Category: Place

Categories
Character Community Place Profiles

Staying Alive

On the way home, I walked past the men’s shelter and met Walter, catcalling for money, and Pierre, sitting on a bench behind him on Carroll St, under the shaded trees that lined the Capitol Square.

Walter was from Chicago where he had gotten kicked out of his apartment for having the wrong kind of people over. He snickered at the memory and lit a cigarette. He had family in Madison, that’s why he was there. Pierre was more motivated and as Walter leaned back, Pierre leaned forward; he was from Chicago as well. Pierre was looking for a job. He was working for the day-laborer companies just until something else came up. He didn’t have a bank account, but he tried to save as best he could. As Pierre spoke, Walter blew smoke directly in my face. I held my breath.

Walter turned away and Pierre focused all of his attention on me – Where was I from? Where did I live? How long had I been in Madison? What did I study in school?

It was humid and hot under the bangs on my forehead, and I was only a block from home. I shifted, told them I would see them around. Suddenly, Walter was all the way on the tips of his toes.

Around here, he asked?

Yeah, around here, soon.

In participation with #reverb10.

Categories
Knowing yourself Place Relationships

Moving to a New City

Airports are particularly filthy places, no matter who you are. No matter what seat you’re in on the plane, everyone has to sit on the same toilet seats in the airport. Or hover, if you’re smart.

I’m not a germaphobe by any means, at least not yet, but airports get to me in a way that other public transportation doesn’t. I’m always looking to count on the goodness of my fellow travelers; but it’s usually about a fifty-fifty split as to who surprises me, for better or for worse.

One of the ideas that I put out there at the beginning of the year was that I wanted to travel more, and indeed, I have taken more trips in the last year than I probably have in my life. And each time, I feel all that is more around me, all that is bigger than myself, and it makes me want.

I get that you can make any city work for you. I’ve been making Madison work for me for almost ten years (oh my lord). And when others would complain about Madison (which they did a lot), I was the one to persuade its virtues (which I did a lot).

So no, this was not my first choice. Or second. Or even third, really.

Following my boyfriend for the good of his career is not my dream. Countless friends have been picked off the career ladder for just this reason and I have always held fast to my ambition during the barrage.

I’ve never had any intention of leaving my career – or my home. But as months, and then years started to separate me from my idealism, I saw in ways that I didn’t understand before how easily people can settle. How it wouldn’t matter much what the next job was because the trappings of work would still be the same, so you settle. Really great positions and ideas and causes can supersede the trappings, but still you come to rest.

So in less than two weeks, Ryan and I have settled everything, but in a different manner entirely.  

In two weeks more, with the help of UnitedVanLines.com, we will have moved and all the way to Washington, DC.

. I will work remotely – Alice.com is graciously letting me keep my position. I’ve rented out my condo. Ryan will open a new Brazen office. And we’ve found a great new place to call home. Ryan has lived in DC before, but it will all be new to me.

As I write this, I’m no longer in the airport, but on the plane. It is the time on the flight when everyone is curiously quiet – the babies are suckling, the old men are sleeping, and the young women are reading. Outside the window is a bit of how large the world is, and then, as the aerial views are covered with a blank slate of clouds, how large it could be.

We won’t be in DC long – I’m still holding out for my first choice, after all – but we will be there long enough. Long enough, I think, for an adventure.

Categories
Community Engagement Generation Y Place

Will Gen Y ruin local community?

The recession has changed everything for Gen Y. While we continue to embrace idealism, meaningful change is much harder.

And while young people have the best intentions to be part of the communities we live in, we’re being challenged by a number of conflicting events that contribute to a lack of involvement in local community.

For starters, disillusionment towards faith and religion has forced the institution to turn its reign over to Facebook as chief community builder. And despite the fact that our social circles are shrinking and loneliness is increasing, we choose where we live, in part, by how easy it is for us to maintain our quasi-anonymity.

Our friends “move in the same circles we do and are exposed to the same information. To get new information we have to activate our weak ties,” Albert-Laszlo Barabasi explains in his book Linked (via Valeria Maltoni).

So all of our Facebook and Twitter friends (those weak ties) are actually “critical to the creative environment of a city” sociologist Richard Florida reports, “because they allow for rapid entry of new people and rapid absorption of new ideas.”

Life and community, my friends, just isn’t the same. And nowhere is this so obvious, in-your-face and damning than the current alarm of the real estate market.

Before the economy collapsed, young people were being locked out of the housing market by astronomical housing prices and by our predecessors, Generation X and the Baby Boomers, who grew even richer.

Now that the housing market has collapsed, it means more young people are content with not owning a home. But as the prevailing American sentiment goes, if you don’t own something, you don’t have a stake in the future of our country. Young people don’t buy that. Literally.

