There was once a man who split with his girlfriend in San Francisco—distraught, he went to a friend, a Britisher, who was staying in the city for a while. On the doorstep to his apartment, the Britisher said, “She’s wasn’t the prettiest girl in the world, was she?”. It was brutal—even his partner thought so—but it was true and, perhaps, it was the opening of the tunnel. The Britisher invited the other man in—the apartment was luxurious; he didn’t own it—he had been lent it by a wealthy admirer. That night, he let the man sleep on the sofa.
In the morning, the man woke up to find the Britisher standing beside him. He pointed to some pot shards on the ground and said, “In the night you got up and, I think, knocked over this pot and broke it. I think it’s Greek and it’s signed, so it’s probably expensive. I don’t want to make you pay for it and I have no intention of paying for it myself, so what I propose is that we go into town, get some glue and some paint, and put it back together again.” And, indeed, they did just that—after a Guinness or two on the way.
They sat on the floor and smoked two cannabis cigarettes while they argued about how the pot went back together. When they had put it back together, they painted it and put it back where it belonged. The Britisher then told his friend he had to meet some other people, he showed him to the door and said, with a wave of his hand, “The streets of San Francisco.” At that moment, the man felt that he was better and that his whole life lay before him. The streets of San Francisco. In magical terms, he was the pot he broke without knowing it—when the pot was repaired, he became whole again; and that is how to mend a broken heart.