The year has turned on several of its invisible hinges, 5 o’clock sunsets aside: a heater hauled down from a high shelf; teeth cleaned, with a return appointment set for six months out; an air ticket purchased to an alternate past. Next comes last year’s rains, returning for us high as passions.

Local news often means real 9th house type stuff: far journeys, publishing open minds, exchanging concepts across distances higher education. But of course its opposite is built in: a walk around the block, a quick hunt for an exchange of local thoughts, or an idea seeking bounds and bounce backs.

Everything needs fuel, even my car when I watch the folks inside the station dialing in a new twenty cent cheaper price less than five minutes after I’ve finished topped off my tank. Do I treat my frustration like fuel? Do I let it fuel something else? No, I do what it lets me do. I keep it moving.

Out a newsroom window, a skateboarder bodysurfs a car in an intersection. Then sirens you follow eventually lead to a flat-tired G-Wagon. Later, a quiet karaoke night gets spiked by a long lost duet partner and his son, and cops talking about “Labyrinth” and a double round of gunshots.

Somewhere, the easier day is shining down in someone else, rays of glory and beauty piercing clouds and landing on folk with epiphanies and breakthroughs and lottery numbers, or maybe just encouragement against long odds and low opinions and difficult, newly darker nights. I bet it’s the antipodes.

Rain dawdled and dragged its heels before shrugging off cloud cover and committing to the bit, right before a sit-down on the same block where I took it in the teeth twentysome years ago. The gig was also good then, but a few things are better even as other stuff has (been) worsened, maybe even me.

In the middle of a Castro lined with rainbow flags, an actual rainbow pierced the fog, shimmering down and appearing to land along 17th Street, where a boat tram took several dozen of us on a long ride along cable car routes with groovy tunes soundtracking camera flashes and cheers from onlookers.

The old grounds look different. I can stop by the business that’s needled me up for nearly a decade or the one that twisted my locks nearly two decades ago for a trim and shapeup, drive by my old place and newsroom, ride around the lake. But everything hits (or misses) differently, shikata na gai.

A short list of things I could always but have only recently decided to do: not miss out on a friend’s concert; talk back to the cat when she insists it’s time for bed; ponder gratitude journal entries’ shape and trajectory; weigh a vacation while thinking about another; sleep and wake up on camera.

Showing up to the party flyer a day late’s a neighborhood sport, if not national pastime. Sure, some sense of acceptance: You wouldn’t have had enough in the tank to stay out or up late; the genres are often better curated and consumed solo than playlisted in public. Hipster, be real with thyself.