Small City, Big City. Safety, Risk.

I was recently struck by an online article that touted "The Top 5 Places to Raise a Family." My curiosity was piqued. I looked. I was appalled at what I found. I was appalled at the assumptions that are routinely made. I was appalled at what mainstream America values and expects of a place to raise children. It appears that I have very different values and expectations than do most of America. I grew up in the suburbs. I left and didn't look back.

Let me just preface this with a look at the cities on the list. They all qualify as cities, albeit small cities. All have a population of 100,000-200,000 and metro areas from 500,000-1,000,000. Of for goodness sakes, this is where I grew up. I couldn't wait to leave. Safe? Check. Cheap? Check. Reasonably good schools? Check. And as Garrison Keillor says, "The women are strong. The men are good looking. All the children are above average."

The list? 1. Des Moines, Iowa 2. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania 3. Rochester, New York 4. Syracuse, New York 5. Provo, Utah. Let it suffice to say that I would no more consider moving to any of these places than I would consider moving back to Little Rock, Arkansas from whence I emerged in the 1970's. Of the top ten cities on this list, only Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania actually qualifies as a real city in my mind, and it's pretty small. At least it has professional sports teams (Major league, not minor league) and a little grit to its character.

The thing is that the criteria for being on the list are as following: 1. Cost of living. That pretty much leaves out New York, L.A., Chicago, San Francisco, Miami, or any of a hundred more interesting places than the basic vanilla small cities on the list. 2. Crime Rate. Guess what? My neighborhood in Chicago has a low crime rate too, and it has as many people as some of the cities on the list. Chances are there are bad neighborhoods in the listed cities as well, just not as large as the bad neighborhoods in big cities. You still want to steer clear of them, though. 3. Commuting distance. Well, duh. These are small cities and thus have short commutes. I live in the middle of the City of Chicago and I have a short commute. It's those people who opt for the suburbs who have to commute long distances. 4. Household Income. Cost of living in Chicago is high. So is household income, at least in those neighborhoods where the professionals live. I do better here than I would in any of those cities on the list. 5. Home ownership. Well, high percentages of the population owning homes just means that there are very few poor people. You can find that in certain suburbs and gated communities as well, even in large cities. So what's going to happen the first time one of these kids raised in an ideal community actually encounter a poor person, a person of color, a person who is very different from themselves? 6. Homeowner cost. Well yeah, homes cost more in interesting places. More people actually want to live there. Demand drives up the cost. Make more money, as I do in Chicago, and you can own one. Don't have to move to Des Moines to own a home. 7. Level of education. Well, once again, it just depends on where you live in a large city. Some neighborhoods, very few people have a high level of education. Some neighborhoods are full of professionals with degrees out the wazoo.

I guess the question is, "If you are actually looking for a great place to raise your kids, what do you want for your kids?" An awful lot of people in America shy away from the big cities. They think the schools are better. They think the neighborhoods are safer. They think the big cities are a great place to visit, but they wouldn't want to live there. They flee the big cities for smaller cities and towns or to the suburbs, seeking that ideal life. People such as myself flee to the big cities searching for diversity, culture, art, opportunity, and diversions that Des Moines and Provo can only dream of.

Honestly, I have no children, but if I did I believe I would be presenting this same argument. Children benefit from exposure to diverse stimuli. Despite all the negative publicity about failing schools, in the neighborhoods where I have lived these last 25 years, there are good schools where kids graduate and go on to good colleges. Children of the cities are exposed to every possibility and have opportunities not available elsewhere.

And yet children of the big cities do all the same stuff that kids do everywhere. Ride their bikes? Ever seen the lakefront bike path in Chicago? Play ball? There are parks everywhere. Indulge their imaginations? There is so much to imagine in a big city. It is to big cities that big imaginers go, from Ludwig Mies Van der Rohe and his glass and steel buildings, to Pablo Picasso and his 50 foot metal sculpture that he gave to the City of Chicago as a gift. Writers, artists, musicians, and business men seeking their fortunes. They take risks. They dare to dream. It is in the small cities, the "Safe Places to Raise Kids" that men go to be safe, to dare to be middle American, and forget dreams of greatness. I am sure that most are quite happy with this, accepting their lot, but it is this that I flee.