The Myth of Wile E

San Francisco's Nob Hill

One summer, Mama, Daddy, Dougie, Gladys, and I were on a trip to San Francisco. It was one of those times when Mama and Daddy were "trying again," after one of those times they were "taking a break." I don't remember the exact year, but it was before Gladys lost her hair, and before Dougie went upriver for ducks, and before Daddy got demoralized, and remoralized.

We were on a road trip to San Francisco because Mama and Daddy had decreed that we should do things together As a Family: like, sit at the table for meals As a Family, play board games together As a Family, and go on road trips As a Family. (Dougie complained that "As a Family" meant "each of us forgoing what we really wanted to do, in favor of the collective misery." Dougie said "As a Family" was some kind of "ism," probably communism, or else maybe fascism, but definitely a violation of his constitutional rights or something. After a few too many of Dougie's protests, Mama insisted that we all play the "quiet game" together As a Family.)

We'd tromped and trolleyed all over San Francisco but we still hadn't gone up Nob Hill. Suddenly there it was, looming before us, steep as the first hill of a rollercoaster. Bending back my head, I stared up that endless road to where it vanished mysteriously into a ceiling of fog. I imagined there was some magical cloud castle at the top, and thought the whole world would look different from way up there. Like a perfect, fairy-tale world, where we all lived happily ever after.

Everyone else thought walking to the top of Nob Hill sounded like a pretty good idea, too. All except for Dougie, who said it was too steep and he was too tired and his feet hurt too much and he was hungry and really wanted a hot pretzel. Suddenly we were all hungry and we started weighing our options.

Hot pretzel. Sore feet. Hot pretzel. Hmm.

True or false: If x = hot pretzel, then Nob Hill + good view - sore feet - hungry > x.

Me: true. Mama: true. Daddy: true . . . unless x = hot pretzel + mustard. Dougie: false. Gladys: true.

Gladys said that her feet, which were squished into tight patent leather Mary Janes, hurt a lot too. This was no news flash. If there was a country of Hurt Feet then Gladys would be queen of it, whereas Dougie would be a court jester, at best. Gladys said that even though her feet hurt, she was going up that hill anyway, because you couldn't very well go to San Francisco without going up Nob Hill. That settled it. (And staying at the bottom until the rest of us came back was not an option for Dougie, since we were now doing things As a Family.)

Mama took Daddy's hand, Gladys took mine, Dougie crossed his arms, and we trudged up the road, four-fifths eager anticipation.

It was a long walk. Probably it only took ten or fifteen minutes to get to the top, but it felt like hours. We were exhausted, but we couldn't quit. It was like staying up late to watch a good suspense movie. You're tired but you're really enjoying it, even though you wish it would hurry up and be over.

Cable cars clanged past us, full of tourists with contented feet. "No fair," Dougie said.

Finally we reached the summit. It was very, very high up. And just as I'd thought, you could see a lot from up there, although most of what you could see was fog.

We stood there for a few minutes, looking.

We looked at one another. We looked back at the view.

We looked at Mama and Daddy holding hands, and almost smiling, and then looking serious, and then not holding hands anymore.

And we headed back down out of the fog.

It was like getting to the end of the suspense movie and having this funny feeling you might have seen the last ten minutes of it on TV a few years ago. At the time you'd been curious what movie you'd just seen the end of. And now you knew. Oh. Well. Good.

As we walked back down, we passed other people who were on their way up. We didn't say anything to them. We didn't want to ruin the ending.