About the Stoop

for starters, ours is not exactly a stoop. sometimes, my roommates and i will walk to the grocery store or mindlessly about town and ogle other apartment stoops with feastful eyes. why couldn't our stoop have steps so we could sit on them like marble chairs that can also carry whiskey glasses?

there is something like a 4'x9' porch before our door that one stranger referred to as, "something from an 90's family sitcom." we don't have steps that lead up to the marble-- just one quick lip-- and generally our stoop requires not only standing, but full hands, too.

but at least it doesn't have a gate. i hate stoops with gates-- they're so impersonal and unexciting.

anyway, about the stoop.

my first stoop was also not a stoop. my first stoop was my san jose home's front porch. but it was stoop-like; we would debate, get high, and be merry on that porch. and under the porch's deck existed an ever-growing planet of cigarette butts, condoms, loose change, and the occasional lighter.

my second stoop was a school-owned vietnamese restaurant which had been transformed into an apartment with very high ceilings and "employees must wash their hands" signs. the stoop itself was expansive and welcomed me gently into the world of san francisco. it had enough steps to sit on, but not enough to tire your entrance home from a hard day. there were two columns and a waist-high wall behind them: an excellent place to lean or place beer bottles when you need more than one hand to be drunk.

the stoop even had a miniature pond, with one dying koi fish.

back then, i was new to the city and so focused on not messing up in school i'd rarely talk to my neighbors. i'd come out for a smoke and then disappear back inside to work. and a major benefit of the stoop should always be the social-ness of it all.

i was cheated out of what should've been a third stoop because a few of us opted for our next apartment to exist in the outer richmond (35th and balboa, for the record). we lived in the first floor of a chinese man's two-story home. there was no front porch or stoop for us because we entered our "apartment" through a garage.

during those times, we just smoked on the side of the house that lead to the backyard. we did have a backyard, but it sucked.

at bush and powell, there was not much of a stoop, but the people made up for it. there was a constant flow of tourists, locals, and homeless passing by frequently enough that i'd started bringing a video camera out after 2am to catch the brilliant waltz of homeless hustling intoxicated tourists and the screaming song of the drunken cougar.

that was my stoop for almost two years. by the end of it, i had driven a garbage truck, seen a newly implanted fake-boob, grown a relationship with the donut delivery man and earned free donuts twice a week, been offered money for gay sex, and debated with a tranny.

my current stoop is, like i mentioned earlier, not a stoop. it's just a porch. and you may remember there being a brief anti-stoop movement.

enough [non-smoking] neighbors disagreed with the idea of moving us down the street that the stoop was re-opened. one neighbor referred to us as the apartment security, and we have a great relationship with all of the neighbors (except one). we're the ones who open the door for you when your hands are full. we'll share a drink and a long story, or play with your puppy and watch him grow up.

and so it wasn't long before the property manager decided to let us come back and smoke where we pleased.

i thoroughly enjoy smoking on the stoop because i'm welcome. knowing all my neighbors and getting to constantly chat with them or strangers makes me happy. this current stoop feels the most like a great old fashioned neighborhood, or a family.

but then maybe that's just my 90's family sitcom doorway getting into my mind.

both ways, i'm glad the great return to the stoop has happened, and i dig my neighbors.