A young, visibly confused security guard looks up from his desk in the main lobby of the San Francisco Chronicle. A man steps out of the elevator and wanders slowly across the room, his body swaying back and forth. His eyes are closed and he's blowing the blues into a harmonica like he means business.

The man's denim shirt, jeans, and old running shoes offer no indication that he might work in the building; nor does his graying hair, which sticks out like it wouldn't recognize a comb if the comb was wearing a red carnation.

"Do you work here?" the guard says.

"I work upstairs," the man says. "Been here about 31 years."

He pumps a few more breaths into his harp and smiles at the guard.

The man leans over the desk and says, "Between the two of us, how many years do you think we've worked here? I'm guessing...31."

Now the guard looks more confused.

"Steve Rubenstein," the man says, introducing himself. "I'm a reporter."

Writing for the Chronicle since 1976, Rubenstein is well known for his ability to turn almost anything into a story. And while he understands how an impromptu harmonica ruckus in a downtown lobby might seem enigmatic to security guards and nine-to-fivers, such moments remind him why he loves being a reporter.

"Every day is different for a reporter," he says, sitting at his desk in the Chronicle's newsroom. "You can't remember what you did yesterday, and you don't know what you'll be doing tomorrow. You're very much in the present, which is a satisfying way to spend the day."

Roaming the building with his harp, and befuddling security personnel, Rubenstein could be a character in one of his own stories.

"I like doing stories about things that fall between the cracks," he says. "The worst job I could possibly imagine would be to cover the White House. To me, there would be nothing more deadly."

Instead, Rubenstein writes the stories people never knew they wanted to read, like his award-winning piece about an elementary school that held a wake for a deceased pet rat.

"I would rather cover a rat funeral than a speech by the president," he says. "It tells you more about the world."

Rubenstein's take on the world is well known around the Chronicle.

"Whenever a funny story comes up, Steve gets to write it," says David Perlman, the Chronicle's science editor who's been writing for the paper since 1951. He says Rubenstein can write straight hard news one day, and inject levity into a story about a dead chef the next. "He's an extremely competent storyteller. He managed to write a very funny piece about a dental convention without actually being mean toward dentists."

Rubenstein says each story dictates his approach to writing it. He figures, the stories exist whether he writes about them or not, so he tries to stay out of the way and almost never writes in the first person. He remains the observer, the reporter who writes like he's the straight man in a comedy.

Sitting at his desk, Rubenstein speaks slowly and quietly. He talks about news stories and feature stories and how it's not all laughs. His head tilts back and forth, and his eyes close as he considers what he wants to say.

"I'm as concerned about man's inhumanity to man as the next guy," he says. "There's meanness about homeless people right now, and most of our coverage hasn't been compassionate enough. We ought to be nicer."

He stands up and looks out the giant window at the building across Mission St. His voice gets even quieter, like his train of thought is drowning it out.

"I see homeless people peeing on that building all the time," he says. "But quality of life hasn't been ruined. There are worse things than peeing on United States Government property."

Today, like several other reporters, Rubenstein went out to cover the recent oil spill in the San Francisco Bay. He walked the beach at Fort Funston and returned to the office with oil stuck to the soles of his shoes.

As he explains how there's nothing funny about an environmental disaster, his phone rings. A fellow reporter is calling to complain that he has oil all over his pants. Rubenstein tells him that Tide won't help and to kiss the pants goodbye.

When he hangs up, he crosses one leg and inspects the bottom of his shoe.

"Maybe I'll get a new pair out of this--on the company."

***

Steve Rubenstein was born 56 years ago in West Los Angeles. His father was a doctor, his mother an elementary school music teacher. He says he started in the newspaper business at age 12 as a delivery boy.

"I was great at tossing papers into the driveway puddles of West Los Angeles," he says.

Rubenstein went to college at the University of California, Berkeley, and graduated with an English degree after bailing out of the pre-med program. By then, he wanted to be a reporter, and took a job at an L.A. paper before moving to San Francisco and working for the Chronicle in 1976.

"A lot of people wanted to get into journalism at the time I did because of 'All the Presidents Men,'" he says, "and because you could bring down a lowlife like Nixon. But those kinds of stories haven't really come into my sphere. I haven't brought down any presidents lately."

Affecting politics was never Rubenstein's goal. And his first shot at journalism came long before Watergate.

For a little boy in the 1950's, a trip to Disneyland was better than a trip to the moon--and Rubenstein was there on opening day. The Magic Kingdom became a favorite destination for the Rubenstein family, and was also the site of Steve's first journalistic triumph.

One afternoon, Walt Disney was rolling through his park in a small motor-cart with the Prime Minister of India. Eight-year-old Rubenstein, camera in hand, saw a crowd gathering and walked over to see what was going on. He ducked through the crowd and found himself directly in front of the cart, blocking its progress, and staring up at Mr. Disney, who was in the driver's seat. Rubenstein acted quickly and snapped a picture. Disney's next words came loud and clear:

"Get out of the way!"

The Prime Minister remained calm, and Steve walked off with a telling photo of two of the most powerful men in the world. His mettle had been tested, and his journalistic credibility was intact.

(The incident would not be Rubenstein's last brush with greatness at The Happiest Place on Earth.)

