When I wrote my last post, lauding the wonders of large cities and thanking my lucky stars that I do not live in a small city I also, in passing, mentioned the suburbs. I knew that there was a strong likelihood that I would offend someone. Someone who reads this will live in a small city, or in a suburb and will take exception to the fact that I think these places are for those who wish to be safe and not experience the adventure that is the large city. Did it happen? Well yeah. It was anonymous.
Anonymous opened with this "Easy to criticize from your perch overlooking the lakefront." I might add that it is also easy to criticize someone's earnest writing while remaining anonymous. You can say what you want but never fear having that coming back to bite you in the butt. I, on the other hand, put myself out there. If you read Views From the 14th Floor, you know who I am. You know what I think about things. I pull no punches. I say what I think (to a fault sometimes, agreed). You even know where I live.
Anonymous went on to note that a great many would love to live where I do, but financial reality will not permit. The implied in this statement is that people live in small cities or in the suburbs because they cannot afford anything else short of "the slummy dangerous areas where their kids would be at risk in a number of ways." To this I must reply that I moved to Chicago in 1985 and I did not arrive in my "perch overlooking the lakefront" until 2005. I busted my butt and lived in a few less desirable spots, and none of them were what I would call "slummy" or "dangerous areas where" the kids might be at risk. There are a great many safe places within the city.
Anonymous also saw fit to note "you've worked hard and had some lucky breaks." This suggests that anonymous may just be someone I know who lives in the suburbs or in a small city and is just pissed off at me and doesn't want anyone to know that they are the one who said what they said. Que sera, sera. This made me start thinking about what lucky breaks I've had, though. Hmmm.
Admittedly, I have had some lucky breaks. I was born with the appropriate genetics to function well in an academic environment. I spent a lot of time in school as a result. Society has rewarded me for my academic diligence. More education=more money. Lucky break. If anonymous is a person who does not do well in school and could not parlay schooling into a rise in income, well I'm sorry. Anonymous has, no doubt, done quite well with his or her innate abilities.
In yet one more example of a lucky break, I had the good fortune to be born into a family who valued a strong work ethic. Things do not come to you just because you are a nice person. It generally takes a bit of hard work and effort. I took this lesson to heart. My family was poor. I paid for all of that above mentioned education myself. I hold a Master's degree plus 58 semester hours of education and I got all of that graduate education while working full-time. As mentioned above, society has rewarded me for that hard work with more money. If Anonymous was not raised in a family that inspired hard work to achieve goals, well once again, I'm sorry. Reality sucks. Got to work hard to get anywhere in life. Nobody just gives it to you.
Now there is one truly lucky break that I got in my journey to my "perch overlooking the lakefront." When I bought my first house, I bought it in an up and coming neighborhood where real estate values shot through the roof shortly after I bought. In a nine year span my property value nearly tripled. I sold that place and took the money and rolled it into my "perch overlooking the lakefront." Wouldn't have been able to afford it otherwise. Yes I now live in a famous landmark in a respected neighborhood of the wealthy, partially because I got lucky and a lot because I worked my butt off my entire life to get here. My previous experience in the big city, before arriving on the 14th floor, was not so godawful, however. Never been mugged. Was able to walk around the neighborhood at all hours of the day or night. This is admittedly nicer, though.
There are those who like to complain about "the system" and how it's rigged to help certain people. There are certainly a lot of things about this system that I would love to change. The Beatles got filthy rich and even they said, "We all want to change the world......We'd love to see the plan...." Thing is, short of starting a revolution and probably coming to a bad end, you have to recognize the system for what it is and learn its rules. You have to play it to the best of your ability with the abilities and inclinations you're given. When I was 9 years old my family lived in a house with heat in the bathroom and kitchen only, and with cardboard over the broken out windows in the bedrooms. When I was 19 years old I lived in cockroach infested apartments that were rented out to students while I lived off rice and beans.
Now I am 59 years old and the journey has taken me around the world. I didn't always embrace the rules, and often I fought against them with a vengeance. Eventually, I learned the rules and played the game as best as I could. With a lot of hard work and a little bit of luck I landed here in my "perch overlooking the lakefront." I have no apologies for that. Nor do I have any apologies for the fact that I do not choose a life in a small city or in the suburbs because they are viewed by Middle America as better places to raise a family. That's not me. Perhaps, Anomymous, it is you. Embrace who you are. Don't make excuses. Make the most of it, and don't get all up in arms by those such as I. I have an opinion, and as we all know "Opinions are like....., everybody's got one," protected by the first amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America.
Please remember, I am anonymous J.C., not that other Anonymous. Perhaps I should change my unknown name.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I certainly don't grudge you the success of your undertakings in life. I was raised to obey, no questions asked, and to work hard,and to fear my superiors. I was also,and still am much too honest to a fault, and filled with the spirit of poetry,or art, which so often causes conflicts with mundane goals and their consequent responsibilities. By the end of high school, at graduation, I refused to toss my cap into the air ( I saw no point in it ), and returned home to be lazy and learning, all at the same time, yet without any regard for " earning a living ". Like a wealthy heir of old, I read Scott, and Hawthorne, and history, and taught myself Latin to the point that, once I finally entered college, I went straight to the most advanced classes.Yet, during all that time, I had no real " Job ", and made no real income -- even though I certainly did work hard; just not in the system. At one point, I was very near to a scholarship to the university of Iowa, but some persons, working in the system,ruined that. Then I came to Minnesota, mainly in order to again try, and because one of the professors here was a renowned expert in the reconstructed Classical ( Ciceronian ) pronuntiation of Latin. Then, at taste of something which, during all those years, I had missed,and some other things,such as that damned airplane noise,and lack of money for further college, and back loans to an enormously exaggerated amount, caused my to officially give up. I did some substituting,( while teaching some high school students at Eden Pairie, and explaing the word decado,I literally fell, which really caught their interest.) and loved it, and, perhaps, I might return to it. Presently, kept alive by my unbelievabley small amount of monthly money, I " work hard ", and, if I charged for it, would probably receive more than I presently do. Yet, such is not in the system. The collectors for my exaggeratedly large student loans earn more than I do;and although talking on a phone in order to harrass someone about pieces of green and gray paper is not what I,or God, or the Gods, ever considered as work, yet, in the system, it is, and they earn much more than probably I ever will.
Nonetheless, I am CONTENT. M.B. has never really had the chance to travel, and I hope that, someday, she will make it over to Luxembourg, and other places. I would like to go down to Washington, Arkansas, and eat in the Williams Tavern, built in 1832 by my 3rd great grandpa, but I would rather like just be in peace and quiet, and leave the city cheese to the city mice, and bona fortuna to them all. That most of all, and so sincerely that I am crying over it, even now, peace, and love, for all persons. No war, no nations, no laws except civil ones which permit anyone to do or say anyhing unless it really does harm another person. Without love,though, that will never happen. In Virgil, you find both: " Omnia vincit labor,et nos cedamus labori" and " Omnia vincit amor, et nos cedamus amori ". J.C.