A Surb Is a City?

Well, a good question to ask in light of musings in the real estate world about what exactly constitutes a city anyway - when the suburbs surrounding some of our major cities are becoming increasingly populated. With condo and apartment buildings, of all things. With manufactured 'centers' (of sorts). Often with the help of some business lingo hoping to make sense of the sense of a community.

Because many if not most cities as we usually know them have the advantage of recognizable centers, a 'downtown'. What's downtown in an area full of high rise 'homes'? Ideally living spaces that are near good transportation. I'm looking at page 10 of the New York Times for Sunday Dec. 18/16, headlined The New Suburbia. (Real Estate section of course). It puts the rose on such developments occurring largely in the outlying New York Metropolitan areas and points to a 'shift' in attitudes towards such options.

the uber pool

Not a swimming pool, of course but Uber 'group' transport - depending on number of people calling in on a single route. The price is right (half the UberX rate I found one recent morning at 10 a.m. in Washington, DC, if your patience is in check. Young Wanda showed up in minutes in a clean Chevy Malibu, taking her car out  for the first time after a bureaucratic hassle with the DC MVB inspectors she said . GPS is her guide/god and I didn't quibble (though I later found the GPS slightly off my destination point).  The only other rider turned out to be a Georgetown Medical Center resident named Peter from Phoenix, just coming out of his gym with coffee cup in hand. He uses the pool all the time and claimed he seldom has more than one sharing. The mood of the day was sunny (after a long previous day of rain), conversation was easy. I found myself wishing the business of sharing rides was the rule rather than the exception. The system crosses income and residential boundaries - and such an opportunity often is rare. Because a ride takes longer for each person, there is time to converse, to learn something about the life of a stranger. What other current transport service encourages that? A chance to share life with a stranger from another background, to compare views. Pie-in-the-sky thinking perhaps but what is the harm in trying this way to breach the walls that contain most of us, traveling paths of least resistance.

The Jazz Painter

Stuart Davis may never have performed an instrument as a jazz musician,  but he could certainly improvise - do a few riffs - on cardboard and canvas. The National Gallery of Art is celebrating this ultra American artist  ("Stuart Davis: In Full Swing" with a large exhibition beginning Sunday November 13) exploring his work after 1921  drawn from 50 different sources - a fully realized show tracking his influences and output through three decades.
 (The image to the left is typical - albeit the work of a culinary artist who provided small edible cookies at the press preview - an exact replica,  a digital photo copy, minus the frosty sugar frame of his "OWH! In Sao Pao, 1951" on loan from New York's Whitney Museum of American Art. Notice the bright yellow background, the play of words - inverted for the title - and sense of energy and joy.)
Oddly enough, I haven't found many of my contemporaries who are familiar with him but I would encourage everyone to go who feels a sense of impending gloom  whether caused by external or internal factors....to revel in the profusion of color and style. It was partly to be provocative that I asked NGA curator Harry Cooper if my embrace of Davis made me a 'lowbrow.'  He answered easily, diplomatically, enough: "low and high" at once.  Wash Post critic/commentator Philip Kennicott goes to great lengths to tell just how complicated the man and his art really are. A complicated review in which he seems to see contradictions - the most basic of course could be the complete contrast between sight and sound - the 'music' of paint vs notes played for the ear. PK is not entirely a fan.
Still it's possible to delight in the contrast - how Davis 'riffs,' thrills to variations of form and mood. The result produces unique sensations, worth many ruminations. Put on some Earl Hines (closed circuit audio) while viewing the show.

Be of good cheer (in spite of all)

In this November 2016 season of our discontent (politically anyway), a little humor is advised. Any possible distraction. Follow the words of the song that begins "Smile though your heart is breaking."
Too soon for endless tears but the habit of cheer is worth adopting. Take advantage of escapist living.
Recall - some people really will - when a lighthearted soul named Harvey Wallbanger got 7 % write-in votes for President in 1972 (Nixon-Magovern). At the time HW was the name of a fashionable drink promoted by the distributors of the Italian liqueur Galliano, a golden syrupy sweet potion layered atop orange juice and vodka. I know a sporting fellow who says he banged down snowy mountains in Colorado with no pain after many Wallbangers and even lived to tell.  It may speak to the good humor or crazy ways of the American public that so many voted for a man named after an alcoholic drink instead of a man. Whoever he is, the Web says he is back in the 2016 race, however belatedly. And the drink may be coming back in favor again if distributors have anything to say about it. The push was on recently in Washington DC's Union Market. A blitz of "Elect Harvey Wallbanger" buttons and the sale of several  concoctions using the liqueur in novel ways were on tap  all afternoon.

