Hill Towns of the Mind

From Telegraph Hill's white stone pillar rising above North Beach, to Montmartre and the cupola-capped cream cake of Sacre Coeur atop its well tracked lines, hill towns have historically provided a sense of protection for those who brave their slopes daily. There's an embrace that comes with with nesting on a slope beneath a watchful totem -- a church, a monument, a rampart.

On the windy slopes of Bernal, the sense of remove ebbs as people flow by, not in a smattering but in torrents: skate boarders braking downhill, dogs and shoppers loaded with leashes and grocery bags, hillside hikers breathing steadily as one step follows another up hill and down. The streets are busy here, even though the grade is ridiculous. The stairways and slides do make navigating the terrain a bit easier.
Here is where raptors ride air columns just above you, where each step at night brings more twinkling lights into view. Around the summit an encircling road winds with people and their dogs on promenade. The heights are such that when fog rolls over Twin Peaks and obscures Sutro Tower, the hilltop becomes a sky island above San Francisco.