What do our burning fields smell like?

I was talking to someone from Detroit last week, and we were discussing the similarities of our sister Great Lakes Cities(Cleveland). Both of them were once proud, progressive towns offering many opportunities to its inhabitants. In my opinion, the decline of the Great Lake Cities is a huge disgrace. This is a crucial region...we've practically built the country through our steel factories, auto plants and manufacturing plants. We have most of the fresh water (the largest collection of fresh water lakes in the world) We don't have a lot of natural disasters and the climate is reasonable(I know people like to bitch about the winters but try living in North Dakota...)

Often, when large cities get abandoned, the property values plummet which opens up the area to artists and other entrepreneurial types, who take advantage of the space/cost ratio. This often leads to a "scene" that springs up out of the ashes, which then becomes gentrified by those who have money and are now willing to live there. When this happens, the artists can no longer afford to live there and move on to the next squalid neighborhood...kind of like carpet-bagging...so it goes. This is generally a good thing. So the question is; is this happening enough in Cleveland and its' surrounding inner-ring suburbs? We know that many of the abandoned warehouses in certain areas have been rehabbed for residential use but these are mostly unaffordable to the average person. What is needed is more downtown affordable housing. It's the only way to get ordinary people to live in the city. And that's what makes good cities great:a population with economic diversity.

If we've hit rock bottom, what's the best way to get back up? We know from our recent past that building big ticket items is only a small temporary solution. If you burn the fields is it guaranteed that the next crop is better?

The Musk Ox

The human race is amazing. We are such gluttons for doom. And violent. When we can't get along, we fight and kill each other instead of using our most dominant attribute-our intelligence. We spend trillions of dollars making things that kill people, we eat/engineer food that's horrible for us, we watch and listen to stupid entertainment that rots our brains, we make most of our choices based on our own personal convenience regardless of the impact on others and our environment, we pump ourselves full of drugs for every little physical ailment even when some of these things can be solved by simply making better choices...etc...

To top it all off, we spend most of our lives preparing for our destiny after we die. I'm not here to debate the existence of Gods and the afterlife-there are much wiser folks than me to do that. But so many people forget about the simple beauty of being alive: looking into someone's eyes, petting an animal, watching a baby laugh, eating delicious food, being in love, listening to music, playing sports, taking a photogragh, telling stories... just watching the world pass by. So much suffering, confusion, cruelty, fear, pain, injustice...it's enough to make someone go nuts with frustration.

We are just barely in control. The earth and the universe are "alive and well and living in"...think of the planet as a Musk Ox...when there are too many flies, it simply shakes it's ass and gets rid of some of them.





Au revoir!

Driving like an A-hole

Driving a car brings out the worst in most people. How many people would go up to someone's face, give them the digit, and loudly cuss them out? A confrontation like that would usually be reserved for the most insidious circumstances. Yet on the road, this happens so often, easily and seemingly unprovoked, that it has almost become the conventional way of communicating while operating heavy machinery. As a comparison, let's try and correlate two similar circumstances; one on the road and one on the sidewalk.

The Bully Tactic

Let's say your walking down a crowded sidewalk (any busy city street will serve as a good example). The person in front of you is moving much slower than you(maybe they're old, in bad shape, not in a hurry, looking for something -or maybe they're just a weenie)...but you're stuck behind them until you get a chance to pass. A mature, normally-adjusted person would probably keep a reasonable distance, mutter their frustration under their breath, and wait for a suitable opportunity to get around. An impatient, arrogant, angry bully-type would hover too close, huff and puff out loud, try and push the person to go faster even though they could just wait and go around them. If really annoyed, this person may even say something when they do get around. This person is a jack-ass. Unequivocally.

Luckily, most reasonable people don't act in this fashion...except in cars. Normal, friendly, well-adjusted people reduce themselves to acting like mad children once they get behind the wheel of a car. It's not out of the ordinary for someone to speed up and ride someone's ass when they can just pass them. This is especially shabby when someone is driving in the right lane....THAT'S WHAT IT'S FOR. And it's just as customary to pass someone (with a raging fury), give them the finger, scowl menacingly and mouth numerous obscenities as they soar past. I have done this myself. And almost always (except when someone is yappin' on their phone) I feel like a heel afterwards.

I would never treat someone that way face-to-face. But in a car, we are not held accountable for our behavior towards other people. We don't really have to look them in the eye and say f*ck you...it's so much easier to vilify someone when they are an abstract operator of a machine.

I'm no driving guru. Anyone who has known me for any significant amount of time knows this. But is it too much to ask for people to chill out while driving a two-ton vehicle? It may be an impossible task but I think it's worth considering.

Facial Hair II

Some of you may remember my post about 4 months back lamenting the accidental loss of my beloved facial hair. Since then, with the exception of my neck and a little trimming here and there,(who the hell can stand hair on their neck?)my countenance has been spared the humiliating process of shaving. What has transpired is quite impressive in my estimation. I must admit however, I'm somewhat surprised at the amount of silver that showed up...while I know it makes me look much older, I'm sort of into the mountain-man look....and my wife thinks it's a sign of manliness. One of my students said that I look like I should have a raccoon on my shoulder...now that sounds like a cool look.

Check it out:

Something to consider...

"The enemy is anybody who's going to get you killed, no matter which side he's on."

-Joseph Heller (author of Catch 22)