Bubbles

Eastown, Grand Rapids, Michigan

Eastown, Grand Rapids, Michigan.

My friend Crystal was talking about Eastown’s bubble. As long as I can remember, Eastown has had a bubble. It has no real cultural specificity and doesn’t play favorites. It’s packed with hardworking shop owners and café owners, restaurant owners and bar owners—all who likely serve everyone or anyone. It has art and art fairs, hippies and punks and skaters and average everyday folks. It has music and culture, and it wants to blur the line between red and blue—making room for individualism and compassion.

It doesn’t play favorites.

I suppose I might call it more of a beacon than a bubble—a beacon of open-armed opportunity, a gratitude for simply being itself.

It’s not a martyr and it’s not a victim. It’s not bossy or overpowering.

It simply exists.

If your town doesn’t have an Eastown, you could begin building one. Ask any of the shop owners or dwellers—they’re probably too busy, but they’ll still talk to you. They probably won’t have the answer, because they’re humble or simply busy thinking about their next thing they want to do.

I just picked up a copy of Year of the Monkey by Patti Smith at Argos.

Eastown, Grand Rapids, Michigan.

—There are many truths and there are many worlds, said the sign solemnly.