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Little Boxes on a Hillside
Mar. 6th, 2008 08:19 pmAfter moving around so much in the last 6 years (sometimes spending as little as a month in a given habitation, never more than 8 or 9), it was a relief, a few weeks ago, to sign the lease on a house that I can stay in for an entire year, from this June to next. My only reservation is about the house itself.
It has what one future housemate described as 'a beautiful suburban air'. I think you see the contradiction. 'Delicious rancid', 'healthy cancerous', 'compassionate conservative'--some adjectival pairs simply don't make sense. The house does have a suburban air, and I've agreed to live in it in spite of that, not because of it. I've spent my life raging against Suburbia.
Most of my venom, I think, is due to my background. I've spent most of my life in rural areas, but in the houses of my childhood this was in what I call the 'rural fringe' of a very, very suburbanised county. This meant that along with our woods and dirt roads and our modicum of privacy, we and our neighbours enjoyed all of the purported benefits of the ever-expanding, ever-encroaching suburban developments that surrounded us. In a place with no public transportation, where everyone is, by necessity created by the utter lack of urban planning, dependent on their cars, a few more miles to drive is nothing.
But then, I've also lived in some truly rural places. Scattergood, for instance, is surrounded by farms for miles on all sides. Still, it's only a couple miles' walk to the nearest town--the same distance, incidentally, from my house in NC to the nearest businesses: a supermarket / gas station that gradually grew into a strip mall--but West Branch is a proper little town, with all of those 'town' things in it. Library, grocery, cafes--y'know. It was also only maybe 20 miles from Iowa City, with all its urban joys and wonders. Celo's probably one step farther out than that. It's not farms, though there are some around, it's just... not city, or town, or anything. From Russell's house, for instance, we'd walk a good 5 or 10 minutes down the hill to the nearest road with any traffic, to hitchhike down to the gas station, just for cigarettes and Something to Do.
So, y'know, I think I understand the desire to live near enough to cities to access them. I really do--nature's great and all, but it's nice to go out on the town. Furthermore, what little time I've spent staying or living in city centres has made me appreciate the quietness of the outer residential areas. I'm not so opposed, anymore, to the white picket fences and well-manicured lawns, nor even--God help me--the ticky-tacky identical houses. These are just symptoms, and they sometimes occur in entirely acceptable circumstances, such as the controlled and reasonable expansion of residential areas (in such layouts that allow for ease of movement and functional public transport). What's really Wrong are the housing developments that plough down huge swaths of land and paste up their cookie-cutter houses, letting the mud of construction run off and choke the streams and replacing it with patches of pre-cut turf imported from somewhere that has topsoil. What's really Wrong are street plans that disallow walking (except of course the leisurely stroll with the dog in your crime-free, streetlighted American Dream), and make busses impractical to the point of impossibility. Cul-de-sacs are a crime against humanity.
Thankfully, I won't be living in one of those places. My next-year house is on the edge of St Andrews' residential area, yes, but it's still part of a continuous swath of houses fanning out from the city centre, and the streets actually (*gasp*) connect to other streets. It's only about 15/20 minute's walk from the town centre. By the warped standards of this very compact little town, that seems like a long way, but actually it's about the same distance as my uncle's house was from Asheville's centre, and that was considered very close indeed. That is to say, it's still in walking distance, and besides, I have a bike. Its 'suburban air' is going to be bearable, I think, if I can manage to detach the concept from the Cary-cancer-suburbia I've spent my whole life loathing.
It has what one future housemate described as 'a beautiful suburban air'. I think you see the contradiction. 'Delicious rancid', 'healthy cancerous', 'compassionate conservative'--some adjectival pairs simply don't make sense. The house does have a suburban air, and I've agreed to live in it in spite of that, not because of it. I've spent my life raging against Suburbia.
Most of my venom, I think, is due to my background. I've spent most of my life in rural areas, but in the houses of my childhood this was in what I call the 'rural fringe' of a very, very suburbanised county. This meant that along with our woods and dirt roads and our modicum of privacy, we and our neighbours enjoyed all of the purported benefits of the ever-expanding, ever-encroaching suburban developments that surrounded us. In a place with no public transportation, where everyone is, by necessity created by the utter lack of urban planning, dependent on their cars, a few more miles to drive is nothing.
But then, I've also lived in some truly rural places. Scattergood, for instance, is surrounded by farms for miles on all sides. Still, it's only a couple miles' walk to the nearest town--the same distance, incidentally, from my house in NC to the nearest businesses: a supermarket / gas station that gradually grew into a strip mall--but West Branch is a proper little town, with all of those 'town' things in it. Library, grocery, cafes--y'know. It was also only maybe 20 miles from Iowa City, with all its urban joys and wonders. Celo's probably one step farther out than that. It's not farms, though there are some around, it's just... not city, or town, or anything. From Russell's house, for instance, we'd walk a good 5 or 10 minutes down the hill to the nearest road with any traffic, to hitchhike down to the gas station, just for cigarettes and Something to Do.
So, y'know, I think I understand the desire to live near enough to cities to access them. I really do--nature's great and all, but it's nice to go out on the town. Furthermore, what little time I've spent staying or living in city centres has made me appreciate the quietness of the outer residential areas. I'm not so opposed, anymore, to the white picket fences and well-manicured lawns, nor even--God help me--the ticky-tacky identical houses. These are just symptoms, and they sometimes occur in entirely acceptable circumstances, such as the controlled and reasonable expansion of residential areas (in such layouts that allow for ease of movement and functional public transport). What's really Wrong are the housing developments that plough down huge swaths of land and paste up their cookie-cutter houses, letting the mud of construction run off and choke the streams and replacing it with patches of pre-cut turf imported from somewhere that has topsoil. What's really Wrong are street plans that disallow walking (except of course the leisurely stroll with the dog in your crime-free, streetlighted American Dream), and make busses impractical to the point of impossibility. Cul-de-sacs are a crime against humanity.
Thankfully, I won't be living in one of those places. My next-year house is on the edge of St Andrews' residential area, yes, but it's still part of a continuous swath of houses fanning out from the city centre, and the streets actually (*gasp*) connect to other streets. It's only about 15/20 minute's walk from the town centre. By the warped standards of this very compact little town, that seems like a long way, but actually it's about the same distance as my uncle's house was from Asheville's centre, and that was considered very close indeed. That is to say, it's still in walking distance, and besides, I have a bike. Its 'suburban air' is going to be bearable, I think, if I can manage to detach the concept from the Cary-cancer-suburbia I've spent my whole life loathing.