Ownership is an antiquated belief belonging to another generation. Gen Y abandons ownership. Instead, today’s young people subscribe to a culture of services and leasing.

We subscribe to services that allow our lives to be easier – Peapod, Mint, Netflix, Pandora, Alice, and ZipCar to name a few. More and more individuals do this in order to pay less, acquire more, and change whenever the desire hits.

“Owning a car used to be the key to freedom,” one millennial marketer argues. “But now younger generations are seeing car ownership as a liability that ties them down.”

And being tied down is the last thing the transient Gen Yer wants. “Owning a home also ties workers down,” NY Times columnist Paul Krugman reports. “Even in the best of times, the costs and hassle of selling one home and buying another — one estimate put the average cost of a house move at more than $60,000 — tend to make workers reluctant to go where the jobs are.”

That’s cool with Gen Y because we plan to move in a month or two for that tech job, relish inner-city downtown life, or can’t see the sense in purchasing a home when we’re going overseas in June to work at a NGO anyway.

“Houses simply do not fit in very well with the demands for flexibility, mobility and continuous innovation in the creative economy,” Florida reports. “They cost a lot and suck up a ton of capital.  They are energy sinks and most people and families don’t use or need all that space.  They’re environmental disasters.  There is a growing body of economics research which suggests home ownership is associated with lower rates of productivity, lower incomes, and higher rates of unemployment.”

Gen Y will certainly grow up at some point, make commitments, have a family and settle down – indeed, research shows that is our every intention. But we are doing so at a later age, and by then, it may be too late and the world too different for local community to thrive.

Changing quarters.

What do you think? Will the housing crisis and Gen Y’s attitude towards ownership change community forever? And if you don’t own a home and aren’t connected to any particular institution, will you have any reason to contribute to the local community? Does it matter?

Categories
Business Entrepreneurship Generation Y Place

Gen Y to cities: Don’t ignore us

Update: A version of this post was published here as an opinion editorial, and another version was featured here on Brazen Careerist.

The pull Madison has is inexplicable, but powerful. It is this magic that sleeps in the winter, and then explodes in the spring like confetti on your twenty-first birthday, that makes me love the city. Even the winters become part of the voodoo that creates the vibrant mix of people and food and ideas and lakes.

Madison defines who I am. My career, friendships, and relationships are delivered to me from the city stork, like they were birthed directly from this intoxicating energy.

My affair with the city is an epic romance. But the city doesn’t know it.

Madison isn’t alone. Despite consistently placing in the top of every list imaginable – from Playboy to Forbes – Madison, like many other cities, is ignoring one of its most competitive advantages. That is, young people.

See, as cash cows go, Gen Y is a big one, and cities are ignoring us – the young leaders, entrepreneurs, professionals and creatives – in their plans for economic development.

Partnering with Gen Y should be of the utmost priority for cities since we are uniquely positioned to stimulate economic development. For example:

1. Good jobs come from good people. Economic development starts with human capital. The war for talent is one of the most interesting and challenging issues that cities face today. Young people actively promote and contribute to the high quality of life in cities, and need to be able to connect to both people and ideas. We are the quality workforce that is indispensable to basic sector job growth. Without a strong cadre of young talent, employers will be unable to expand.

2. Competitive advantage starts with entrepreneurship. More than any other generation, young people today are entrepreneurs. To meet the small business owners, the tenants of research parks, and other key entrepreneurs in cities is to meet an under forty demographic. There is ample opportunity to provide dynamic support for young entrepreneurs and the talent coming out of universities. Young entrepreneurs are a powerful determinant of a city’s future economy. They cannot be an afterthought.

3. To new customers, cities have no legacy. Gen Y knows little about the negative perceptions that have been prevalent within the business community. We don’t know the history or the mistakes. This is an opportunity for cities to build positive goodwill through superior customer service for this new generation. Young people can help cities to think innovatively. Cities can then borrow that energy and willingness to change to jump-start a perception shift in the existing business community.

4. Spiky should be funded. Place is extremely important to Gen Y and largely determines our destiny in today’s spiky world, to borrow a term from Richard Florida. To become a taller spike in the world’s economy – to compete – cities needs to attract young talent. In turn, young people will develop businesses and new markets. Cities should allocate money to young talent groups that promote and build upon the city’s strengths and spikiness to create the competitive advantage that allows us to expand business.

Cities must proactively reach out to Gen Y. Young people represent growth, and must be engaged in a city’s future development. We are a natural partner and ally in stimulating economic development.

Talent city.

Categories
Community Engagement Place

The top 3 things you can do to save the world. Literally.

