One of the things that I think San Francisco is truly great for is the chance to experience “that one time when”.

“That one time when” is the phrase that I use to refer to any of the experiences that I’ve had that I don’t really ever feel the need to have again but am glad that to have gotten the chance to experience them once in my lifetime. Sometimes these are the things that I sought out myself or chose to do (like “that one time when” I took off traveling around the country with someone I barely knew). Other times these are things that just kind of happened because of snags in life but which provided interesting experiences (like the recent “one time when” my trip to Vegas went horribly awry and I ended up seeing a ridiculous Christmas drag show in Phoenix instead).

We all have these types of experiences. You can identify yours by considering what things you’ve done that allow you to start out a funny/interesting story with “there was this one time when” … as in “that one time when” you had the wild one night stand, “that one time when” you spontaneously took off to a foreign country, “that one time when” you lived with five people in a three bedroom apartment, “that one time when” you dressed in drag / starred in a horrible musical / danced on a tabletop / did karaoke. These are the experiences that do not define who we are but which add sparkles and exclamations to the stories of our lives.

The “one time when” experiences can be had anywhere. But the percentage of them that are available in San Francisco seems to be greater than the percentage of such experiences that are easily found elsewhere. You can choose to experience “that one time when” on a near-daily basis if you’re willing to push your own boundaries here.

You can have “that one time when” you went to the tranny strip club. You can have ”that one time when” you checked out The Power Exchange or watched people getting whipped at the bondage club. You can fondly remember ”that one time when” you took that burlesque class and made pasties and made friends. Or groad about “that one time when” you met that guy off of Craigslist. Or tell others about ”that one time when” you did dining in dark at Opaque or ate a meal in bed at Supperclub. There’s “that one time when” you went to the peep show booth at the strip club just to see what those coin operated moments of display are really like or “that one time when” you went dancing in the Castro during Pride.

And in San Francisco, you’ll often find that you experience “that one time when” just walking through the city and seeing things that you haven’t seen before. You’ll have “that one time when” you met the seven foot tall drag queen on the bus and she gave you really good advice about your hair. You’ll have that one time when you ended up in the movie theatre right next to the threesome group that was making out there. You’ll have “that one time when” you overheard something or saw something or stumbled upon something that you never really wanted to see but you can still kind of appreciate the exposure to it in retrospect.

The great thing about “that one time when” is that it adds a new dimension to your life experience. The more that we take in, the more potential we have for what we can be. Artists and writers often refer to this as “filling the creative well” - they take in other art and writing and information in order to broaden their own horizons and open up new doors in the creative homes where their hearts dwell. But you don’t have to be a poet to understand this language - you just need to be able to say yes more often than you say no, to be willing to check unique things out just once in order to have that “one time when” experience.

San Francisco is known for those things, big and small, that happen “only in San Francisco”. While you’re  here, you might as well take advantage of some of them. You don’t have to do the thing ever again. You don’t have to love the experience. You don’t have to go too far beyond your own boundaries. But you might find that your boundaries aren’t nearly as limited as you think that they are and that some of those “one time whens” become things that you actually like doing on a regular basis. Or you might not … but at least you’ll be more interesting to talk to at parties!

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This entry was posted on Monday, January 12th, 2009 at 3:00 pm and is filed under General Info and Random Thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.