Joie de vivre

Life is truly beautiful. Some things are beyond description. That's why I love the phrase "joie de vivre" - which means literally translated "the joy of living."

It is true that there is much that needs fixing. But if we go around as negative as our world would seem to indicate we need to be it will be difficult to accomplish much of anything. So wake up! Life is great. And it sure beats the alternative...

PS - these are my children at the Battleship Texas (don't those beds look comfy?) Ammon age 10 and Elise age 5.

The Disneyland Chimera and New Urbanism

In Greek mythology, the Chimera was a monster that was made up of parts of several different animals. In our language, the word chimera refers to "an illusion or fabrication of the mind; especially : an unrealizable dream" (from http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/chimera).

Disneyland is just such a place.

The self-proclaimed "happiest place on earth" is an incredible amalgamation of falsehoods, clever marketing ploys, and other general glitz. It's a gilded orb, but like most such orbs, it's completely empty and offers only the warmth imparted by the holders own hand.

What is amazing to me is that it works. Let's look at some of the things that are positive about Disneyland:

• Completely walkable - everything you could ever want from food to a trash can to clothing to restrooms are all immediately available.
• Homogeneous late 19th century gingerbread architecture that invokes a time gone by that Americans seem to be nostalgic for.
• Wayfinding is easy - you are NEVER lost at Disneyland, and if you are, there are cleverly placed landmarks, directional signs, and helpful employees to guide you.
• It is inherently safe - the admission fee alone should deter most petty thieves, and the ubiquitous yet demur security are also prohibitive - not to mention the sheer number of people.
• It is clean and in good repair - part of the whole gig of Disneyland is to ensure that every day is like the first. This is important because most people do not go there everyday, and on the day you do go, you want everything to be perfect for you.
• The employees love their jobs and are well compensated for their time. There are no poor in Disneyland, no problems.
• There's a mix of uses everywhere - I understand that Mr. Disney even maintained an apartment near the entrance, there's a sport court in the top of the hollow Matterhorn.

So for $50 a person per day, you can enjoy the perfect environment carefully planned for your delight. Everything around you has been carefully designed and organized for your total enjoyment.

But at what cost? One of the largest parking structures in the world is located right outside its gates, with over 10,000 parking stalls (that cost, incidentally, $20,000 a space...) and serviced by its own freeway on and off ramp system. So much for walkability. And as far as everything else goes, well, it's all well and good to enjoy that for a day on vacation. But would you like to live there?

It reminds me of the Truman Show. Remember that movie? Truman lived in a completely fake environment while he was the unwitting star of a TV show. Interesting premise, right? Did you know that the Truman Show was filmed in a place called Seaside, Florida? That's right, another new urbanism locale (I am loath to call it a city for reasons which should be apparent). The directors were obviously looking for a place to film that would give them that "too good to be true" feel. And they found it. It works perfect, because it is perfect. It has been carefully designed to be perfect. It's like those pre-packaged peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with the crust already cut off. All right, who is so lazy that they can't even make their own peanut butter and jelly and then cut the crust off...

The point is, all of this seems too fake to be real. And it is. There are no poor, there are no problems, and there is no growth. People grow strong out of adversity and diversity, not being spoon fed baby food their whole lives. Or having people cut the crust off their bread for them. People may think that they want their lives to be completely planned and exactly spelled out. But there is something of fortitude which comes through finding a blemish and getting over it or (great day in the morning) do something about it...

So make your own peanut butter and jelly. And cut your own crust off. Or enjoy the chewy, flaky dryness of the crust.

Planning for the Poor (Why new urbanism doesn't work)

I approach this subject with the appropriate amount of apprehension. I know that there are strong feelings about this subject. I know that there are many poignant opinions shared by everyone in this topic. It is certainly not my intention to inflame prejudices or provoke people to anger. It is my intention, however, to inflame the light of understanding and to provoke people to action.

As I mentioned in the previous post, I am re-reading the epic classic Les Miserables. It is a wonderful story, one full of the observations of Mr. Hugo and one that leads thoughtful people to an analysis of the conditions of the world. In particular, the miserable ones referenced by the title are the poor. He spends a lot of time on mandatory free education and how free that would make people. I heartily agree. And I think that our world is seeing the results of this sort of education.