Cities on the Move

Surprise! Urbanists are no longer defined only as 'city planners' - though plenty of people have known this for a while, anyone who cares about civilization and its discontents especially in cities. The New York Times' architecture critic, Michael Kimmelman, this past Sunday (10/30/16) devoted his column to a short summary of a recent gathering in Ecuador of Habitat,  a UN 'global cities summit meeting' that convenes only once every 20 years. That is hardly believable given that the world's populations are ever more steadily moving from rural to urban areas (habitat). Who even blinks an eye anymore reading about 'millions upon millions' living in major capitals. Kimmelman is positive overall,  noting how at least  young and idealistic movers and shakers are creating a "generational shift" - even "a worldwide sea change" - when it comes to improving attitudes towards city living. This has happened over the past 40 years, he says. Cities "are being recognized increasingly as opportunities for economic and social progress, density as a response to environmental threats; the automobile as a big problem, " etc.  (He overlooks the plight of poor towns in the so-called American rust belt; maybe they aren't the 'cities' he means and maybe there is even hope for them in years to come...And he isn't blind to problems of cities in many countries, especially in the developing world, led by "older leaders.")
Aha: the millennials strike again! He credits the energy of  leaders in many municipalities, as opposed to "federal  authorities."
Nice to think so. At least to read some encouraging news and views.

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All of which begs the question: what is urban (city) and what is rural (country? small town?) anymore?
The issue arises post-November '16 election, with the Electoral College giving what appears to be unbalanced power to so-called rural areas/communities.  And that has to do with how people identify themselves. A person can feel like a big city person living in a small town and have little in common with residents in outlying areas (farmers, etc., if they exist). States with just 17 percent of the American population theoretically can elect a Senate and House majority - according to the New York Times' report on November 21/16. Rural voters put Trump into the presidency. It's a confusing time - and a confusing identity. The Times refers to a 'rural bias' in our democratic electoral process.  What does that mean? Does it have to do with the diminishing power of so-called mainstream media's fact-checkers - the relative power of offbeat radio and TV not inclined to fact check much of anything?

Soul Searching

What does it mean to talk about a city's 'soul' ? Is there any such thing?  I'll go overboard and say yes, that most people understand the concept -even though they are inclined to think in favorable terms, often pre-set terms articulated by others.
Visiting the city of Billings, Mt., recently, I put the question to a politically minded (i.e. aware of the world around them) group at a cocktail party.  Almost all agreed without asking me to define my own terms. Almost to a one I was referred to a recent article in Outside magazine calling Billings one of  the best places to live in the US. To live actively, that is, since the article described all the wonderful 'outdoor' activities available there, uniformly portrayed under clear blue skies. Implied: available to people active enough to participate. People willing to go to meet the city's soul (the magazine never used the word) more than halfway.
But what is there in a city that reaches out to people rather than making people seek out 'best things' on their own? The magazine made a great deal out of craft breweries as well.
Externals guaranteed to catch the tourist eye.
How to define the more complicated aspects of soul that has to do with the character of  its residents, and the larger matter of culture. How to comprehend the 'culture' of a city of 110,000 that has casinos in almost every block of one of the main thoroughfares leading into town? That seems to have more banks - the largest buildings in sight - than gas stations? A spread of homes and industry (oil, services, endless chain stores) across a vast plain?

Be Sensible!

And be wise.... don't miss Folger Theatre's latest offering, the new stage adaptation of Jane Austen's novel 'Sense and Sensibility' - actually her first published book. The super-energetic production conceived by New York's Bedlam Theater plays through the end of October (2016). Furniture moves around on wheels. Actors play several roles, even sometimes within the same scene. Scenes of tears and joy. Madcap characters and misunderstood emotions. An entirely different take on British gentry you won't see anywhere else, the very opposite of 'Downton Abbey' and sure to influence future takes of other of her literary creations.
 The connection between this most beloved author and Shakespeare  is not as far-fetched as you might imagine, though some 200 years separates the two.  Folger Shakespeare Library is celebrating them both with a comprehensive exhibit to honor Austen's 200th anniversary coming up in 2017. See: 'Will & Jane: Shakespeare, Austen, and the Cult of Celebrity' that will remain long after the Bedlam production has gone.
Some thoughts: The meaning of 'sensibility'  refers not to common sense but to the capacity for being sensitive. Two of the three sisters involved in the mating game represent  two quite opposite personalities characterized by those words.
Director Eric Tucker calls the play 'actor driven' for good reason. It's difficult to ever take your eyes off them.  And while the staging is modern in concept, settings and costumes are definitely  of the period (the book was published in 1811). Speaking to Folger supporters one evening, he pointed out ice advantage that theater of this kind offers in contrast to TV and film  - 'boundaries can be stretched and even broken.' Compelling stories remain the same, however: 'it's all about relationships and people, gossip and changing lives."

Notice! tiny little wheels on the legs of the chairs.