Economic Development, Russian Tanks
Jul. 16th, 2022 07:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mallorys_cameraDreamed I was going on a cruise. The ship was leaving from Tunisia. But the ship was nowhere near the sea; instead, it had to be dragged some miles to get to the water.
We passed through a savannah—This is what the Sahara Desert used to look like, we were told. We passed through the salt-strewn ruins of ancient Carthage. We passed through several other scenes of historical import.
It was kinda like a Disneyland ride.
We had a guide with us who was narrating the significance of the places we were passing through.
But all I could think was c’mon, c’mon, c’mon—I want to see that ocean.
###
Glorious day yesterday.
As drought and high-temperature statistics pile up from the rest of the world, I occasionally reflect upon how lucky I am to live in a place where it still rains, and if temperatures flirt with 90°, it’s because temperatures flirt with 90° every year.
In the morning, I did the tromp across the Walkway down into the forlorn little village of Highland and back.
Starting next week, they are closing the Walkway parking lot because finally they are rennovating the empty factory across the street from the parking lot:
I arrived in the quaint and scenic Hudson Valley in 2013 at the behest of AmeriCorps Vista.
I’d always said that when RTT started college, I would enlist in the Peace Corps. Seemed appropriate: Breeding interrupted my humanitarian trajectory, you might say; I’d been on the verge of going overseas to volunteer at a Thai refugee camp in 1983 when I met the man who became my first husband.
In 2013, though, being an American Abroad doing Good Works didn’t seem like a very prudent choice.
No worries!
It’s not like there’s any dearth of poverty and suffering rooted in systemic injustice in the good ole U.S. of A.
And AmeriCorps Vista specializes in systemic poverty and injustice rooted in the U.S. of A.
###
AmeriCorps Vista sent me to Poughkeepsie.
I thought this was weird: My only association with Poughkeepsie at that time was that Vassar College was located there. Vassar College! Jackie Kennedy, The Group, right? So, I thought Poughkeepsie had to be upscale.
I was wrong.
Poughkeepsie, then as now, was a little slice of the South Bronx circa late 1970s, magically transported through time and space to the quaint and scenic Hudson Valley.
###
I was assigned to head up a youth group that was operating under the auspices of a particularly slimy umbrella Christian organization.
As it happens, I have always been very good with teenagers, possibly because I never made a successful transition to adulthood.
The first thing I did was use up my minuscule operating budget on six battered and ancient Apple computers upon which I installed SimCity.
We were an after-school program. Teenagers like to play video games after school.
Why SimCity?
I was trying to nudge some sort of awareness that the reason why so many of them woke up in houses every morning where the only thing to eat was a half-empty bag of stale Dorritos wasn’t because That’s The Way Things Are but because of decisions made at a level they didn’t even know existed—decisions about land use, decisions about taxes, decisions about police deployment and supermarket locations and teachers’ salaries. That there were causes. That these causes had effects. That the effects couldn’t really be changed without going after the causes.
Maybe 10% of them got what I was hoping they would get.
But SimCity is a pretty compelling video game, so most of them liked to play it.
###
The second thing I did was to write a business plan for setting up a smoothie stall on the Walkway Over the Hudson.
In 2013, the Walkway attracted 450,000 visitors a year, but there was nothing in the way of tourist amenities. The entrance was surrounded by bombed-out-looking factories. There wasn’t a single food stall.
So, I thought, smoothies—ingredients cheap, easy to make.
I figured all the transport of stalls and fresh ingredients would have to be done with bicycles because even if some of the kids could drive, insuring them would cost too much. And I got a pal to design small stalls that could be pulled by bicycles.
And I started doing research on permits.
The kids were very excited!
I figured I’d give them “ownership” over stuff like uniforms and branding.
The smoothie menus, of course, would have to be determined by what fruits were in season. The pricing would have to leave us enough profit to bulk up the college funds I intended to set up for participating kids.
I costed the whole project out at around $12,000.
The slimy Christian umbrella organization wouldn’t give us the $12,000, but I figured, No problem! We’ll do a Kickstarter.
The kids were even more excited!
We started scripting the videos we would make for the Kickstarter.
Except then, the slimy Christian umbrella organization wouldn’t give us permission to do the Kickstarter.
And the whole thing fell apart.
###
Anyway. I am pleased and perhaps a trifle bemused to see the City of Poughkeepsie finally doing some Walkway economic development nine years after my AmeriCorps Vista experience.
###
In the afternoon, I drove up to Great Barrington to replenish my edibles supply.
Such a gorgeous day!
Such a benediction, the sun on this glorious green landscape!
I’ve been wanting to be stoned all the time recently. To offset that nagging sense that something is irremediably wrong.
I go back and forth about whether I should give in to that desire, but the past couple of weeks I’ve been thinking, Why the hell not?
Because any moment now, Russian tanks are gonna invade the Hudson Valley, and you’ll need to drive to escape them! just doesn’t seem like a very compelling reason not to be stoned all the time, you know?
