San Fran

A few weeks ago we went to San Francisco for a project of Paris’s. He was hired by Lightroom to be in a funny video about what goes on behind the scenes of photoshoots and then speak on a panel with some other “instagram husbands”. It was fun to go back to San Francisco, the city where I lived for about a year right after college that now feels like so long ago. We took a few photos and revisited some of our favorite restaurants but I thought it would be fun to talk about my time in San Francisco a bit in this blog post, here we go.

So I grew up in Arizona, and left to go to San Diego for school but returned after my first semester to go to ASU in Arizona. I was so embarrassed to be there. The business school, which I was in, was really difficult and nationally ranked at the time but ASU has such a bad reputation for being a party school that lets anyone in, it wasn’t where I saw myself for my continued education. I decided I would get out of there as soon as possible and ended up graduating early with my degrees in about 2 years then applying for graduate school. Since I was already young for my grade, this had me set to get my MBA in another 2 years by 22, hopefully in New York City. After studying hard for the GMAT in about 30 days (most take 6 months so this was not a fun month) I did really well and thought that combined with my 3.9 GPA would get me into any grad school of my choosing… NYU! Well, I was wrong, I didn’t get in because of a lack of work experience. It sucked, but with my heart still set on a city I set off to San Francisco, knowing no-one.

Well I guess I cant really say I knew no-one, because I obviously knew Paris. Paris (my now fiancé) and I had been dating mostly on but sometimes off a bit since high school. At that time we were on and he was living in Sacramento going to school, playing basketball and interning for a news station while living with one of his older brothers. San Francisco and Sacramento are only a few hours away by train, so it didn’t hurt that after 2 years of long distance there would be less distance for the time being.

Hello SF – I visiting SF a few times to get my affairs in order, visit the school and find an apartment with my mom. A few months after graduating with my undegrad degrees I was moving into my first city apartment (I lived in a rental townhome in Arizona that my dad owned as a rental property).

The Hunt – I found my place on Craigslist after someone suggested that it was a decent place to find apartments in San Francisco. We went to probably 5 places in different neighborhoods and price points, some had doormen and big price tags while some were crazy affordable, but also just kind of crazy. My parents were helping me with a bit of rent so that was nice, they didn’t want me to have to work during grad school so I could focus. I also had been working during my undergrad and had saved a bunch of money all that I was planning on using in New York, or now San Francisco. I wanted to live within walking distance to work and class, and I wanted to be near the cable care line. I have never liked driving and after a few issues growing up (being in a car crash and being called the N word by a racist cop at 16) I had no desire to get behind the wheel again. Really I HATED driving, and actually still do. As I say, I prefer to be driven – hayyyy. My dad never understood this (control freak you know, he wants to drive himself) so he made me bring my car to San Francisco and pay to park it … I actually never touched it ONCE and now I never want to own a car again. Anyways, so I wanted to be near the cable carline because I thought that would be fun transit. We found a place on Pine and Powell right on the cable car line, and my apartment was DARLING, Okay, its not Pinterest worthy or anything but at the time I thought it was really cute. I’ve actually since learned that Blair of Atlantic Pacific living in my building before me. I didn’t know her IRL then but her blog was just really starting to take off and she was still in SF so I had started following her around that time. When I moved, my mom and I pulled up a list of every Goodwill in the city and drove around picking out furniture. We drove up my bed frame and mattress + a few other pieces from Arizona and started painting. We painted these thrifted pieces for a weekend in really fun ways, including this vintage sofa I found for like $75. I probably spent $500 max on every piece of furniture in my apartment. Then my mom left, and I was alone but ready to figure things out in SF.

Think back a bit – I know this was only like 5 or so years ago, but you have to remember how different things were. So just wanted to share a few things that were different when I lived in SF. There were no Ubers (just cabs), very few food delivery apps. I had Netflix but I don’t think I had Hulu, I know I had a DVR so I feel like it was just the combo of the too. I also cant remember how I had Netflix, because I know I didn’t have a smart TV or any streaming device on my TV, but I distinctly remember background binging the first season of Mad Men while working on my thesis and not retaining any of it I’m just not sure how.I did the DVD thing in college / highschool through Netflix but I don’t think I was still doing it by then. Anyways, half way through my year I learned I could order groceries online from Safeway and have them delivered, saving me a 30 min walk to the store, but I’m not sure it was an option the first half of my time there.

4 years – growing up my dad always said “I’ll pay for four years of school, not 5 not 8” as if to say don’t mess around and party or you’re on your own. My dad went to school on an athletic scholarship and had since gotten an MBA and a PHD so education was obviously very important. My mom also went to college, eventually getting a second degree and then a third associates degree when she decided to shift careers, so going to college was always a natural step for me. I loved school, I liked doing well in it. Studying, standardized tests and a heavy workload were all things I looked forward to. I just wanted to get the most I could from school always, and I actually now miss school very much. Growing up I always planned on getting my PHD and eventually becoming a professor, now with this weird career I’ve fallen into I’m not sure if its still in the cards or still what I want, but at the time that’s where my head was. To be honest, I cant even really think about it right now. Anyways, since I finished my undergrad degrees and certificates in 2 and a half years or 5 semesters, I essentially had 3 more semesters in which my dad would fit the bill. When I told him this at my ASU graduation, he laughed and said I might make a better lawyer than a marketer, and agreed to pay for my grad school tuition. To this day, that’s still the greatest gift anyone has ever given me. Thanks dad.

