You know what I don’t miss about San Francisco?

When you’re away from home, what do your kids miss? And not miss?

My oldest son has mentioned it several times since we’ve been away (and on other trips, too) and I don’t know quite what to think about it other than: I get it.

He doesn’t miss the homeless.

He’s scared of them in San Francisco. He doesn’t really like going downtown because they scare him. Hey, guess what, I can’t blame him, they’re often scary. Especially if you’re 11 years old.

I’m just the messenger. I don’t have any solutions. Others cities we’ve been in don’t have anything near the homeless that San Francsico does. In fact, we saw one guy asking for money in a big city the other day (Darmstadt, Germany) and my son noticed that he had a smart phone. “Wait,” he said, “that guy wants us to give him money but he’s has a smart phone? With ear buds? And he’s listening to music? Why does he want our money?”

Yeah, I get it.

Want to learn about the place where you live? Get out of it for a while.

For the record: I know, I know, it’s not fair to compare a smaller city to a large city, but I’m not here to compare statistics, solve world hunger or even make some kind of social statement. I’m just the messenger here. I didn’t even ask my son what he didn’t miss (or did miss) back home. He just said it as we walked down streets that were free of homeless people.

I know, I know, I’ll probably “get in trouble” for writing this post. Oh well.

Wow, funny. Just did a keyword search for the title of this post and it came up with “don’t miss in San Francisco,” as in touristy hot spots that you don’t want to miss. But of course, my point is that this is what we don’t miss. But actually, you can’t miss it in San Francsico, you can’t not miss it.