Today, the picture of Disney resides in a thick scrapbook on Rubenstein's desk. It's an astonishing photograph, especially for an 8-year-old photographer. The image is nearly in perfect focus, and Disney is looking straight into the lens. The hint of confusion on his face is almost as obvious as the avalanche of rage that is about to replace it. MAD Magazine couldn't have drawn Disney looking more ridiculous.

Other items on Rubenstein's desk reflect the pleasure he takes in his daily grind. Small flip-up notepads lay open revealing the origins of a yet unwritten story. Family photos hang from the desk dividers. A pencil holder made out of Popsicle sticks rests next to his computer. Five wooden alphabet blocks sit on a small shelf, spelling out Rubenstein's name in primary colors--S-T-E-V-E.

Beneath the desk lives the typewriter of one Herb Caen, the late, legendary columnist who Rubenstein calls "a great gift to the readers of San Francisco."

"After Herb passed away I went into his office and snagged it. I used to be very romantic about typewriters. Sometimes I take it out and type a letter on it."

And then there are more scrapbooks. One of them chronicles Rubenstein's bicycle trip across America. In 2006, he spent two months riding from Seattle to Washington D.C. to benefit the American Lung Association of Washington. He had planned to take a leave of absence, but then offered to write about his trip along the way, so the Chronicle left him on the clock.

"I was lucky enough to con these guys into thinking it counted as work," he says.

Rubenstein had dreamed of a coast to coast bicycle journey for many years and says--now from experience--that it's the way to travel if you want to see America, especially if you're a writer.

"You find yourself visiting the kinds of places that sell pork rinds," he says. "I don't buy the pork rinds, but I like going into the places that sell them."

***

Rubenstein has lived in the same house near Twin Peaks, in San Francisco, for about 20 years. His wife, a former editor for The San Jose Mercury News, is a freelance journalist and a musician. His Son, 17, and daughter, 13, are both accomplished horn players. In addition to the harmonica, Rubenstein plays guitar, banjo, trumpet, a little French horn, and, most likely, some other things that may have slipped his mind. Unlike a lot of people, he looks forward to Monday mornings, when he volunteers as a music teacher at an elementary school.

"That's how I like to spend Mondays," he says, smiling like he knows the secret to happiness.

Fridays are another story. Today, between visits to the newly poisoned beaches of San Francisco, Rubenstein sits in his office talking about craft--interviewing, writing, reporting--and mimes throwing a tape recorder out the window.

"Tape recorders get in the way," he says. "They gum up the works and keep you from listening."

When the subjects of ethics and objectivity come up, Rubenstein offers sarcasm. "Is there a code of ethics?" he asks. "I don't think you need to go to Sunday school to know you shouldn't bump somebody off."

Just because he's joking, doesn't mean it's not true.

"As for objectivity--I think--it's possible to be objective as possible."

Something Rubenstein isn't joking about is the instability of newspapers in the age of internet dominance, and the possibility that journalism won't be a viable profession in 10 years. He mourns the recent dismissal of 25 percent of the Chronicle's staff reporters, and says the paper has suffered as a result of the cutbacks. With the New York Times admitting doubts that it will be in print in five years, Rubenstein struggles with the idea of San Francisco without the Chronicle.

"I read The Guardian and other independent papers because what they do is important, and they do it well. But there's no substitute for a general interest metro daily if you're living in the city."

As the newspaper saga continues unfolding, Rubenstein keeps writing his stories, and taking things seriously only when it really counts. He keeps his eyes and ears open for the next bit of reportable weirdness that he can write down and pass along to others. He seems interested in just about everything, but figures that when something comes along that makes him laugh it just might do the same for someone else.

"Every once in a while, you write something you get a kick out of," he says. "Not every day. But sometimes you write something that you think did the job, and that you might have done the reader a favor on that particular day."

Afterword
Tomorrowland: May 21, 1998

Steve Rubenstein, never one to be intimidated by the grumpy entertainment moguls, bravely returned to Disneyland this morning to celebrate the grand opening of the newly revamped Tomorrowland. Forty NASA astronauts were on hand to act as living symbols of mankind's great technological achievements and boundless vision for the future.

As Rubenstein was enjoying the festivities, he caught a glimpse of an old man sauntering up to a complimentary coffee station--the man was Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin, the astronaut who traveled with Neil Armstrong on mankind's first trip to the moon.

Aldrin grabbed an empty cup and held it under the spout, only to find that when he flipped the little plastic doodad, the urn produced no coffee.

"I guess I'm too late," he said.

Recognizing humanity's debt to the great adventurer, Rubenstein answered his call to duty, and appointed himself Ambassador of Gratitude for the People of the World.

He approached the legendary pilot and said:

"Mr. Aldrin, you've given so much to the world--let me show you something. If you take the coffee urn, and tip it just a little bit, there's probably a little more coffee in the bottom that will come out."

There was.

The old pioneer had his coffee, and the scales of American history and service were back in balance.

Rubenstein is asked, from time to time, to recount his meeting with Buzz Aldrin. And though most people would find it impossible to put such a profound encounter into words, Rubenstein, a writer of the first order, manages to crystallize the moment eloquently:

"This is only a guy who figured out how to go to the moon."

Trey Bundy is a journalism student at San Francisco State University and a punk rock musician.