Something Something Detroit

I’m wary of sweeping trend pieces like the one in the New York Times a few weeks ago that described Bushwick in Brooklyn as having a “bohemian vibe” and tout that it’s at the heart of some sort of artistic revolution. A co-op or two does not a revolution make, and sure there may by a group of young white people making art and sharing stuff in part of Bushwick, but the last thing I got from the Bushwick in the past two years that I visited the neighborhood frequently was a “bohemian vibe.”

And that’s the problem with any urban area – there’s no one story. Detroit is the easiest example, and has been used as such exhaustively over the past couple of years. As Vice pointed out in it’s 2009 story called "Something, something, something, Detroit: Lazy journalists love pictures of abandoned stuff," Detroit’s decay became shorthand for all that is going wrong in American during the recession and abandoned buildings are as beautiful to photographers as sunsets (hell I love photographing abandoned buildings too). Of course there’s a lot of crime, tons of poverty, and LOTS of abandoned houses. But it’s not the whole story of Detroit and also far from one that should be used to illustrate the economic collapse of 2008-present day. News by definition should be NEW and there have been abandoned buildings in Detroit for decades.

And then there’s the other story of Detroit, one of its “creative renaissance” and this video is so interesting and encouraging, and such great PR for the city that needs it so badly. I’m glad they spoke to people who live there rather than just about them, but still why does Detroit need effing Johnny Knoxville to come in and tell the world about it? Yes there’s stuff happening in Detroit, but just like Bushwick, I don’t know that it can really be labeled as sort of trend in the same way that it’s not accurate to label the whole area as abandoned and hopeless. Both, as a woman in the video calls it, are “pick and choose journalism.”

Of course perpetuating a narrative of an artist utopia isn’t nearly as harmful as perpetuating one of hopeless blight, but my point is that neither is accurate, and that an urban area is complex and can’t be boiled down to a trend piece as simple as “Hippies now in Bushwick” or “Stuff is abandoned in Detroit.” To do so is just lazy journalism.

Complex reporting isn’t short and easy to digest, nor is it cheap and fast to produce, and no one benefits from some New Yorker dropping by a few abandoned buildings or hipster bars and proclaiming what a city he spent 12 hours in is all about. The last thing Detroit or needs is another journalist who is looking to make it a metaphor or someone like me who left for greener pastures dropping back in for a quick byline and then ducking back to an overpriced neighborhood on the East Coast to education everyone on what’s happening in the flyover states.

Those most qualified to tell the world the real story are the journalists who stayed –some of the reporting at publications like Metro Times Detroit and The Detroit Free Press is among the best I’ve seen. Let’s give them national attention rather than treating the city like an easy trend piece.

A Decade of Kate

Oh year-end recaps! Oh decade rehashes! Oh listicles! Yes it’s that time of year and as lazy and self-serving as it is, I can’t resist the urge to look back on my own little life in the ‘00s. Unlike the two other decades of my life, this one seems like a decade without definition, I can’t really point to many cultural trends that tied 2000-2009 together except maybe the Internet and Reality TV. I graduated from high school in 1999, which means my entire adult life to this point has taken place in this odd ambiguous decade. So if you care to indulge me, here’s a snapshot of a 20-something in the 00s. (also stay tuned for a look at a decade of great taste, aka. my favorites in media and pop culture in the 00s, posting soon)

2000

I started the year and the decade off watching fireworks, police in riot gear, and the world not come to an end in Chicago’s Grant Park with my first love. It was really cold and kind of exciting. The year was all downhill from there. Chicago was thrilling to the 18 year old version of me who had barely been outside of her tiny home town, but several circumstances conspired to make me miserable there, and by March I dropped out of college and moved back home in what was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done.

That spring I had an extremely difficult break up, and that fall I swallowed my pride and started classes at the local community college. By the end of the year I was settled into life back at home: working at the mall, hanging out with my old friends, and going out flirting with dudes. I was moving towards being less depressed, but still felt like I was a million miles away from everything I had wanted for my life.