MBA – I was in San Francisco to get my MBA with an emphasis in luxury marketing. I quickly learned that I could double up on my course work as I had done back in undergrad and with a little less free sleep and ultimately no free time I would be able to complete my MBA in a year and graduate at 21, with one semester to spare. I did just that. I barley slept all year and had one real friend (who is still a real friend) who I spent maybe one day a week with. Oh and I worked too!

Kate Spade – My dream at this time was to work in marketing at Kate Spade in New York. I had loved the brand for four years and known everything there was to know about Kate, the company and the current creative director Deborah Lloyd. I thought an easy way to get started would be to work at a store in the city, so the second I got to San Francisco I applied at the most charming store on Grant Avenue near union square and started working as a sales associate. I was living 15 min away from my store – well 15 min to get there, 25 to get home because it was up hill. I didn’t make any money, it all went to my store discount and the increase in city expenses like paying double for groceries, but I still loved it. I met a really great female mentor who was my boss at the time and we still keep in touch. Since I’ve run into some not so nice women in the workplace who try to destroy each other, but she taught me how to push through all of that. Now I try to go above and beyond to help others and lift everyone up, most of that I got from my mom but I think her example really helped me see it in a workplace too.

My schedule – My school was also 15/25 min away from my apartment but in a perpendicular direction, so if you drew a point from my apartment, to my job, to my store it would almost resemble a right angle spacing 15 minutes worth of walking (or 25 up hill) in either direction. I had class four days a week. On Monday & Wednesday I would do double course load and go to class from around 8 am to 9 pm. On Tuesdays & Thursdays I would work at the store from opening to lunch time then start classes around 2 and go to 10. On Fridays I would work a half shift, usually opening to lunch then do my homework for the weekend. On Saturday’s I would work a full or half shift then finish up any left over work I didn’t complete. On Sunday’s I would work the whole day but our hours were only 12-6 so it wasn’t so bad, I would usually spend Sunday night with a friend, making outfits on polyvore, pinning or catching up on TV. I think at the time I had just started watching Teen Wolf on MTV from the beginning and I had gone in with my one friend to buy all of Sex and the City on DVD.

My friend – my one friend was Emily, basically my clone who worked at Kate Spade. She didn’t look like me, but we shared the same dream of working at Kate Spade corporate. We would split Chinese take out and watch SATC in pajamas at my apartment. Some weekend mornings we would go get pancakes near hers in Hayes valley or window shop at vintage stores we couldn’t afford. We would read Blair’s blog, look at old ads online and dream about when we both moved to New York City and were running Kate spade. It was the first time I had a friend with dreams the replicated mine, so it was really fun to plan our futures over shared noodles and ice cream. I didn’t need any other friends and honestly I didn’t have time for any either. Emily and I are still close. We’ve both had our own issues with Kate Spade careers not being what we thought they would be, so we made new dreams. She now has a training and marketing role at Benefit cosmetics. I think she’s been promoted 3 times since landing the roll 3 or 4 years ago. She’s married to a guy she met while I was in SF and they did a long distance dance too. I was a bridesmaid at her wedding and wore a floral Kate Spade dress.

Paris – About once a month I would get to see Paris. He would take a bus to the train to a bus to the cable car to get to my apartment, or I would do the reverse taking a weekend off to go to Sacramento. One time he bought me tickets to see a community theatre show there because he knew how much I loved broadway. But most of the time we would rent dexter DVDS from (wait for it) blockbuster and watch it. When he came to visit me we would walk to the warf and get bread bowls or find free things to do in the city. It was simple, we had no real plans or commitments, we were just still trying to figure things out.

Goodbye – After a year, I left San Francisco and moved back to Arizona. I had planned it so Waffles (my frenchie) was waiting for me when I returned and spent a few months saving up before relocating to New York where I’ve been ever since. When I lived in SF I was playing 2K in rent a month, and the girl who moved into my place started paying 4.5 form the get go. Silicone valley was booming and things in SF started to change. I always thought we would move back to San Francisco one day, I thought it would be my forever home. Paris grew up a bit in the bay and our families in Arizona, it just made more sense than New York but the city has changed and honestly so have we. We like it a lot less than we did before, and I just don’t see us ever living there again. We still don’t really know where that forever home is. Our perfect city is London, but its a bit far from our families, so we’re still figuring it out and don’t really know where we’ll land.

Sorry this blog post was super random and there is no real moral, I just wanted to tell you a bit about my time in SF and why this city will always have my heart.

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