Oddisee has been a bit of a thing in DC since he showed up a couple of years ago, but since summer’s coming around, I’d like to bring up his mixtape from last year,Rock Creek Park. When I graduated from high school, I don’t think that I could have imagined a hip-hop album about anything within a half-mile of my parents house that wasn’t a tryin’ it homage to Maret’s lunch menu, but hey, things change. And it’s really great, as both music and also for what it represents.
The instrumental album, I suppose, feels like the park. At the least, it feels like a great soundtrack to rolling around the park when your mind’s at ease. The opener, “Still Doin’ It,” establishes the theme with collaborator y.U.’s lyrics about biking and driving around DC. That kind of multimodal use of the city warms the cockles of this urbanist’s heart. The symphonic “Carter Barron” plays off the go-go rhythms of “Clara Barton.” Oddisee throws pretty much any sound you can find in DC together and makes it work. And doesn’t “Closed After Dark“ let you know that the Blackbyrds still know what goes on there?
Anyhow, check it out. It’s local. And still fresh.
It’s vacation time around here, and that gets us thinking about the olden days. So let’s take a trip back to the time when the leading proponent of deconstruction in architecture and the Dreihaus Prize-winning designer of Celebration, Florida once worked together. Happy holidays!
This is just a small aside from the post about urban planning in Moscow. In the February 2011 Echo of Moscow interview with Sergei Sobyanin comes about halfway through it, when they take a break and offer Sobyanin a book as a token of appreciation.
In response, Sobyanin makes fun of an unspecified Washington mayor. I’d bet money they’re not talking about Adrian Fenty’s cycle club escort.
А.ВЕНЕДИКТОВ: Мэр Москвы Сергей Собянин. Прежде чем мы прервемся на 2 минуты и передадим слово нашим корреспондентам, мы хотим вам сделать подарок, Сергей Семенович. Это книга бывшего мэра Нью-Йорка Рудольфа Джулиани «Лидер», который принял Нью-Йорк городом мафиозным и тяжелым, ну а, как говорят те, кто там живут, когда он ушел, этот город стал пригоден для жилья всем. Так что, я думаю, вдруг она вам понравится.
С.СОБЯНИН: Спасибо, что не от мэра Вашингтона.
А.ВЕНЕДИКТОВ: Да-да. (смеется) От мэра Вашингтона ни в коем случае. 2 минуты перерыва, потом наши корреспонденты.
I’ve included the Russian from the transcript, lest anyone doubt this happened. It’s hard to capture the sarcasm, but the translation is clear:
VENEDIKTOV: We’re with the Mayor of Moscow, Sergei Sobyanin. Before we take a two minute break and let our correspondents have a word, we would like to give you a gift, Mr. Sobyanin. It’s the book, Leadership, by former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani, who turned New York City from a frightful mafia-infested wreck to the kind of a city, the residents who lived there when he left said, that was safe for all. So, I think you’ll take a liking to him.
SOBYANIN: Well, thanks for it not being from the Mayor of Washington.
VENEDIKTOV: Heavens, no. (Laughs) No way we’d give you something from the mayor of Washington. Two minute break, then our correspondents’ questions.
Leadership was translated in 2004. I’m not sure why they’re handing it out now, but there it is, next to DC’s shame, circa 1990.
While writing about AU expansion, I’ve been getting a sense that one reason I’ve been having a hard time writing arguments that will resonate is that the opposing perspective is approaching the topic with a totally different paradigm of what it is.
My (undeveloped) conjecture is: the older generation sees environmental problems from an intuitive (fishkills & pesticide) perspective, whereas the later generations see the issue in terms of abstractions (%CO2 over 10,000 years). I think I can say that ecology is based on systems thinking. “Ecosystem,” after all, precisely refers to an interrelated organization. That complex activity can only be understood through abstractions that make consequences more intuitively threatening.
But the older generation seems to approach an environmental issue as perceptible, in that anyone can readily see the links and the loops and understand their consequences. You cut down a tree, and this directly harms the environment and limits one’s access to it. A particular, standing in for the general, is irrevocably lost. Building where there once was a grassy patch is paving over paradise, and a building that brings any cars to the neighborhood is causing pollution.
The primary enemies of the 1960s were intensely graphic horrors such as the burning Cuyahoga, broken bird eggs, and the disfiguration wrought by thalidomide. The problems were so obvious, you could see them with your eyes, and that his how we noticed in the first place. For the generation brought up during an era of global warming, the agents are more nefarious. How does one picture a rise of water over decades? How do you draw the cancer cluster caused by dioxins in an aquifer? You have to rely on the numbers.
Thus, cutting one tree here can save ten elsewhere, the understory is better than a lawn, and a building that brings traffic to one area might reduce car trips on a regional scale is a ethical imperative.
