Saturday, May 18, 2019
Roots Are Not All They’re Cracked Up to Be
I’m sitting in Hoboken, NJ at the W Hotel, here for our high school class reunion being held a few blocks away. I’m staring at the New York skyline, where I usually stay, looking toward New Jersey. The Jersey side has been gentrified and packed, from Ft. Lee to Jersey City, so that it’s like living in an ant colony. Streets are merely parking lots, except I tend to move faster in parking lots. The congestion of the housing is staggering. I’m reminded of the old song line, “And they’re all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same….” (Malvina Reynolds/Pete Seeger, 1961-62)
To each his or her own. We left here almost 50 years ago, when there were miles of rotting docks and abandoned train tracks. Maybe this is progress, but I don’t want to be here now any more than I did then.
Looking over at New York I get the eerie feeling of Avis looking at Hertz.