2001

The first few months of this year were an echo of the last few of 2000, I briefly dated someone a few years older, breezed though my classes, worked, and started to plan my next move. Shortly after my 20th birthday I went to work on Michigan’s Mackinac Island for the summer, even though the pay was low, and the conditions less than stellar, it was a fun escape that helped me to feel adventurous and less complacent again.

In the fall I moved to Ann Arbor and into what my family deemed a “hippie commune” (actually a co-op house of mostly privileged liberal University of Michigan students). Although I was nervous after my previous failed attempt, I dove head first into college life and quickly found a niche, joining several groups, writing for the college paper, going to parties, participating in poetry slams, and met a close friend, who eight years later I share an apartment with in Brooklyn.

Since you can’t mention the fall of 2001 without it, here’s where I was on September 11th: I was running late for my morning class, circling the parking lot looking for a spot when I heard what I first assumed was an odd morning radio show gag. I arrived to find classes cancelled and everyone gathered around TVs. It was an odd day that I felt pretty removed from.

2002
Again much like the last few months of 2001, I found myself enjoying college life and thriving in my classes and activities. Where I was a small fish in Chicago, I felt like a big fish at Eastern Michigan University. My passion for writing was renewed and I took comfortably to the role of overachiever. I also become dedicated to traveling more and went to work at a nature preserve in Florida during Spring Break. I followed that up with my 21st birthday, my brother’s wedding, and a cross country bus trip to work in Yellowstone National Park for the summer.

I long referred to that summer as life changing and while I’ve lived though a lot since then, it’s certainly still up there. The isolation and beauty of living in the wildness magnified the dramas of life: The over-the-phone break-up with my college boyfriend, the friendships formed and lost, the attack and rape of my roommate, the death of my father.

I came back to my college life in a much different place than I had left it three months prior. Still uber-involved, I began my school year as Editor in Chief of the campus magazine and capped it off with an honor from the Michigan Press Association, while being submerged in one of the darkest moods of my life.

2003
Thankfully this year worked the opposite of 2002; it came in on a low note and steadily improved. The first several months were spent again much like the ones before them; working hard and feeling low. But with the melting snow my mood and life started to change. I successfully completed my tenure as Editor in Chief, and decided to slightly delay my summer internship at Metro Times in Detroit to take a month-long solo road trip down south and then up the east coast.

It was just the freedom and head-clearing I needed, and the rest of the summer was among some of the best times in my life. While I interned and worked two jobs, I found my feet more as a journalist and found a powerful infatuation (that would end over a year later in another country). Reality set in that fall when that beau moved back to England, I moved into a not so collegiate apartment complex, started working full time, and in December, graduated from college. Still having never been on an airplane, let alone out of the country (except for Canada which used to not count), I got a passport, just in case.

2004
Now officially a college graduate, and not living the glamorous life I thought a 22 year old should be, quarter-life ennui started to set in. I was working a job straight out of Office Space. I started searching for anything and blindly and unwisely sent out over 100 cover letters and resumes to newspapers all over the country. I took my first trip on an airplane and visited San Francisco. I started working part time at night as a copy editor; I applied to a year long program in London.

Then just after my 23rd birthday I found out I had an interview in New York City for the London program and flew there the same week, I was told I might not hear for a month or more, but by the time I returned to Michigan I was accepted. That summer I prepared to make the biggest move of my life. Many in my life were sure it had something to do with a boy. It did not. Just before I left I revisited Yellowstone with a good friend, it was the same and very different at the same time.

That fall I moved to London. It was lonely and difficult and exciting and I loved every second of it, even when at its most thorny. I disliked my job (training and development at a large investment bank) but my devotion to the city never wavered. I traveled to Wales, Spain, and spent my first and only Christmas away from home in Hungry. My sister in law told me over the phone that she was pregnant. The British boy from the summer before broke my heart, a boy I had met very briefly came to visit me for new years and we foolishly decided to get involved across the ocean.

