Gentrification

Written February 13, 2013

Last year I walked the sidewalk blues along with my broken shadow and my geriatric dog. The city smelled like gutters, masked with the frantic…fervent spritzes of ocean scented Febreze–the kind that happy white women with brunette hair and 2.7 children spray in their post crime scene, bleached white bathrooms, in a commercial that blares across the screen during a rerun of Full House.

The cars would speed up each time a tentative toe hit the crosswalk. Children’s feet would retract from the busy street like babies testing scorching hot water for the first time. Adults would gradually move further into the intersection like impatient surfers wading out to the horizon.  LA’s 5 o’clock rush hour would play like a low budget, predictable soap opera. Someone was going to get cut off; the middle finger would be flung into the air; and a man in all black was going to casually glide across the middle of a 4-lane main street, causing cars to come to a screeching halt. (I think there’s a crosswalk there now.)

I’d walk aimlessly, forgetting to note the landmarks so that I could remember my way back– maybe because the city seemed too small to get lost in. The sight of downtown, wafting in the near distance brought on the foreboding feeling of claustrophobia, as though the buildings were slowly encroaching upon the rest of the city. There was no where interesting to go. Construction wrapped around blocks like sticky gauze. Everything was “Coming Soon” before I’d even realized anything had left.

This year,  I live in a place where the sidewalk ends far before civilization starts, and a walk is all I crave. I remember my old, decrepit dog who ran away some time ago and I wonder if she’s dead or alive. I imagine she’s found a loving home near where we once lived, where no one forces her to walk because there is not a pressing need to explore, to “get out,” because staying in is what’s safer, at least until the rest of the neighborhood dogs run away, or, refuse to leave rather.