably, but there it is, staring me in the face.

And there it is, each night its red lights blinking, telling us that all is well and that our favorite shows are waiting for us on the TV... except for NBC which many of us do not get since it left Channel 4 and moved to Channel 11 (which I am recalling is not broadcast via the tower, but via another tower all the way down in San Jose). I missed the entire season of Heroes, only catching a few episodes on NBC.com and now viewing the rest on DVD. All because our tower was deprived of the appropriate signal.

I often think of Neptune looking at the tower, appropriate for the Sunset, so close to the sea. There should be a shrine to Neptune just at the base of the tower. I think Adolph Sutro (who had greek statues on the crenelations around his home at Sutro Heights) would have enjoyed that thought.

These are images taken just a couple of blocks from my home for the last 7 years, which was just a couple blocks more from my previous home of another 7 years. Who knows if I'll have this kind of view in the next 7. I hope so.

Included is a picture of the sun setting over the ocean (the fog makes it look like it is setting IN the ocean) and the Golden Gate Bridge (some might say it is an over-appreciated site, but it still takes my breath away), all from the same vantage point. Many folks frown upon the Sunset as the "sticks" or "way out there" and not in the city "proper". I would point to these photographs, all taken together, and ask what other part of this city or any other can offer more? Maybe North Beach, but doubtful even there. Someone would have to go to great lengths to prove it, and I just went to one spot, stood there, and turned as I took the photos. I truly love the Sunset.