Just a little reminiscing - Seeing the neighborhoods die in front my eyes makes me very sad.

[1776Forever]

One of the worst things that is happening in this recession is the death of my hometown city. I moved back to a middle size college community after retiring and it is still holding on but after most of us older folks are gone it will never be the same if things continue the way they are. There are dozens of empty homes now with more everyday, and most of our neighbors are our age so after we are gone I really wonder what this town will look like. The younger folks are moving to apartment complexes or the burbs in larger cities and the old neighborhoods are shrinking quickly. This means that the local school districts are dwindling and those children that are left are not going to have the support our children had.

Less taxes means less care of the streets, less security, less parks and recreations along with less education support for our next generation. Our lifestyles are changing for the worse and for that I am very disappointed because I would have never thought that in my lifetime the quality of life would worsen in the United States of America! It is a true disgrace and one that relates to Michael Moore's fact check that 99.9% of our wealth in this country is held by 1% of our citizens. I once told a group I belonged to made up mostly of Republicans who didn't think we should help each other that it is going to come to people living in gated communities that have to drive through slums to get to another gated community if the good of all of us was not met. I am afraid we are close to that and I am very sad.

[no_hypocrisy]

1. I feel the same way when I go into cities like Paterson or Newark in New Jersey.

I look at once majestic homes and commercial buildings and realize they've deteriorated because the money's left the cities. The investments are gone and not returning any time soon.

[1776Forever]

3. Exactly - If I live for another 20 yrs it will be interesting to see what happens.

This town is 200 years old and has lived through 2 World Wars and many recessions but this one is different so far. I hope something will happen that will breath new life into it!

[Romulox]

2. Greetings from Metro Detroit!

:shrug:

[1776Forever]

4. Hello - I have seen the pictures of your area. I feel your pain & can't fathom your sorry.

What can you say? I wish someone would take on your area like they have New Orleans. I see them both as disasters. Blessings.

:shrug:

[HillbillyBob]

5. The small city nearest where I grew up has been dying since

runnyraygun. When I graduated in 80 there was no money for college as my dad was a factory worker who was just hanging in.
There were several factories that have since closed and the jobs started moving South then they move out of the country. There were few jobs for my generation. We have scattered. I joined the navy and trained as an air traffic controller.
Thanks to rayguns extreme homophobia there was a bit of a witch hunt. My name was added to a list that a fellow ship mate made up after he was arrested for murdering his bf. Long and short I was dumped and could not get a civilian FAA job even though I went voluntarily and did not fight it and got an admin under honorable.

Since that time it has been a struggle to even make a decent living even when I got some training and became and electrician. Each time I had been at a place long enough or rather almost I would get laid off, or fired on suspicions of being gay. I m not effeminate, it was just that they always wanted to know why I did not have wife or girl friend etc.

I had spent my working life working for plantation owner wanna bes.
They seem to think you can cheat everyone all the time. I had this happen repeated ly one employer was even a senator. I took that to court and got 2600 in back pay, we were required to work over time, but not paid for it under the raygun regime and working for 25c an hr over minimum wage on a dangerous job site.

My folks could not understand why I could not make a decent living, I did try to tell them everything I have said here.

RunnyRayguns trickle theory was bs then and it is now, just the drizzlin shits.
I am disabled now and things are even worse for us financially, but we have sort of done ok, finally buying an abandoned, but ok house in the woods of rural NC. It was cheap and we have started to put in organic garden and orchard, it is an extreme struggle. We have managed to keep the lights on and the payments made. We moved in here a bit over 2 years ago and the prior owners had divorced, rented it out and those folks were removed by the police for growing dope. The owners walked away and it was vacant for almost 3 years. No one wanted it. This used to be the wealthiest county in NC, it is now among the poorest. Dan River mills was nearby, there were tobacco farms(this was part of one)and warehouses, the train depot in Danville was also a repair yard.
We were living in Greensboro when the textiles plus levis and wrangler plants moved to Mexico, Russia and where ever.
Those were generational jobs, just like the ones back in my home town.
The neighborhood were we rented there was where a lot of those textile workers lived..now there is about 40% empty houses, the crime rate shot up. we were afraid so we left. There is not a lot I can do being disabled. After we had a strong arm robbery at the front door, drive by shootings. I don't blame those folks so much, desperate people do desperate things. And the repigs keep blathering on that poor people are criminals, well if you steal from them they eventually are going to get fed up and desperate.

[Divine Discontent]

9. my best to you! what a story, and you keep hangin' in there!

yep, ronnyraygun caused much of this, and it's went down hill since. The element of rich corporate family hatred for the poor & working class is so immense that it'd send shivers down everyone's spine if we could hear them talk. I hope that what you have (an actual 'home') brings you comfort, and that things will work out for you there. At least we don't have ronny destroying the country's unions, his homophobia influencing policy, and his runaway spending on missile defense systems & illegal wars to worry about anymore! Thank God he's gone!

[juno jones]

13. One of my first kitchen jobs was washing dishes in an upscale place

owned by a man from Carmel who'd married some money and would entertain Clint Eastwood's coterie in hopes of moving up the political food chain. We were never graced with the divine Clint, but we did get a few of his number 2's and what great fat stinking gobs of reganesque humanity they were.