He mentions that the main economic problems that nations face have to do with the accumulation of wealth and then the distribution of that wealth. In particular, he says that communism is not the answer. There is no equality without equity. It is not parity in salaries that produces satisfaction: it is satisfaction that produces satisfaction. People who don't really know what they want or need are always going to be dissatisfied.

So what does this all have to do with planning? Current planning theory doesn't take into account the needs of the poor. In the first place, it doesn't understand what poor people need. There are several reasons for this, including not knowing why poor people are poor, what it takes to help them, and a failure to communicate with the very people that they are trying to help. Poor people often find themselves systematically disenfranchised by an establishment that ostensibly is democratic and open to all. But when office hours are from 8-5, M-F, in formidable neo-classical offices staffed by formidable, neo-classical people with the attendant formidable neo-classical attitudes, where everything seems to scream at people to GO AWAY!, there is little chance for the gap to be bridged.

The current housing crisis is a further exacerbation of the problem. Current planning theory is that new developments are built on models of economic (and therefore racial and ethnic - and why is that, anyway?) diversity. These theoriticians hold up examples like Seaside, Florida, or Daybreak, Utah, as examples of this kind of diversity. But the reality is unfortunately different than the ideal. These places ostensibly have a diversity in housing options that will cater to the needs of many people from all kinds of backgrounds. What ends up happening is that these places are wildly successful. With the success comes the attendant increase in property values and the beginning of the process known as gentrification.

Historical preservation may have the same kind of effect, as seen in many notable neighborhoods all over the country. Originally, these areas have been bastions of diversity in the wake of white flight. But now these areas are being restored to their original grandeur, and the process of gentrification begins anew. And again, the poor are displaced to the suburbs. With our automobile-centered transportation systems, it is not the rich who have returned to the downtown areas who will feel the gasoline price crunch - it is the poor who have been forced out to the dilapidated suburbs with the failing infrastructure and 2 hour commutes.

And what of the working poor (there are such people)? Those who work but still lack? With an unemployment rate of very near 100% (within the margins of statistical error), we are led to ask why there are people who are still poor? People who work should be able to provide for thier needs. I don't know much about these folks, and neither does anyone else. People struggle from paycheck to paycheck, get caught up in housing crises, and pray that their children don't get sick. These people don't have time or energy to get involved with politics. So they get ignored. Politicians are more worried about the elderly and the baby boomers than they are about younger people and their needs.

And what of the elderly? You baby boomers who will soon be joining the ranks of the elderly should wonder how the house of cards you have been building for the last 30 years is going to stay up on that rickety card table. Who will pay for the services you will need? Who will design the communities you will desire (and probably demand)? And how will the struggling younger generations, so long neglected and pampered behind your walls (which exclude dangers and the potential of failure, but also encourage a kind of apathy that is more damaging because it is nearly ubiquitous)?

The solution to all of these things is easy to see. I have been taught that all it takes for evil to prosper is for good people to do nothing. Is that just a trite phrase? I don't think so. The evidences are too great in the affirmation of the strength of a organized moral people. It's what our country was founded on and what has made us great for so long.

If you are older - look for ways to mentor younger people. You have so much to share, and the fires that you have are tempered with the years of experience. The future is (and has ever been) in your hands. Use your skills honed in the crucible of experience to shape and sharpen the people around you who so desperately need you.

If you are younger - stop being so apathetic. And pathetic. I know things are tough and politics is boring. But how do you think that they are ever going to change if you don't do SOMETHING? It doesn't even matter if it is the wrong thing, because people can learn from that. And others will see your efforts and catch the vision themselves.

Planning for the poor involves more than a simple drawing or document or statement of principles or beliefs. It involves a complete change of the way things are done and considered. The poor need to be embraced, not dictated to. They need respect, not condescention. They need appreciation, not patronizing attitudes. And they need a voice and an ear, not Pruit-Igoe. Complete social engineering, in whatever guise, never works. It fails because the people are not consulted. They are not consulted because they are not respected. And the poor are not respected because they are not understood, apprciated, or listened to - they are not even asked. This needs to be the basis of any plan for the poor. This is what gives people the all-important investment in the ultimate success of the plan - a voice in its creation.

