The Angry Post

Maybe it is not the best idea to go deeper underground* (i.e. legitimate excuse for no posts for a while) and have this is as the last post, but, it is what it is!

In December 2008, I attended a holiday party meant to celebrate all the sustainability advocates and volunteers in Tompkins County. Like an office party for sustainability. I struck up a conversation with a young lady about life in Ithaca. The whole conversation was actually somewhat surreal considering how introverted I am (There is a reason why I blog!), but the entire exchange felt very organic and charged.

I told the young lady that I was thinking about leaving Ithaca. She looked at me like I was the damn devil. The kind of look where a person's eyes tip back into their sockets, but spin right back and unify at an angle while they stare at you. "Why would you ever want to leave," she said.

Comments like that are not unusual in Ithaca and Tompkins County. The area has the ability to vex the yearly wave of newcomers and transient with a passion usually reserved for bigger cities. Ever go to college with a kid from New York or Chicago and they kept reminding you how much better their city was then whatever town your college inhabited? Well, that happens in Ithaca except instead of a metropolis we are talking about a place where dogs have their own guild association and a yellow VW bug (formerly) kept us safe.

I had the Ithaca Fever. I believe that for many generation Y kids that never felt in touch with their lives back home, Ithaca offers this weird fresh alternative that you never want to leave. I had never shopped in a downtown district or been able to walk somewhere I wanted to. Hey. they have two indie film theaters, three to five book stores, and all these artists! If you felt that your home was nothing but squares, then Ithaca seemed like a place where the entire missions was to freak out the squares! I had a plan. I would work for the Finger Lakes Land Trust and live really close by in the Fall Creek neighborhood, Ithaca's Gold Coast. I would shop only at Greenstar and attend all the rallies on the Commons, telling all the evil people what this person from the "1o square miles" thought about their profiteering. It would make my mom insane and we would all be happy!

Ithaca has many charms. More on those in the happy post. But, my Ithaca Fever broke sometime after my third year here, instead replaced by my desire to escape.

Professionally, Ithaca is the doldrums. The Ithaca Fevers affects hundreds of young professionals and future grads every year and they all want that office assistant job with the Ithaca Free Clinic. When a master or PHd student comes to Cornell and brings along their spouse/family, it inflates the candidate pool in a town with an even smaller job selection. Say what you will about Cleveland, but my job search there has been much more vigorous then ever in Ithaca. Of course, it a metropolitan area and size does matter, but, in Ithaca, a town that prizes itself on arts and free expression, the last writing gig, for example on the local Craigslist until April 17th was on March 27th. Cornell and IC area huge employers, but, like any big company, they tend to hire from within, promoting people over new hires. Candidates are over educated and I have seen way to many people hold down some dinkus job while volunteering at a local non-profit. Juggling becomes their career. I did it for a while and I realized that I still had to list barista as my job title and I did not want to do so. The sheer amount of volunteer opportunities in Ithaca starts to lose its appeal when you can't pay the bills.

The common knowledge about Ithaca is that it is very left leaning and very progressive. While that is certainly true, the meaning of all that is much more nuanced. As a left leaning person myself, I still feel left out of the Ithaca political scene. The local intelligista are very far left leaning and will make sure that that becomes the definition of "progressive" or "Democrat." A wonderful example was the 2007 Town of Ithaca Democratic primary where one huge question for both candidates was "Just how better of a (Ithaca) Democrat are you?"

For how much Ithaca presents itself as an alternative to mainstream America, this sort of dichotomy just represents the ugly red state vs. blue state divide of the early part of the decade. The people in Kansas feel just like the folks in Ithaca, only for different sides of the aisle.

With our world facing so many problems and Ithaca labeling itself as the city to fix all that, it really breaks my hear to see progressivism defined by your loyalty to Greenstar Cooperative Market or Fall Creek Cinemas. The environmental movement used to be defined by what we should not do. Do not throw that can away. Do not throw those plastic rings away without cutting them. Do not do dough nuts in the parking lot. Recently, we have seen a surge in things that we CAN and SHOULD do to help the environment and solve our global problems. The semantics are important and help remove the accusations of elitism that have always dogged social justice. While it is foolish to think we can buy our way out of these problems (Countering the "everyone should buy a re-usable tote bag logic") it is even more foolish, even dangerous, to define all those who give a shit as the people in a tiny green supermarket in Ithaca, NY. Yes, I have felt ostracized in Ithaca.

There is a lot of outward thinking in Ithaca. How can we as a city specifically address climate change/Darfur/immigration/impeachment seems to be the par for the course. Ever watch those city council meetings on Channel 13? They have a three minute limit for a reason. If not, the report from the fire commissioner would come at 11:30 after we have heard tirades about the lights at Schokellpoff field and cell phones on the Commons. When such folks come together (like the TC Dog group) the entire thing becomes a filibuster, like something out of of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. All of this is commendable, but in an ideal situation, I would hope the city realizes its own problems before trying to unilaterally solve the rest of the world's. I would not trust the Federal government or the UN to fix the Ithaca Commons. Neither would I trust the Ithaca Common Council to run the War in Afghanistan.

This post has lost a lot of steam. I began to write in Ithaca, but now I am in Lakewood, OH. The size of the metro area makes for that energy I always wanted. Cleveland has problems and so does our little suburb. However, here I have met all kinds of folks from preppies to hippies and Latinos to Albanians. Ithaca felt static Right now the scene outside my window feels alive. The headlines in the Cleveland paper feel heavy and dynamic to these tired eyes.

There are things I will miss from Ithaca and even though I am happy to leave, I cannot dismiss six years of memories. I am glad that Ithaca betwixts so many people. It hurts when that community pride becomes group think.

Goodbye Ithaca. If you have the Ithaca Fever then run with it and try and make Ithaca the best place it can be. Just remember there are other places besides Ithaca and that these are wonderful too. If you are anything like me or Amanda (i.e. young professional), keep up the good fight! You just might move on too or find that it is better to build a better environment then dig a deeper trench. Try to find that Ithaca underground of progressive, intelligent folks that are not hippies or hipster. Those with a touch of the "real world."

PEACE!