This post is part of Blog Action Day. I do not have any advertising on this site, so I cannot donate the revenue. Instead, I am donating .25 for every subscriber I have today and splitting the donation between my favorite online environmental charity and my favorite local environmental charity.

1. Ditch the car. I know a guy who drives a couple blocks from his condo to the bars. It’s one of those things that gets under my skin and makes me go crazy. The single best thing you can do to help the environment is to not own a car. Instead of driving, you can walk (gasp!), ride the bus, or carpool and carshare.

At my last job, I rode the bus to work every day. Now, my workplace is only a three minute walk away (the coffee shop and my cubicle both), and I actually miss the bus. There’s something relaxing in having someone else serve you, drive you, and being able to people watch, look out the window, read, listen to music. It’s a good way to start the day.

2. Live in a trendy location. If you live downtown, you’re probably doing this already. Living downtown in a city usually means that you are living in a small footprint . My apartment is 450 square feet and my new condo is 650 square feet. A trendy location is also close to farmers markets, the grocery store, bars, restaurants, coffee shops, parks, bookstores, libraries, fitness clubs, and shopping! I.e., the places that have a good walkabilty score. My walk score is 97 out of 100. That’s good for your health and good for the environment.

It’s easy not to own a car when you live in such a great location. It also means that you’ll always be only steps away from the best things happening on any given day. You will pay more in rent for living in such a location, but with no car costs (up keep, gas, insurance, parking costs, etc.), choosing the right neighborhood will ultimately be cheaper.

3. Eat yummy food. No chain restaurants. Keep it local. Avoid food that you don’t know where it came from. And for goodness sakes, please stop going to Starbucks. Here in Madison, there is a Starbucks on both ends of State St. It’s ridiculous. You probably live where you do for a reason. Why go somewhere that is the same everywhere across the world? Celebrate the uniqueness of where you live and who you are. Of course, even local restaurants don’t always have local food, but just try your best. When you eat food that is local, it tastes better and is better for you. And you shouldn’t settle for anything less to take care of your body.

Being good to the environment is not about living with less. It’s about living with more. Living better. It’s about quality over quantity. And it’s definitely the Modite way to go.

Greener pastures.

Categories
Career Community Generation X Generation Y Place

The power of place – What do you think?

It was a few months ago when I thought I might leave Madison, WI to move to Chicago where my boyfriend lived. Long story short, I went to visit him, we broke up, and I rode home on the bus, trying to decipher all that had happened in such a short weekend.

When I got home, however – poof! Everything was okay.

As if the city had enveloped me in between its two lakes and brought the east and west side together to meet, and there in the middle, I stood, a bright light shining like a fool, excited merely just to be home. If I were a pedestrian approaching, I would have crossed the street to avoid me. Definitely.

Back to normalcy, I now sit outside a coffee shop. The sun is shining and the sound of cars accelerating from the intersection is absorbed by the tall trees in front of the street. A bicycle’s gears coast down the sidewalk while flip flops playfully smack the pavement. I’ve pulled up my pant legs and the denim folds uncomfortably around my knees. A group of suits has moved their meeting to this coffee shop and the woman across from me acts as a mirror: laptop out, papers on the table, sunglasses propped atop her head. A few blocks away, State Street is alive with its teenagers shopping and homeless begging and street performers entertaining.

A breeze arrives on my back and spreads to my arms just when the sun is too warm. The breeze brings with it the freshness of the lakes and the aroma of sundrenched grass. I breathe in, deeply now, and I smell my lotion, with the unmistakable hint of sun block, and then slightly, delicately, the smell of fresh flowers. A bus squeaks to a stop and a motorcycle guzzles loudly past. There is a dog sprawled underneath a table with a man – a musician? – who writes on one slice of yellow notebook paper with two glasses of water sitting next to him.

This is Madison and it’s the city that I love. And I sit here and wonder how I could consider leaving something I love.

Madison defines who I am. I live here because it shows me where I was, who I am, and where I will go. There is much discussion on the influence of Generation Y and Generation X on the workforce, but attention is increasingly being shined on the power of place. Two-thirds of college-educated young adults 25-34, in fact, say they will pick a place to live first. Work comes second.

Certainly for me, place has become the nascent factor over other odds such as timing, stress, and responsibility. As careers take a back seat to relationships, and as it becomes easier to connect with those we care about, it is place that drives our decisions.

You’ve chosen your place to live for a multitude of good reasons. Your city is working really hard to keep you there. Now, why do you live there in the first place? How did you choose? Do you put place before work? Relationships? What are you going to do to give back? How can you, or do you, contribute to your city? Who or what keeps you there?

Let me know your ideas in the comments!

Keeping it in the ‘hood.