Musings on my seaside urban driveway nature-world’s evolution; the nourishing quality of urban slowness; the petty brutality of operatic harassment and more
Sometimes when I get discouraged about my progress or work, I will get some small reminder that cheers me up a bit and encourages me to keep going. In this case, the reminder came yesterday via a Facebook memory from four years ago.
First picture is my driveway four years ago; the other pictures are from today and yesterday.
I have sought to create a little bit of an urban nature oasis, very small scale and intimate, that would feel a little bit like a coastal Florida version of how it used to feel living in Japan or walking around cities in England or the European continent (back when I still traveled).
In my spaces, I see nature not as an escape from the urban environment; but an integrated part of it.
The other day when talking with a fellow civic activist about ADUs and thickening-up our beautiful but depopulated historic neighborhoods, I realized fully for the first time that I could never move back to Japan even if the opportunity were there.
One, I would miss my siblings and nieces too much even though I only see them once a year. At least now we are on the same side of an ocean, and the same coast of the USA.
But also, I realized fully, maybe for the first time, that I could never just go live someplace where I once lived or visited, just because I felt comfortable and alive and aesthetically nurtured there.
I realized that for me, part of my happiness and calling lies in bringing sweetness and a kind of slow urban intimacy HERE and NOW to a place that I feel would be nourished by it.
Here in most parts of the USA, the roads are wide; designed to prioritize monster vehicles and speeding as fast as possible.
Shops are set up for huge bulk cardboard-food shopping, and food takeout is set up for drive-through and drive-out. Minimal interaction, no messy inefficiency, pure speed.
It’s pretty much the opposite of the slow intimate urban feel that nurtured me in my era of working and traveling outside of the USA. (Late 1980s-mid 1990s mostly.)
Patrick Lydon, a blogger I know of via his talks and presentations at The Nature of Cities (virtual worldwide conference) this past time, has a couple of really wonderful pieces about traveling in Japan. He talks about slow and urban in the same sentence. (Check out Patrick Lydon, The Possible City, he is on Substack as a lot of activist/writers are these days.)
Lydon and his partner Sujee (I believe she’s Korean) now live in Korea, but lived in Japan for some years before that, and recently took a trip back to Japan via the ferry from Pusan to Shimonoseki.
His writing about his Japan life and travels really brought back a lot of memories for me.
The way he describes how his tiny streets nurtured life and art had me a little bit nostalgic and teary for a couple of days. I sort of felt unmoored, the way I do sometimes when I get to missing Japan. But Japan is someone else’s country; and my place is here.
Slow and urban weren’t two words I would’ve thought to pair before I heard Lydon mention them, but once I read it, it totally clicked in me. There is a slowness, a delicious messiness in dense urban spaces. The sense that something matters more than speed and efficiency. A density of interaction. A human-scale aesthetic intimacy. Yes, even in the most rushed time of day in Manhattan or whatever, there’s just a certain feel that makes it feel OK and exciting to walk and just be. And there is a feeling of being sheltered, not exposed on some windswept plain of asphalt and merciless utilitarianism.
In Donna Lyons’ highly addictive crime novel series, the Commissario Brunetti books, the characters never tire of walking around their native Venice and admiring the streets and shops, magnificent art and architecture.
I fell in love with Daytona Beach and the people here. The early part of my falling-in-love was visual/aesthetic: I was grabbed by the narrow streets and charming houses and commercial buildings that constituted the old bones of an old pre-car-dependent neighborhoods. The neighborhoods between the A1A and Nova Road. They were designed for a community-centered life before cars and cavernous, harshly lit big-box stores dominated everything.
I say my early falling in love with Daytona Beach was the visual aesthetic. But there was additionally a later, deeper falling in love, which had to do with the people and the culture of this city specifically. As distinct from the neighboring cities.
I don’t necessarily have anything against the neighboring cities except when their leaders openly disparage Daytona Beach from the dais of their commission and board meetings. But my love and loyalty and heart is with Daytona Beach and the people here.
I want to bring and share a magic to this place. Some of the magic I’ve experienced in my life. A lot of which is centered on artistic and aesthetic experiences that I’ve had the luxury to be able to digest over many decades.
On a seemingly unrelated but actually related note, this morning on my beach / neighborhood walk I stopped for a coffee at the 7-Eleven as I sometimes do even though I have perfectly good coffee at home.
And, as in recent weeks, was greeted by the robotic flashing blue light of our little 7-Eleven community’s newest addition: a 20-foot-tall metal police robot effigy thing. Standing tall and flashing its blue cyclops eye. The spindly metal creature is mounted on a trailer parked at the corner of the parking lot, and in its hollow recorded voice it repeats: “For your safety, this parking lot is being recorded on film.”
This does not in fact make me feel safe.
Neither does the blaring opera music that spews from the outdoor speakers installed on each side of the low brick building of the convenience store. Opera music meant to discourage homeless people from napping at the sides of the building.
Now, opera has just never been my kind of music, I just don’t really get into it. Other than a couple of the humorous Gilbert and Sullivan operas that I always get a little chuckle from. (“Never? Well, hardly ever!”)
But, my Mom and Dad loved opera. It was one of their treats. So to see opera music being used in this way as a weapon was heartbreaking. It was one Italian tenor this morning, maybe even Pavarotti, my dad’s favorite.
Also, my cousin Jim Kay, an artist and educator born and raised, and returned in midlife and lived out his 87 years, in Fall River Massachusetts, taught art and dance to kids, largely immigrant children who came from low-income families.
When he started to try to introduce classical music and ballet to the kids, at first they scoffed. They wanted to hear hip-hop and all. But Jim took them on a bus to go see some performances of opera and classical music and ballet at the performance hall, and they loved it.
I’m sure cousin Jim and my parents would be heartbroken to see classical art forms weaponized as just one little extra touch of cruelty and reminder of the brutal aspects of our culture that seem to have taken over in recent years. The aspect of our culture that not only normalizes but actually encourages and rewards punching-down on those more vulnerable than ourselves.
And I walked home in tears, wanting to make a sobby video for you guys, but ended up being drawn to write, and being reminded of why I prefer to be mainly a writer rather than mainly a public speaker. Because if I had made a video I would possibly still be sobbing right now. Whereas something about writing allows me to get it out and share it in a way that might be helpful and nurturing to somebody.
Well, thanks for coming on this journey with me if you have read this far.
You can see this post with the pictures here on my Facebook page Art & Design by jenny nazak.