Late at night, after the patrons were gone and it was just the hired help cleaning up (me) they would light their cigars and launch into such tirades about the poor, all the welfare queen, ketchup as a vegetable stuff-a complete sterotype of that time, only somewhat before it became national consciousness. To his credit, my boss looked uncomfortable, but he never confronted them either. I wasn't even considered to be in the room, of course they had no idea I was in college and taking US history at the time and listening to everything they said.

They fucking hate us, when we aren't serving them, picking up after them or making their food. If we aren't serving them, then what good are we?

[Divine Discontent]

21. amen! and that's why they hate the Kennedy's, Kerry, etc...

these people have class - true class under fire! They're not SUPPOSED to be this way with us poor people, how dare they go against their country club millionaire buddies and back, my GOD, programs that HELP these people with OUR tax money! :sarcasm:

You are so right, I have heard some of them myself at affairs where there are wealthy people about, many of them hate everyone. What a shameful and sad way to live.

Best to you! :hug:

[juno jones]

22. And to you too!

:hug:

[juno jones]

6. My 'hometown' is a ghost of what it was thirty years ago.

I'm sure there is no no art museum, no carousel in the park, no sunday nights at the bandshell, none of those little flourishes of civilization that I took for granted as a child.

Gone with Ronnie Raygun, rot his soul. Last contact I had with anyone there, my 'friends' were all doing the same thing they were doing when I left, working in gas stations, bars, and fast food and getting drunk every night. A state of suspended adolescence reinforced by a lack of adult jobs and roles availible in the community. The 'new' neighborhood I once lived in as a kid is full of empty houses and is as deteriorated as the older houses on the other side of town that the wealthy and middle-class used to shun.

[Divine Discontent]

10. and I bet nearly all small towns new developments from the 70-80's are poor looking like the 'bad'

side of town. The wealth has just dried up - the children of most families that grew up decades ago are not making enough to even pay for housing, let alone the util, gas, food, clothing, household, taxes/fees/tolls and insurance premiums!

[1776Forever]

16. So true - What will the future hold for us if we don't go green & get our factories going again?

:shrug:
:kick:

[1776Forever]

14. You know I must say you have a real flair for writing - Are you a writer?

If not have you thought about it? I really think you bring experiences to reality in a unique way. Thanks for posting this as I think it says a lot about our "culture" now. Let them eat and work at Mikey D's! The better to serve "us" - ugh!

[juno jones]

18. Thank you.

:hi:

No, I don't write, I might someday-although after so many years in kitchens it will probably be a cookbook when I do! :)

I have had a lifelong love affair with the English language, instilled into me by parents who played word games, made puns and read to me as a child.

My son's planned college major is journalism/ writing for media. His heroes are Norman Mailer and Gore Vidal.

[1776Forever]

19. Ah ha - Must be in his gene's - Good luck to him!

It is never too late to write you know. I have been reading some Agatha Christie mysteries and just finished her Hallowe'en Party. She wrote I understand until a very late stage of her life.

[Javaman]

7. Ghost Town - The Specials.

This town, is coming like a ghost town
All the clubs have been closed down
This place, is coming like a ghost town
Bands won't play no more
too much fighting on the dance floor

Do you remember the good old days
Before the ghost town?
We danced and sang,
And the music played inna de boomtown

This town, is coming like a ghost town
Why must the youth fight against themselves?
Government leaving the youth on the shelf
This place, is coming like a ghost town
No job to be found in this country
Can't go on no more
The people getting angry

This town, is coming like a ghost town
This town, is coming like a ghost town
This town, is coming like a ghost town
This town, is coming like a ghost town

[Divine Discontent]

8. K&R #5 - off to the greatest with thee!

it'll be just like they've been planning all along, and by they, I mean, the extremely wealthy.

[donco6]

11. If someone wants a little hope - here's my hometown.

http://www.wamego.org/

This should be a dying little farm town in Kansas. When I lived there, there were maybe 2500 if you counted cats and dogs. But one family moved in and just created a whole industry out of the Wizard of Oz. Now the main street is all Oz this and Oz that - Oztoberfest is coming up. They have a huge tulip festival. It's actually fun to go home.

Now the town I work in . . . another story. In the 15 years I've been here, I've watched the homes just slowly decay - roofs need repair, lawns gone to weeds, graffitti everywhere, abandoned crack houses with the doors still broken down from when they raided the place. It's very depressing.

Why can one little place with absolutely nothing going for it manage to survive and even thrive, while another just outside a metro area just fall down the toilet?

[1776Forever]

17. Thanks for sharing. I think it has a lot to do with planning for the future.

The pictures are great! Thanks for sharing!

[donco6]

20. You're welcome!

If you're ever driving down I-70 through Kansas, take a side trip about 8 miles to Wamego. It's a real little slice of Americana.

[onethatcares]

12. when the banks own all the land,

and everyone lives in tall buildings, never getting to know thier neighbors, our children will curse our names.

[1776Forever]

15. Deep - I know what you are saying! So true and so sad!

:eyes: