Wednesday morning at the corner of Sacramento and Cherry. The three of us—me, the bus driver, and an elderly woman—peer into a parked bus with muted awe. Inside, an enormous man is shouting at a crumpled blanket. “Hey, HEY! Wake up! Get up!”
As it turns out, under the blanket lies a man wearing ripped clothing; he staggers to his feet at the third admonishment, limps out the door, and vomits. He has no idea where we are. “Are we in Sacramento?” he asks. “No,” says the enormous man, a Street Crisis Response Team “peer specialist” dispatched to respond to a report of an unresponsive adult male on the 33 bus. “We’re on Sacramento and Cherry. Presidio Heights. San Francisco. West Side.”
