Found Treasures: S.F. Press Club Awards

December 15, 2023 – I asked the doctor with the soft smile in his eyes how his relationship with noise was evolving. 

I wondered as much because he was emerging from three weeks of silent meditation.

He acknowledged ups and downs.

Then he added he was getting better at interrupting the flow of (often noisy) everyday life to alight upon details.

“Mindfulness bells,” he called them.

Bells, for him, can be things like rain on the windshield or cold on the skin.

“Any opportunity to pause and be aware of what’s happening in the moment,” he said.

The thought resonated with me. 

The subtext has been there all along: Stay absorptive of whatever might unfold, breath by breath. 

His thoughts helped me reanimate a ritual, my personal pause to reconnect with right now. 

Put differently, I like to seize upon the chance to go bell hunting, one page at a time. 

With each quarterly issue of Edible, I take a slow stroll, eye and appetite activated, taking in the stories on the pages, but more than anything, scoping out the ads. 

The personal benefits from that approach get immense.

In leafing through the winter issue that landed last week, I suddenly have a checklist of promising places to meet friends and family for a holiday snack and sip.

I now have a master list of gift ideas that support thoughtful tastemakers. 

I also feel freshly empowered to overachieve in the kitchen, thanks to all the recipes. 

And I can tune into each fly element of design, seductive slice of photography, and every line of well-placed prose.

Bell here, bell there, bells pretty much everywhere.

Best of all, I get a molecular blast of gratitude and affirmation from seeing the quantity and quality of purveyors who support what Edible does.

EMB’s editor-publisher Deborah Luhrman reflects on that with this issue’s introductory salvo, which gets at the humble-brag bell on the cover: “Edible Publication of the Year.” 

“There is absolutely nothing comparable to being recognized by your peers and appreciated for all the hard work that goes into every issue of this magazine,” she writes. “I’ll admit we have a huge advantage here in the Monterey Bay Area, with delicious, healthy foods being produced everywhere you turn, interesting characters to write about, some of the best scenery in the country and a deep pool of talented journalists and photographers.”

While humility is helpful, I’d like to think Buddha’d be cool with me beaming pride for the community she spotlights. 

We earned that recognition among scores (and scores) of glowing sister Edible publications, nearly 90 all told, across North America, from Ottawa to Orlando.

Which merits a pause.

But only for a moment. 

Because I have a hard time sitting still, bells or no. 

And there were other awards that needed attending to. 

This Wednesday I headed to the MacArthur BART station, bound for the heart of downtown San Francisco.

Part of the reason the doctor’s thoughts resonate: I’m so manic in finding ways to stop and think that I hoard Yogi tea tags that I then rearrange so I remember to reconsider them.

The tag on from my Yogi Tea before I left for S.F. arrived right on time.

“The unknown is where all outcomes are possible,” it reads. “Enter it with grace.”

I didn’t know how EMB’s virgin voyage to San Francisco Press Club’s Annual Journalism Awards Gala, now in its 46th annual installment, would go.

But I did know it would involve the potential for recognition now that the Press Club has expanded awards to include points north and south (a nice +).

I knew it would happen within the oldest existing Elks Club as host venue, vintage decor included (++).

And I knew hundreds of journalists from the likes of San Francisco Chronicle and Bloomberg would be in attendance, in one giant rollicking gossipy newsroom (+++). 

Bells accompanied the ride there. 

Which I guess is the point the quiet doc was getting at: Them bells are there, if we choose to take a fleeting moment to note them. 

On the BART Yellow Line, a group of four shuffled into our subway car. 

They dripped bells. 

One snaked crisp tattoos beneath stylish sleeves. Another tethered a charging cord from another’s backpack to his phone. Each rode old-school vintage footwear.

When their leader yelled to the captive audience that no viewers would be harmed in the forthcoming display, the humidity in the subway thickened.

The long legged hombre in the squad stole the show. 

His dislocating and relocating of his shoulder would have merited tips on their own—EMB donated 5 bucks on behalf of readers—but it was his backflipping gymnastics off the handrails that made me happy to be there most.

Bell.

When he was done, the team emcee announced, “That was inspired for you who looked away and pretended you didn’t want to watch.”

Another way to phrase it: Pay attention to bells, and don’t be scared when you think they might kick you in the face.

When we disemBARTed near Union Square, I had to—on theme—pause to listen to the soulful dude on the electronic keyboard weaving dope holiday-scented sequences from his wheelchair.

The next pause was to read his sign.

“People care more about shoes, clothes and wine,” it read. “This mindset helps cause more homelessness + crime.”

The chaos upon entry at the Elks included a check in with SF Press Club president Curtis Sparrer, who wore a shimmering silver suit to last year’s event. 

This time around his lightly shiny black suit was more mild. 

“Less gay super villain,” he said.  

It felt like a grace to be seated in the far corner of the vast ballroom, which occupies a football field of space. 

And that wasn’t big enough. The additional attending spilled into the adjoining bar room, itself a good 900 square feet on its own.

At our table I spotted a slim stack of notecards scribbled with prose. Had to be an acceptance speech, right? 

I had my acceptance speech figured out, if EMB got a win: Thanks, look for bells, and keep reporting.

Only her notecards weren’t an acceptance speech. 

It turned out the woman to whom those cards belonged would speak on behalf of her departed husband, awarding the Bill Workman Award for a journalist as dedicated to reporting news important enough that he once said, “You know you’re doing a good job when you get a death threat.”

Marla Lowentha, a professor of rhetoric at SF State, seems like the type of human who only pauses when it’s important. 

She did on this night. 

She stopped to interrogate the table on who we are and why we do what we do. On stage she said she’d like “to honor all of you for giving the world a chance at democracy,” and invited those attending to take a chance on taking a moment.

“Meet each other,” she said, noting she met her late husband at a press event not unlike this one. “Coordinate with each other. You might get a new job, and you might find the one who changes your life.”

Edible coordinates with roughly a thousand tastemakers who I consider life-changing when you take the time to pause and savor what they do.

Our team, you included, were recognized with honorable mentions for best photography and storytelling, and third place for a feature about the struggles facing the Monterey Bay crabbing industry.

We also won a first place award for the most outstanding magazine column in the greater San Francisco Bay Area. 

Yup, it was a contest, and Found Treasures came out number one. 

I’d like to think it’s because you and I know how to take a pause and enjoy what makes our foodscape special. (It was yet another fun pause to submit the requested examples of what makes this column what is is. Luhrman and I sent in what felt like three reps of what this column aspires to illuminate: a family-spun market in downtown Santa Cruz, a singular Big Sur odyssey and a hidden barbecue haven in the redwoods.)

Last night I told the quiet doctor we earned that honor and I wanted to find a way to share it with the people who make it possible, but didn’t know exactly how to do it.

He told me this: “Welcome the thing that’s out of the ordinary, the thing that pushes you into a new space—anything that breaks up conditioned responses to things, that invade [our] nonstop thinking and force us to pause.

“The bell is the moment where I feel like we arrived again, and can breathe more deeply and be aware of our place.

“In that pause, we’re able to appreciate where we are.”