I don’t want to nail the intuitive position as inferior. The aesthetics of an environment contribute to its quality, particularly trees and greenery. They’re an essential part of good urban design, and remembering that humans have an inborn relationship to nature, they almost certainly contribute to the well-being of residents.
However, it is much easier to accommodate the perceivable sense of nature within an abstracted framework than vice versa. I.e., you can plant trees in a city where you don’t have to drive, but it’s hard to fix the numbers on pollution when you have to drive everywhere to and from your 2.3 acres.
As I dust off my presence in cyberspace, in the meatspace, I am now safely arrived in New Haven. New Mexico was delightfully challenging and thought-provoking. New posts forthcoming.
It’s with not a little sadness that I have to announce my departure from the DC area.
I grew up here, and after college and some misadventures, came back to discover a city I hardly knew, one that was interesting, diverse, and beautiful. Over the past two years, I’ve worked with passionate activists and written with some pretty brilliant people. Then there are the friends and coworkers with whom I’ve enjoyed Washington so much. It’s hard to leave.
But my return to DC was always temporary. My career requires still more education. So, in September, I will start classes at the Yale School of Architecture. It’s an unequaled opportunity that I just have to throw myself into. I’m going to go work a lot, sleep occasionally, and hopefully learn a little.
As a result, this blog will become a lower-level priority in my life. I probably will post less frequently. The content will focus more on design, as studios consume my mind.
That does not mean I will stop talking about DC. I will not let the Tenleytown NIMBYs off the hook. Greater Greater Washington will likely continue to tolerate my ramblings. To make it easier, I intend to start a series in the fall that will let me contribute with less pressure. In the same vein, I will continue to work on and post about my project for Fort Reno, even if it takes all of grad school to finish.
Right – but all of the academia that Yale entails put me in the mood to do something radically different with my remaining time. So, at the end of May, I will be moving to New Mexico to work at the Philmont Scout Ranch. Philmont is a high adventure camp on a working ranch between the Great Plains and the Rocky Mountains. At 137,000 acres, it’s slightly larger than 3 Districts of Columbia. The ranch is also 6,090-12,441 feet closer to the sky and its pastures contain around 100 more bison than Washington’s.
The landscape is powerful. The experiences people have are profound. I think this promo reel captures enough of the natural majesty – as well as the old-fashioned clothes I will be wearing:
Philmont holds a cultic power over people who have been there, especially those who have worked out in the backcountry. The most prominent Philmont obsessive is Donald Rumsfeld, who worked there in 1949 and now owns a vacation house in nearby Taos. And there are plenty of others, the ranks of which I joined after a trek in 2002 and a position in 2005.
So, I’ll be away from my computer for a while, restoring historical cabins. One last breath before I move on to adulthood. I’ll see you all later.
Just a reminder that GGW and Ward 3 Vision are hosting a happy hour at Guapo’s in Tenleytown tonight from 6:30 to 9. Come by, check out the many positive changes around the neighborhood, and have a drink or two. There will be surprise guests.
How to get to Guapo’s:
The easiest way to get to Guapo’s is to exit through the south entrance of the station and take a right until you’re back on Wisconsin. Walk north toward the Domino’s and the blue-striped building. Guapo’s has a large patio with a big neon sign. Go in and come upstairs!
I just came back from a trip to New York, got some great reading done, and had an infrastructural safari in Manhattanville. I’ll talk about these in good time, but for now I want to continue my tradition of talking about things that happened months ago.
Back in late February, I went to see Joanna Newsom at the 6th&I Historic Synagogue, and you know, the word “awesome” is really overused these days. It was awesome. You can also read NOMOFOMO’s coverage of the event, which was actually written around the time of the concert.
In the time since then NPR covered and recorded the entire show. If you have a little over and hour, you can listen (fixed so the link works now), and for the good of your soul, you should take the time.
Now, many people find her voice to be skreetchy, generally because most people gave up after her first album, and I can’t necessarily blame them. But her voice has mellowed without losing any of the color or expressiveness that she always had. It may have gotten better, in fact. As an example, check out the album version of Inflammatory Writ, a song I used to find unlistenable:
Greater Greater Washington will be hosting a happy hour in Tenleytown, co-sponsored by Ward 3 Vision later this month.
We will be Guapo’s at 4515 Wisconsin Ave, Tuesday, April 27th after 6:30 pm. If you live in Tenleytown, I hope you can come by on the way from work, or take a moment to go home beforehand. The event is in the upstairs room, and we have margarita and beer specials.
If you don’t live in the area, you should come as well. Not only will you meet many of the GGW contributors, you can meet other residents who have been working hard to make Upper Northwest a more livable place for all ages. I know that it’s far from downtown, but the restaurant is just steps away from the Tenleytown-AU metro station.
Tenleytown has undergone a number of positive changes over the last year, so if you can come out early, you might actually take a look around the neighborhood.
If you like, there’s a Facebook event page, and, as always, feel free to invite your friends.