2005
I continued to hate my job and love London more and more, I traveled to France, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Greece, and Scotland. I broke up with the boy back in American, I turned 24. My mom got engaged. I had an exciting romance with a co-worker. I met and became friends with a man whom understood me more than anyone I had ever met before; I made myself keep a distance because there were parts of him that scared me. I missed a train that exploded only minutes later on the morning for the July 7th bombings. I held on to every aspect of the city even as it slipped away and my visa expired. My mom put my childhood home up for sale, sold it and moved in with her soon to be husband, my brother became a father and I became an aunt.
In the fall I moved back to the US and into the house of my mom’s fiancé, a man I had met twice before. I met my awesome baby nephew, and saw all the people I had missed for a year. I started looking for jobs in New York City and ways to get back to London. I was miserable. I came to New York and slept on couches of friends for several weeks, turned down a high paying job I doing something I didn’t understand at an investment bank in Connecticut, I turned down a very low paying job as a copy editor at an Energy Trade publication, I took a job writing about things I didn’t understand for the communications department of a French Investment Bank. I found an apartment and roommate in Brooklyn and just before Christmas moved to New York.

2006
New York put me through the ringer. My drink was drugged at a party and I woke up the next morning in the hospital with cuts and bruises (and later a $1,000 hospital bill). I hated my job and started to look for a new one. I traveled back to Michigan for my mom’s wedding. The 3rd British boy in my life (the one I felt close to but tried to keep a distance from) visited me and I realized I loved him. I was hit by a car while riding my bike.

I turned 25. New York started to grow on me, but at the end of the summer I traveled back to London and (unwisely) decided to start a relationship (across the ocean) with the British man I loved who already treated me poorly (although I couldn’t see that at the time). I continued to hate my job, and looked for a new one. The boy and I made frequent trips across the ocean, I planned to move back to London in a year to go to grad school and be with him. A week before Christmas I was laid off from the job I hated, a few days later I was offered an Assistant Editor position at Popular Photography magazine, it was the type of job I had been waiting for since graduation. The boy came to visit for Christmas and it was clear I was going to delay moving to London, our problems increased.

2007
I started working at Popular Photography and loved it. My roommate moved out and my good friend whom I lived with in college in Michigan moved in. I continued to make frequent trips to London, the boy and I continued to have problems, we made plans for him to move to New York, but it became increasingly clear he wasn’t going to. I turned 26. The verbal and emotional abuse increased, I was miserable but in love in an intense way I never had been before. At the end of a horrible summer I traveled to London for the last time and we broke up.

I spent that fall angry, bitter, and busy. I did a 35 mile bike tour, I put myself on a strict regime to lose weight mostly to have something to do, and I signed up to become a Big Sister. I traveled to Michigan for my first Thanksgiving at home in years. My uncle was found dead in my grandparent’s basement a few days after I returned to New York. At Christmas my best friend announced that she was getting married to her long time boyfriend, I started helping her plan.

2008
I became a Big Sister to a 13 year old girl, my bitterness towards men softened a little, and I started dating. I traveled alone to Costa Rica and had an amazing time. I turned 27, and went on a date with a man whom I figured would be a summer fling. I had a fantastic summer and by the fall realized I wanted more than a fling with the man, and thankfully he did too. I did another 35-mile bike tour. My circle of friends in New York grew and I became for the first time happy and settled in the city, which made me fear that I was becoming complacent. My sister-in-law announced she was pregnant again.


2009
My sister in law lost the baby. My boyfriend lost a family member, my best friend lost her grandmother, and I lost my grandmother. I started having insomnia. I continued being a Big Sister. My boyfriend and I traveled to San Francisco together and I remembered how much I love everything about that city. I found out the magazine I worked for was being sold; our pay was cut 6%. I still liked my job, but felt like I was never going to advance in my career and was barely making any money. I turned 28. The man who I thought would be a fling turned out to be the most loving, caring and stable man I’d ever met. We fell in love. I traveled back to Michigan for my best friend’s wedding. My 10-year high school reunion happened and I didn’t attend.

