Two moderately-sized towns / small cities, two subjects, one blog post:
1. Downtowns. Eugene's downtown is a bad joke that never gets any funnier. For decades, the "once-thriving" (when? When it was a mud-streeted cow town? When men with beards declared that there's gold in them thar hills?) downtown of Eugene has been a commercial graveyard, full of an ugly gang of mall rats and lots of empty storefronts. Every year the city council tries to revive downtown with various zoning schemes, but it never works.
Santa Cruz's downtown is thriving. This is deeply confusing to me, used to decrepit downtowns as I am. Walking the ten blocks down Pacific from Laurel to Mission is overwhelming; hundreds of people milling around, street performers, theaters, restaurants, colorful shop windows, more-or-less-good-natured hobos. Christmas shopping for Becky this year will be easy. Semplice
2. Hippies. Eugene has an undeserved reputation as a hippy town. It used to be an authentic hippy town, probably as late as the early 90s. There are still hippy hot spots in town as well; we lived less than a block from Sundance Natural Foods, which was as hippy as Jerry Garcia eating pot brownies. Most of the town, however, is not hippy at all: the university and the surrounds are just frat houses and jocks and as soon as you get outside of the city center it's just rednecks as far as the eye can see (to the north: rednecks. To the west: rednecks. To the Springfield: rednecks.)
Santa Cruz is a lot of things, among them hippy. Real, authentic aging-60s-radicals hippy and real, authentic present-day-leftist-activists hippy. The surfer reputation and the university reputation precede the hippy reputation, but I feel like there's more of a true hippy core to this place than there is to Eugene.
On unrelated notes, I'd like to send a shout-out to R! for his tip about the best of Craigslist. That is some funny shit.
Also, it's been raining like nuts since yesterday. As we drove up to Kelly's last night to eat cookies and drink I thought we might get washed away. This morning it's been coming down steady. Our beloved homie Pat is visiting from Oregon and we sincerely hope he and his lady-friend Lowry make it over the 17 without being run over by a Californian confused by falling water.
12.10.2006
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4 comments:
Ouch...but very true that our downtown is a waste of space and our hippieness is more performative than actual. But I will say this for Eugene: it's not in California. So I think it's all a wash.
Ach! You win this time, Oregonian! But we will overwhelm you with our sprawling megalopoli soon enough!
Does Santa Cruz have a big commercial strip away from (but within an easy commute from) the downtown? I think that makes the difference in Eugene. The Eugene (and Springfield) mall, the other commercial strip (where the Trader Joe's is located) and the Southtowne center all serve to draw people and business away from downtown - thus, sustaining and furthering decay. The response recently has been to install a Whole Foods downtown (by razing some local businesses and attempting to kill the Kiva - it's not big and grand enough). Anyway, the downtown is part of the whole city, so that makes me wonder if Santa Cruz has attempted to limit the strip-mall and box-store phenomenon.
I think everything in California is more densely populated than Oregon, including their "small towns". Its just a fact.
When I was 13, my parents moved our family from LA County to Molalla, Oregon. At that time Molalla's population was around 3500. I thought I was going to die because I had never SEEN a town that small; they just dont make 'em like that in California. I remember my extreme surprise and relief the first time we went to the mall in Clackamas; with a name like "The Town Center" I was half expecting hitching posts and barrels of hay. The kids at the school I went to were even into stuff (music and clothes) my friends in California had been over for almost a year.
Compared to the majority of California, Oregon isn’t even settled yet. (which is why its way better)
:)
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