San Francisco, June 2018: Der Ring, revisited

When I first saw that San Francisco Opera was planning to remount its 2011 production of the Ring cycle for summer 2018, I contemplated giving it a miss. Francisca Zambello's conception of the work is riveting, and I recall the 2011 Ring as one of the most profound operatic experiences I've ever had. I wasn't sure whether viewing it for a second time might not prove disappointing. In the end I decided to go, however, and I'm glad I did, for this production was differently slanted, even though it employed the same sets and much the same staging. The 2011 Ring centered on Brünnhilde--appropriately, since Nina Stemme, who sung the role, is such a powerful actress. Consequently, the redemptive element of the cycle emerged early in Walküre and predominated throughout. This time around, Zambello chose to direct more attention to Wotan, exploring the complexities of his character and treating him as the source of all corruption--other tragic choices, like those made by Siegmund or Brünnhilde, are indirectly owed to his agency. Greer Grimsley handled the challenge well, though in the present political climate he couldn't help seeming a Donald Trump with less hair and more self-awareness. In fact, I pointed out the family analogies on a Facebook posting, but my classicist friends, as bemused by my fondness for Wagner as they are puzzled by my passion for horses, greeted the observation with polite chuckles at best.

Other aspects of the San Francisco trip were problematic. Weather was supposed to be in the 70s, but I had not brought a warm jacket, and walking back to the hotel was very cold. We had some nice lunches and dinners, though our one excursion on the Napa Wine Train wasn't worth the money this time around. Our get-together with my sister Jeanne and her husband Norm also didn't go quite the way I had hoped. I thought that Jeanne, with her extensive knowledge of home remodeling, would be able to give me advice on having our new house built. Unfortunately, I prefaced my discussion of that topic with a description of the two existing homes for sale we had visited. When I mentioned that the one homeowner was very anxious to sell, Jeanne pounced on the fact, and no amount of explaining how poorly maintained the house was (hard-water scale coating all the shower enclosures) could get her off the topic of picking up a bargain. Getting our house ready for the market is bad enough--the idea of taking on yet another renovation project in another location just freaks me, no matter how much time and money that might save.

The most stressful part of the trip was the return. At 7:00 a.m. I learned that Southwest had cancelled our 10:40 a.m. flight. Over my cell phone I rebooked on a flight leaving at 5:40 p.m.--there was nothing earlier--and changed our van pickup time to 3:00 p.m., or so I thought. With an extra morning of vacation to play with, we breakfasted for the last time at La Boulangerie on Hayes and Octavia, caught the Embarcadero bus to Pier 39, and did tourist things--viewed Alcatraz and sea lions

and browsed through shops. Had a very nice salad and glass of wine on the pier, then caught the bus back to the Days Inn. At that point the trouble started. The van didn't arrive. Calls to the shuttle service only gained us reassurances that it was "on its way." A half-hour later, we were picked up, only to spend another half-hour waiting downtown for a fare that didn't show. When we finally arrived at the airport, we would have been in danger of missing our flight, had it not been delayed for an hour. Then on to worrying about the connection--itself delayed for ten minutes. To sum up: home by midnight, cranky and frayed, imperfectly prepared to deal with a needy and whiny cat. No compensation offered by Southwest or by the van service for cancellations, delays, and inexplicable procrastination. These are the issues--rather than the operas presented--that cause me to wonder whether our twice-yearly excursions to San Francisco are worth the stress. True, it's important to maintain regular contact with Jeanne and Norm. Since Jeanne will probably be unsympathetic once she learns that we're not going to take advantage of what seems, to her, a splendid real-estate opportunity, I'll have to be prepared to cope with that as well. Back now to repeated follow-up calls to window-glass sellers, garage door technicians, etc.