Apparently spring in Detroit routinely bums me out. I get really edgy, everything seems to be bad news, little things like the INSANE parking enforcement downtown or the ghetto-ization of Lafayette Towers became big things (more on those another time), another old building is suddenly a demolition imperative for no apparent reason (never the Packard Plant though), Kwame sticks his ugly mug out of the ground and we get six more weeks of emotional winter ...
I can't pinpoint where it started for me this year, but do know at one point I started to attribute feeling crappy to low blood sugar and began a weird kind of stress eating that resulted in gaining like ten pounds in six weeks. And by "like ten pounds" I mean fifteen. The weather became nicer and my friend (and your dog's bestie) Liz Blondy suggested I undertake some city biking with her instead of turning my jeans into stretch pants, but biking through Detroit's intermittently desolate east side only served to bum me out further. You can only see so many people trying to keep their house nice while a burned out shell sits next door before you start to think man, this is all really really fucked.
When the things that used to inspire you drive you to drink, you know it's time to reassess.
With the end of my apartment lease coinciding with the move-out from my business location at the end of May, I made the executive decision to get out of Dodge for a while and recharge my batteries. All those friends who have moved away from SE Michigan over the years (and who have a guest room) are getting a visit.
So I tied up loose ends and, homeless and jobless, departed for locales west. First stop, beautiful Palm Springs, California.
Of course Detroit had to get in the last word. As I was loading the last of my things from the store the night before I left, one of the dozens of "street prophets" comes into the store and chats me up, and by the time I can get rid of him he's stolen my new phone.
So I've had a week in Palm Springs, where I don't have to watch everything I own every minute of the day to make sure it doesn't get snatched and where modern isn't a dirty word. And it's been amazing. And tomorrow I head off to San Fran for a solid month for my continuing attitude adjustment. And after that, Chicago.
For now, I'm getting in the private pool and getting as sunburned as I possibly can. Detroit, see you later. We'll always have Indian Summer.
I'd go for a skinny dip in the private pool but there'd be nothing
skinny about it.
.
1 comment:
Some people are incredibly talented at talking money out of your pockets. Imagine if we had a functional school system, we would have the best dealers.
Look out for the educated scammers off the peninsulas.
Miles and miles of empty lots and burnt houses will become forest.
Say hello to the ocean for me.
I'll be skinny dipping at Belle Isle ;)
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