THE CITY YOU LOVE is already dead. The symbolic light of Portland is a signal from a star that burnt out long before you saw it. This can happen. This is what happens. This is the only thing that happens. Produce Row closes, and then Slabtown closes, and they’ve got their sights set on Chopsticks II. And soon every wall that soaked up your raucous laughter and breakup lunches will be painted over. The table that held all 15 shots you powered through on your 21st birthday will be torn from its anchoring and tossed unceremoniously into a dumpster. A condo will stand astride the footprint of the restaurant where you proposed. A bully—full of people from fucking Tucson or Boston or wherever—who’s not so much uncaring as just not thinking about that ground’s indisputable meaning.
They are tearing down an actual wonderland and replacing it with Disneyland. But these are the symptoms, not the disease. Portland is a victim of its own wonderfulness, and now we face the challenge of maintaining the feeling that brought us here in the first place, that kept us here or keeps us coming back. We have to actively not be San Francisco, a city that had its cultural pockets rolled by its own financial success. They say the condos will keep the rent down, bringing it from, “It’s hilarious that you think I can afford that,” to, “Look, it’s still pretty funny that you think I can afford that.”
Maybe that’s true, but it’s also a lot harder to cram six roommates into a condo. It’s a lot harder to hang up several sheets and turn a condo living room into a bedroom. They check your credit when you try to get a condo. A condo party feels so inherently and fundamentally different from a house party. But, you know, here we are, and we can’t not be here. “This fucking sucks,” isn’t a solution, or even a useful thought.
The city you love isn’t really what you love. The light of Portland isn’t cast by the neon glow of a sign that’s been flickering since your grandfather was getting carded. Sorry for what I’m about to say, because I know exactly how it sounds even as I’m writing it: You are the light of Portland. You are the common thread in every memory this city has given you. You drank those shots, and stumbled into those walls, inebriated by alcohol or feeling. Places have meaning, and it’s a churning sort of awful that these places are being torn apart, brick by brick, by the invisible hand.
But know this: You can have a meaningful moment at the Old Spaghetti Factory if the conditions are right. Now also know this: You won’t need to. This city isn’t weird, the people are, and even though you’re being pushed away from the Willamette River by America’s bulging fetishization of the Rose City, you aren’t being pushed out of Portland. You are Portland.
Old and new. It’s going to be fun to smoke a j and kick sack at the old A-Range. BTW, four full winters is the commonly accepted defining line between”living in Portland” and being a “Portlander”. If you wear fleece pants in public you can shave some years off. It’s the only exception.
I’m Portland? I wanted to be Batman.
Spot on.
Can you rent a condo? I thought those were for purchasing…otherwise, wouldn’t they be called apartments? *shifty eyes* Regardless, lots of BOOOOOing in the general direction of greedy developers, gentrification and whitewashing over charm&character that many of these places have/had.
You are the Light until the rent goes up and you have to move out of town. Then the light goes out. Die Yuppie Scum!
We couldn’t afford to buy in Portland. Gladstone is still real as fuck.
Gladstone is also more diverse then the Portland neighborhood we left.
To reiterate, Gladstone is Real As Fuck! New column? Whole new indie rag.?
I’m totally with you through the first three paragraphs. Right up until the feelgood, sellout, quitter’s collapse of a third act.
It isn’t really a sellout, it’s how I feel, but I totally get why you’d be pessimistic.
As someone who just celebrated my 21st birthday 2 months ago and has lived in Portland all 21 of those years, this piece made me feel a lot of feelings. Keep on writing man.
Is this a repeat column?
I’ve lived in and loved Portland my whole life (except during the times when I hated everything). Recent developments (literally) have changed that. Portland now pisses me off more than it charms me. So I’m house hunting in Washington. I am not Portland anymore. The Portland you mentioned, the people, are leaving.
There’s plenty of room to still be weird, real, and whatever the fuck you’re talking about with that light bullshit (*psst* I love you Ian, and I love your light). You just have to be willing to get over your fear of everything east of 82nd Avenue, and call bullshit on the perpetual bullshit that Portland City Hall doles out everytime they talk about improving outer southeast, while turning around and building a street-car-bioswale-tram on se 20th, and dropping $1,000,000 on a nature themed park in Westmoreland (actually just happened). Lots of room out here for neon-soaked drunken escapades.
Guess how many Portland Mayors have said during their election campaigns they’d fix the dirt roads in outer southeast for the last three decades? All of them.
if Portland is so worried about equity, progressive ideals, and supporting those in need, guess what? It’s really easy. All you have to do it’s give a shit about the other half of Portland.
Why isn’t there a higher tax on new multi family development to at minimum slow it down. Our city is run by small thinking ADULTS.
as some1 who has lived the example you use, this saddens me. I appreciate the attempt, and maybe it’s my fear of change talking, but the Portland I knew is just dying.
It’s not so much the new development that’s killed Portland – that’s to be expected – it’s the City government. They spend hundreds of millions of dollars to actively make the infrastructure of the city worse than it was before they began tinkering. Who’s the stupid asshole that approved the removal of a lane of traffic from N. Williams? How is that suppose to improve anything?
Shut your L.A. trap, Ian Hollywood Karmel. This is my town now! I rather enjoy my nice lofty condo, Thank You!
10 years ago I was renting a decent 1 bedroom apt on 20th & Hawthorne for $600 a month. I saw the writing on the wall 3 years ago, leave Portland all together or head further East. I chose to stay east of the 205 and guess what. I still do all of the things I used to do except now I have 2500 sq feet with my own basement studio in a very well built, non cookie cutter mid century ranch that I own for $1200 a month. The people living out there ARE THE REAL PORTLAND LOCALS and they are not scary. I still have all my friends, resources, and access to inner SE or any other PDX local fare anytime i want. When the streets of inner PDX turn into a dysfunctional shit show at around 3pm, I B-line back to my mid-century palace and do my Portlandy shit on my own terms. All my neighbors are great too, they look out for me and always wave. 10 years in inner SE, I had maybe 3 cool neighbors and a ton of assholes, whistle blowers, and creeps. Your address does not define you.
Grew up in NE Portland. 30 years my home. All the BS crap they are building on Williams right now, moving “The Pearl” to N/NE… gag me. Bunch of idiots waiting in line for ice cream with bleu cheese or some shit. Anyway, what made Portland RAD growing up was that is was rainy and kind’ve melancholy. A place a poetic soul could really sink into. The kids were edgy, running around to all age shows and all night cafes (QP!). Nobody stood in long lines for expensive food. Maybe for some crappy food, but definitely not spendy fancy bits that were on Oprah.
Now… the New Portland as defined by Portlandia and all that, is the Whimsical Portland. Gone is the truly edgy dark but friendly Portland, and now it is ruled by Whimsical Millenials who like to play Kickball and wear funny unicorn helmets or some such shit when they aren’t designing an app or working at eBay downtown. And that is all well and good. But I could give a shit about all the childish whimsy “wheeeee we are soooo fun” stuff after a while. Its entertaining to a point, but also gets so goddamn cliche.
So I did the unthinkable. The so uncool it feels cool: I moved to SW Portland up in the hills, as far from hipsters and condos as I could get and still be in Portland. And there is rain and trees and quiet streets, and I can almost feel the ghost of Portland’s Past in the dank, rotting leaves on the ground. Its lovely!
what is this trend of people who leave the city immediately turning around and shitting on it? is it just to make them feel better about their choice? why does this guy have a column about our city when he lives in LA?