"Voices of Friends Vanished and Gone"*

Plugging in the earbuds on my mile walk home along the streets of San Francisco, shuffle mode. The Boss breaks into "The Streets of Philadelphia"...

Flashback 1980... telling Dad I'm moving across the country to California. "San Francisco? Isn't that where all the gays are?" A remark reflective of emerging focus on a mysterious new disease appearing on that scene.

Never could bring myself to see the movie but for 3-1/2 minutes on the streets of San Francisco, the haunting tune transported me through three decades of my own image reel, seemingly sourced in a single ironic prophecy.

*Bruce Springsteen