We passed through a savannah—This is what the Sahara Desert used to look like, we were told. We passed through the salt-strewn ruins of ancient Carthage. We passed through several other scenes of historical import.
It was kinda like a Disneyland ride.
We had a guide with us who was narrating the significance of the places we were passing through.
But all I could think was c’mon, c’mon, c’mon—I want to see that ocean.
###
Glorious day yesterday.
As drought and high-temperature statistics pile up from the rest of the world, I occasionally reflect upon how lucky I am to live in a place where it still rains, and if temperatures flirt with 90°, it’s because temperatures flirt with 90° every year.
In the morning, I did the tromp across the Walkway down into the forlorn little village of Highland and back.
Starting next week, they are closing the Walkway parking lot because finally they are rennovating the empty factory across the street from the parking lot:
I arrived in the quaint and scenic Hudson Valley in 2013 at the behest of AmeriCorps Vista.
I’d always said that when RTT started college, I would enlist in the Peace Corps. Seemed appropriate: Breeding interrupted my humanitarian trajectory, you might say; I’d been on the verge of going overseas to volunteer at a Thai refugee camp in 1983 when I met the man who became my first husband.
In 2013, though, being an American Abroad doing Good Works didn’t seem like a very prudent choice.
No worries!
It’s not like there’s any dearth of poverty and suffering rooted in systemic injustice in the good ole U.S. of A.
And AmeriCorps Vista specializes in systemic poverty and injustice rooted in the U.S. of A.
###
AmeriCorps Vista sent me to Poughkeepsie.
I thought this was weird: My only association with Poughkeepsie at that time was that Vassar College was located there. Vassar College! Jackie Kennedy, The Group, right? So, I thought Poughkeepsie had to be upscale.
I was wrong.
Poughkeepsie, then as now, was a little slice of the South Bronx circa late 1970s, magically transported through time and space to the quaint and scenic Hudson Valley.
###
I was assigned to head up a youth group that was operating under the auspices of a particularly slimy umbrella Christian organization.
As it happens, I have always been very good with teenagers, possibly because I never made a successful transition to adulthood.
The first thing I did was use up my minuscule operating budget on six battered and ancient Apple computers upon which I installed SimCity.
We were an after-school program. Teenagers like to play video games after school.
Why SimCity?
I was trying to nudge some sort of awareness that the reason why so many of them woke up in houses every morning where the only thing to eat was a half-empty bag of stale Dorritos wasn’t because That’s The Way Things Are but because of decisions made at a level they didn’t even know existed—decisions about land use, decisions about taxes, decisions about police deployment and supermarket locations and teachers’ salaries. That there were causes. That these causes had effects. That the effects couldn’t really be changed without going after the causes.
Maybe 10% of them got what I was hoping they would get.
But SimCity is a pretty compelling video game, so most of them liked to play it.
###
The second thing I did was to write a business plan for setting up a smoothie stall on the Walkway Over the Hudson.
In 2013, the Walkway attracted 450,000 visitors a year, but there was nothing in the way of tourist amenities. The entrance was surrounded by bombed-out-looking factories. There wasn’t a single food stall.
So, I thought, smoothies—ingredients cheap, easy to make.
I figured all the transport of stalls and fresh ingredients would have to be done with bicycles because even if some of the kids could drive, insuring them would cost too much. And I got a pal to design small stalls that could be pulled by bicycles.
And I started doing research on permits.
The kids were very excited!
I figured I’d give them “ownership” over stuff like uniforms and branding.
The smoothie menus, of course, would have to be determined by what fruits were in season. The pricing would have to leave us enough profit to bulk up the college funds I intended to set up for participating kids.
I costed the whole project out at around $12,000.
The slimy Christian umbrella organization wouldn’t give us the $12,000, but I figured, No problem! We’ll do a Kickstarter.
The kids were even more excited!
We started scripting the videos we would make for the Kickstarter.
Except then, the slimy Christian umbrella organization wouldn’t give us permission to do the Kickstarter.
And the whole thing fell apart.
###
Anyway. I am pleased and perhaps a trifle bemused to see the City of Poughkeepsie finally doing some Walkway economic development nine years after my AmeriCorps Vista experience.
###
In the afternoon, I drove up to Great Barrington to replenish my edibles supply.
Such a gorgeous day!
Such a benediction, the sun on this glorious green landscape!
I’ve been wanting to be stoned all the time recently. To offset that nagging sense that something is irremediably wrong.
I go back and forth about whether I should give in to that desire, but the past couple of weeks I’ve been thinking, Why the hell not?
Because any moment now, Russian tanks are gonna invade the Hudson Valley, and you’ll need to drive to escape them! just doesn’t seem like a very compelling reason not to be stoned all the time, you know?
no subject
Date: 2022-07-16 05:55 pm (UTC)You could have even made smoothies using bike blenders!
no subject
Date: 2022-07-17 11:20 am (UTC)I hear you there, loud and mf-ing clearly!!
Really, what counts as that transition!? Gah.
no subject
Date: 2022-07-17 11:42 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-07-17 11:43 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-07-17 04:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-07-18 03:59 am (UTC)