My magazine was sold and our Editor in Chief left, lay offs began, we moved to new offices, we were told our jobs were safe. I was laid off two weeks later. I spent two months unemployed. I did a 55-mile bike tour. I started freelancing a lot, and took a full time freelance position at WomansDay.com (back at my old publisher). I had a wisdom tooth removed. I applied for Grad School for Journalism in both New York and San Francisco. I wrote a blog post about my decade.

2010-2019: TBD

An Open Book

I had written an exhaustive post the other week about my six-plus weeks (and counting) of unemployment. I wanted it to be a kind of an inside look at what being unemployed is like (i.e. it’s a lot of work) but it didn’t make for a very interesting read, and was probably more than anyone would really care to know. So instead I’ve decided to re-visit another post I started and abandoned:

My Top Five Books (in no particular order)*

1) 1) 1984 by George Orwell: To know me is to know my obsession with all things Orwell. I’ve read all of his books, several essays, and a biography or two. He is the kind of writer I want to be, both in style and content. 1984 is of course his most famous work, but it wasn’t one of the first I read by him, and it’s one of the classics that’s a classic for a reason. It’s a book that stays with you forever. I’ve seen the (US-banned!) film version and a stage production, and both were mostly well done, but nothing has ever compared to the way the book draws you in and changes the way you look at the world.

2) 2) Pull of the Moon by Elizabeth Berg: Sure, she’s an Oprah Book Club alumni (but sometimes Oprah has really good taste) and maybe her books aren’t high literature and the target audience may be middle-aged ladies, but Elizabeth Berg knows how to write characters and dialog like few authors. She writes honestly and without pretension, and creates people that you actually care about living in a world that seems familiar even if it’s one you don’t live in. Her main characters are always women and in this book it’s a woman in her 60s alone on the road trying to find herself writing journals and letters to her confused husband she abandoned at home. I read it as a 19-year-old and knew just how she felt. That’s good writing. Plus I met Elizabeth Berg in Chicago once; she’s a wonderfully nice lady.

3) 3)The Bell Jar by Silvia Plath: This one goes out to my angsty 14-year-old self. I’m sure I’d feel differently about it now, but at the time it just all seemed so…deep. I remember sitting on the porch and in my bedroom reading Silvia Plath and all J.D. Salinger that spring and feeling so misunderstood.

4) 4) Without a Net edited by Michelle Tea: The only non-fiction book on my list. While some parts are more well-written than others, the message in this collection of essays by women who grew up Working Class articulates parts of my own experience growing up as well as issues such as racism, sexual identity and feminism, and the co-opting of downtrodden cultures in a straightforward and honest way that few books I’ve read have.

5) 5) Caucasia by Danzy Senna: Reading this book was the best thing to come out of my short lived time in a Book Club, and one of the most interesting multi-layered discussions about a book I’ve ever had with a group of people. On the surface it’s a book about race (in fact Borders seems to think it’s only for Black People http://fullofwit.blogspot.com/2008/12/is-borders-racist.html), but aside from racial identity, it was a beautiful and artfully woven story of a girl’s relationship with her father, politics, growing up.

Honorable Mentions:

· Down and Out in London and Paris by George Orwell : His best book about class and that’s saying a lot), I read it while I was living in London and it gave me a new perspective on the city’s history, plus this is actually the first Orwell book I ever read and your first is always special.

· A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith: I was reading this book when I was in the process of moving to New York and several random people approached me while I was reading it to tell me how much they loved it. It was a memorable story and an interesting history lesson about the city I was moving to.

· Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides: An epic story that covers the gamut from sexual and national identity, and a lot of history of my home state.

· Oh the Places You’ll Go by Dr. Seuss: Along with the Lorax, the best Seuss books, plus this one makes a perfect graduation speech.

· Without Reservations by Alice Steinbach: The best travel book I’ve read, it was particularly meaningful because I was reading it as I was moving abroad.

*Anyone who loves books or music or movies always has a hard time picking their favorites, and so there are tons of books I love that I didn’t think to include.

