White smooth padded flat rate plastic Postal Service

envelope:

The small parts of the top of the bay bridge. The times in the Ford van where I used to sit up front and my mother would open the side door and let the hippies get in. To drive across the bay into the city. The way they would stand just after the turn onto University Avenue before.  Stand in the island to the north, just before University lift it up over the highway. Stand there, because hitchhiking was illegal. But people knew to pick them up. My mom knew to pick them up. And they would shuffle in and they would be chatty, and they had long hair, and they had clothes made of colors.  And we would drive over to Andy's bakery in the Richmond district, for red borscht with sour cream. Piroshky, oniony beef inside the battery fried bread. And those crisps, wafers, dipped in chocolate. And the red vinyl booths. And my dad on lunch from his high school.