Night Watch

Last night, at 1 a.m., I took my police scanner-equipped Android phone, Canon 7D camera and rusty Schwinn, and headed out into the streets of the Mission, looking for trouble.

The purpose was twofold: to try out my three new police scanner applications (there are close to two dozen), and to get a sense of what goes down on a typical Saturday night after the bars close their doors and release thousands of intoxicated revelers into the neighborhood.

Having lived in San Francisco for four years, mostly in the Tenderloin, I’d seen my share of brawls, DUIs, irate couple fights, cop-dodging prostitutes, general debauchery and everything in-between, so I didn’t expect to be surprised.

By 3:30, however, nothing had happened.

Perhaps it was some karmic rule about looking for trouble, or maybe it was just a rare peaceful night in the Mission, but I heard no sirens, and saw nothing unusual. The police scanner squawked occasionally about disturbances near Market Street, and something in North Beach, but the Mission Police seemed to have the night off.

I cruised up and down Shotwell and South Van Ness between 16^th and 25^th, believing this to be a good middle ground for quick access to anywhere in the neighborhood.

On Market Street, at 1:30, a man was being loaded into a paramedic’s truck, but the EMTs were in no hurry, and the man’s face looked calm, almost bored.

An hour later, at 22^nd and Shotwell, five prostitutes suddenly materialized on the corner and rapidly dispersed in five different directions, not like they were running away from something; more like a football team breaking to position after the huddle.

Half an hour later, one of them, a short Latina in a tight purple dress, recognized me from earlier.

“Are you police?” she asked.

I glanced down at myself—Converse shoes, camera bag slung over my back, no helmet. Maybe she thought I was undercover.

I smiled back. “Do I look like I’m police?”

She laughed.

I considered explaining that I was just a journalist out looking for a story, but that sounded even less plausible, so I continued on my way, convinced that they were probably more comfortable with the idea that I was just another wandering John than if they knew I was a reporter.

A bit later, a cab pulled up at 21^st and dropped off a tall man in his mid-40s. The man was clearly there for one reason; he lapped the intersection a few times slowly, glancing up Shotwell from time to time.

By 3:30, I was getting hungry, so when a reckless driver almost hit me with his massive black pickup truck on Folsom Street, I decided to call it quits.

I returned home with no story, but with a slightly closer connection to the neighborhood. Only minutes after I crawled into bed, I heard a siren.