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Uma's avatar

My child is a bit older now (10) but a few things I’ve learned is that it’s absolutely possible to build a community in SF. It takes effort and you have to throw out a lot of preconceived notions or assumptions eg I was completely fine not following the expensive private school route and still rent - both things that make a huge outlier in tech people my age. And she does go by herself to playgrounds and has just started walking home. Making an effort to find parents that want to parent like me has helped and that’s often through places kids are in eg preschool, elementary etc. The one thing I wasn’t prepared for was how transient sf is with people you develop real bonds with leaving constantly because it’s too hard/moving back to be with family etc.

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Dave Guarino's avatar

Yep, it is very hard, particularly in San Francisco in my mind. We're dealing with this a lot and "build community" has jumped to #1 on our Asana board [1]. I'm not sure I have particularly good tactics beyond the observation that often it just takes *anyone* sending up a road flare. (Speaking of: if any fellow moderately depressed young parents in the Duboce/Western Addition broader area want to do some collective action on this, we're here for it.)

I think one part of this that goes a bit unspoken is the importance of "the between time" — especially with young kids. "Getting together" can be this overwhelming, large chunk. The moments where I most want to live in community are to shoot the shit while unloading the dishwasher, or to have folks having a conversation I can passively engage with while I cook us all a meal, 10 feet away.

[1] Nota bene: Neither of us are PMs nor even particularly close to traditional tech structures like this; we needed something that worked for a couple comprised of Profound Planner and Pure Inspiration Reactor.

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