Goodbye Castro! … From After Elton ~ The Castro’s A Different Light is shutting its doors.
I remember back in late seventies when I first started going into The Castro all by myself. There was A Different Light and Harvey Milk’s camera shop and a bunch of gay bars and restaurants like The Patio Cafe and people hanging out the windows of their cheap upstairs apartments with music blaring making plans with guys on the street below to go out that night or just “cruising”. There was life there and people enjoying where they lived and you wanted to find out what was going on because it always seemed like a party was brewing even on a Tuesday night.
Now, LOL! Harvey Milk’s camera shop is just another souvenir hawker across from a run down Gap store and most of the “good” bars and clubs are long gone because you know all those disreputable drunk people having sex at all hours disturbed the yuppies and those cheap upstairs apartments are just another condo/cooped memory from long ago and with it seems the last gay bookstore.
Let’s stick a fork in The Castro folks it is over and it’s done. No one can afford to seek a new life there or recreate themselves or liberate themselves anymore. Finding a job or affordable housing or even tolerance or silly ideas like community support is no longer the residents… oops! I mean “investors” priority.
It’s just another cheesy rainbow strewn San Francisco tourist trap that the trolleys happen to stop at because it’s at the end of the line and now it simply feels like the end of the line even more. I am sure The Castro Theater will be next on the list for the “investors” to sell and profit from it’s demise. Probably would make a fine Walmart and parking lot duplex for the yuppie real estate speculators to shop with their screaming brats after they visit the Starbucks next door.
Tags: That's Not eBooks
JL Langley wrote,
This makes me sad! I only visited the once, but it was enough. There were some great people working there and a great feel to the store. :(
Link | April 5th, 2011 at 7:10 am
Sunita wrote,
Oh no. You’re right of course, the Castro is nothing like the same anymore. But still. I am so bummed.
Link | April 5th, 2011 at 7:11 am
AM Riley wrote,
Noooo!
Bright side, I suppose, is that the ‘need’ for a district where gay people could congregate is not as pressing these days. It would be cool to make it into a touristy historical area though. Like Alvarado St in Los Angeles. Vendors selling little gay trinkets and stuff?
little gay trinkets. lord, my brain is weird this morning.
Link | April 7th, 2011 at 10:05 am
TeddyPig wrote,
It still is damn sad… a gay neighborhood without a gay book store… A place without a memory or a memory without a place.
Or maybe the saddest part is just the person who remembers the people that made it special. The books will always be around hopefully even if it will take pirates to keep them alive since the publishers will be long gone now there are no bookstores.
Immortality through copyright violation of dead gay writers who never knew Amazon and the world goes mad.
Link | April 7th, 2011 at 10:37 am
S.F. Eagle ~ Closing and Location Sold | The Naughty Bits wrote,
[...] that type of time it takes to get a Venti and order take out then I would have told you to target the Gay Bookstore on Castro and the S.F. Eagle Tavern which are businesses which could be bought and [...]
Link | April 11th, 2011 at 7:16 am
New Gay: Old Self Hate | The Naughty Bits wrote,
[...] remember I told you about the S.F. Eagle closing and I also told you about A Different Light closing in The [...]
Link | May 11th, 2011 at 6:26 am