John Six Pack?

So it's about time Kwame is hauled off to jail. And good on the Judge for doing what everyone has been saying needs to be done for months now. But "John Six-Pack?" since when is this a term that people use? I'm not sure how to feel about it...

Politicking (Part 2-some ranting)

The government likes to make it difficult for me to vote. They made me jump through more hoops than most to vote by absentee from London during the last presidential election, and now they are trying to keep me from voting in the New York primary next month. (You see, I switched my voter registration from Michigan to New York a year and a half ago when I switched my drivers license, but yet they claimed I wasn’t registered, so on Friday I had to re-register.)

At any rate, my beef at the moment isn’t as much with the government as it is with the Democratic Party (with whom as of Friday I officially registered with). I’ve always looked at them as the lesser of two evils, and only ever took their side because it was slightly less crazy. But they really seem intent on being complete dumbasses. Case in point: the Michigan Primary. The Democratic Party is “reprimanding” the state for moving its primary up to this month, and as a result most of the candidates aren’t campaigning there (only Clinton is, and she’s the only "major" Democrat on the ballot there). It’s really about the stupidest thing the party (and Obama and especially Edwards) can do. The state’s economy is horrible and the candidate whose platform is most in line with both what the state needs and what it values is Edwards, who is spending no time there and won’t be on the ballot.

Instead, the state will likely go Republican, and likely go for Romney, whose father was (from what I gather) a mediocre governor for Michigan 40 years ago. Happier times, indeed, nostalgia is a funny thing like that. Voting for someone because their father was once governor is almost as stupid as voting for someone because their husband was once president.

We're #1, We're #1!

It’s been a big month for the mitten state. In what has been called "an irresponsible misuse of crime data,” a private research group's report based on annual FBI crime statistics rank Detroit as America’s most dangerous city (and good ol’ Flint, MI as #3).

The main criticism is that simplifying such a complex issue as crime into handy “move out of or don’t move to this already ailing city, it really sucks” rankings does a lot more harm than good to everyone involved. Besides, according to the AP article Detroit “Murder Capital” has lost 1 million people since 1950, and real estate agents attempting to sell the new condos aren’t likely to use the “most dangerous city in the US” tagline in their listings.


(Prime, affordable real estate in Detroit)

The most concise commentary of the report that I’ve read came from Gawker:

“The annual list helps reinforce the cycle of poverty, white flight, and neglect that is killing post-industrial America while the rich create unsustainable fantasy worlds on the coasts. And it provides a nice way for a news anchor to fill up 45 seconds.”

New York, by the way, ranked 130-something. Whatever, tell that to my two stolen bikes and my old roommate’s snatched purse. I’ve never had anything stolen in D-town.

"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."

Terror Rocks My Hometown

Except not really...the suicide/murder that they were talking about actually happened in the next town over, and people have been writing dumbass notes like that at the high school for years. It is kind of amusing how quaint and close knit they try to make Plainwell seem though, yeah it’s small, but I didn’t know all 4,000 people that lived there like that lady who’s hair salon that has been open for less than five years would have you believe. Still this is the biggest thing to happen there since we won the state powerlifting title in 1998, maybe now they'll finally take it off the city limit sign.

Great Lakes, Not so Great Times

When I noticed a few months ago that BP was acting like its initials stood for “Beyond Petroleum” instead of “British Petroleum” I was pretty sure it was just a green bandwagon jumping publicity stunt.

Yep.

From Environment Michigan:

“BP talks a lot about being 'Beyond Petroleum,' but their plan for increasing dumping ammonia and toxic sludge into Lake Michigan from their oil refinery in Whiting, Indiana shows they're certainly not beyond polluting our Great Lakes. Even after mounting public pressure, including over 55,000 petition signatures urging them to stop their toxic dumping plans from Environment Michigan supporters and our sister organizations around the region, BP still intends to go forward with their refinery project, even if it means more pollution for Lake Michigan. They have not committed to a plan that would ensure that no additional pollution would be dumped in the lake.”