I have a lot more to say on this, but I think that this will suffice for now.

Victor Hugo on Historic Preservation

I am re-reading the fabulous novel Les Miserables by Victor Hugo. If you have never read it, I highly recommend it. It has changed the way I think about things. But be sure you get the full version. You can actually download a free version from the Gutenberg Project. It's a pretty good translation.

At any rate, one of the passages I read caught my attention. This is what it says:

The author of this book, who regrets the necessity of mentioning himself, has been absent from Paris for many years. Paris has been transformed since he quitted it. A new city has arisen, which is, after a fashion,unknown to him. There is no need for him to say that he loves Paris: Paris is his mind's natal city. In consequence of demolitions and reconstructions, the Paris of his youth, that Paris which he bore away religiously in his memory, is now a Paris of days gone by. He must be permitted to speak of that Paris as though it still existed. It is possible that when the author conducts his readers to a spot and says, "In such a street there stands such and such a house," neither street nor house will any longer exist in that locality. Readers may verify the facts if they care to take the trouble. For his own part, he is unacquainted with the new Paris, and he writes with the old Paris before his eyes in an illusion which is precious to him. It is a delight to him to dream that there still lingers behind him something of that which he beheld when he was in his own country, and that all has not vanished. So long as you go and come in your native land, you imagine that those streets area matter of indifference to you; that those windows, those roofs, and those doors are nothing to you; that those walls are strangers to you; that those trees are merely the first encountered haphazard; that those houses, which you do not enter, are useless to you; that the pavements which you tread are merely stones. Later on, when you are no longer there, you perceive that the streets are dear to you; that you miss those roofs, those doors; and that those walls are necessary to you, those trees are well beloved by you; that you entered those houses which you never entered, every day, and that you have left a part of your heart, of your blood, of your soul, in those pavements. All those places which you no longer behold, which you may never behold again, perchance, and whose memory you have cherished, take on a melancholy charm, recur to your mind with the melancholy of an apparition, make the holy land visible to you, and are, so to speak, the very form of France, and you love them; and you call them up as they are, as they were, and you persist in this, and you will submit to no change: for you are attached to the figure of your fatherland as to the face of your mother.

Such beautiful words are rarely said now.

What he is speaking about, of course, is the massive urban reconstruction that Paris is constantly undergoing. Perhaps we may think that Paris needs some reconstruction... To be honest, we all feel nostalgic about our home lands, the cities of our youth, any place we have come to know well.

In the United States, we have difficulty appreciating things of historic value. Yet none of us functions in a vacuum. We are all products of every experience we have had, good and bad. We judge things against this experience, enabling us to determine what is good, what is bad, etc. and we make decisions based on these judgements. The desire to preserve some facet of our past history needs to grow within us so that we can learn from the past and use that knowledge to inform our future. Don't destroy so easily that which has become a part of the shared experience that acts as an anchor to our lives.

Democracy Rules!

I am a certifiable political junkie. It's true. I admit it. I love everything about it - from the silly grandstanding debates to the little "secret" balloting booths - and I pay close attention to the things that are going on. I am not naive enough to think that I can know what people are really thinking (despite what people say, I know that often reality is different), nor do I think that my single vote matters a lot when it comes to many aspects of the large scheme of things.

But that does not mean that I do not participate. I love to be a part of it all, even a small part. The fact that we have a peaceful "regime change" that takes place every two years, that people feel like they have a "mandate" to do whatever... What a miracle! What a blessing it is to live in such a wonderful country where we are free to do these things. You don't like Hilary Clinton? Fine. Tell me why. You don't like Ron Paul? What is it that you don't like about him? Regardless of the reasons, it is a wonderful thing that we are free to analyze our political leaders and agree or disagree with them based on intellectual and often esoteric reasons. Our leaders are chosen not for their military might but for their intellectual leadership. This is why America is great. It's not a popularity contest: it's a real analysis of the stances that our leaders will take upon assuming office. And all of this transition is easy and peaceful.

I don't pretend to know everything. All I know is that I love it! It's so fun.

And Iowa is just the beginning!