City Block Face

City Block Face

What was wrong? What did I feel?I live in a major city. Friends invited us to dinner at a downtown restaurant.

It was cold winter night we drove downtown, getting there sooner than R reservation time.We drove around downtown for awhile,taking this famous street or that one for timewasting sightseeing, which was fine.We drove on one block full of bright lit jewelry stores,beautiful jewelry displayed in windows.We made a wrong turn & were forced to follow a path that took us directly below the jewelry block. There,the street had a ceiling of the street above.Homeless people in various attempts to keep warm-bundled in blankets, huddled together,shielding themselves with boxes against a biting wind directly below the jewelry stores. One man using a box the size of a washing machine to stay warm by huddling in it,stood up,picked up the box he was inside & moved to another spot to stay warm.Our friend made a comment about him not having to turn in a change of address.All 3 laughed.I stuffed to not overtly cry and looked out my window to hide my face.Which made things worse.I hated friends 4 a bit.Y?

Because you have character and empathy which they didn't display. Your friends may be good people who happened to have a moment of stupidity. I'm a person who hates the whole picking on the weak and helpless, but even I have moments where funny, but still very much wrong, thoughts pop in my head or out of my mouth. We're human and sometimes our "brain filters" don't always work. If your friends are ALWAYS crude, I would avoid going out with them, but if they are generally good people, write those random instances off as a moment of weakness on their part.
But I feel ya. (And you are a really good writer)

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Congratulations Philadelphia- Winner of the Best City With the Crappiest Reputation Award

Since I've lived here in Center City Philadelphia for quite some time now, there are a few things I know about my City.

1) Philadelphia is not as bad as Philadelphians (et al) say it is

2) I have honestly yet to hear someone say that they regret having moved into the Center City Philadelphia area

When I first moved from Philly back in 1987, I remember walking behind a well dressed older couple when I overheard the husband tell his wife to "secure her handbag...we were in the Center City area of Philadelphia. Yeah... prestigious Rittenhouse Square. Ya' moron. But that was his point of view. The city had gone to hell in a handbag, and it wasn't coming back anytime soon. Well boys and girls, anytime soon is here, and I have a unique yardstick to measure such change.

The vast differential in the poor perception of Philadelphia, and the livability of the city are miles apart. I became aware of this last night when sitting in a really hip new Asian fusion restaurant/club (The Pearl at 19th and Chestnut Streets), talking to Tiffany, my lovely Australian friend who said that when she told her parents that she had taken a job in Philadelphia, they wrinkled their collective noses, and made what seemed to be a form of a primitive grunting noise. From Australia. Perhaps someone took out a big billboard along, I dunno', Australia's Route 1 that says something like "PHILADELPHIA REALLY SUCKS". How could these folks have any idea of what our City is really like? Apparently, our reputation, albeit an old and inaccurate one, lives on.

For the last 19 years that I have spent as a Realtor here in Center City Philadelphia, I have sold to young buyers here, seen them get married here, helped them find a larger condo here and seen them have children here. Now their kids pass me on the streets of Old City or Rittenhouse Sqaure on their way to middle school. I see my past buyers at the market, the movie house, the car wash, and occasionally half crocked at two in the morning at Little Pete's, ordering the generic equivalent of a Grand Slam Breakfast. And EVERY time, I can see that they enjoy living in town, like the city, the pace, the growth, the growth in the homes values, the lifestyle, and the comfort in the easy familiarity that a "big small town" can bring. They see recognizable faces, places, events, and know the best way from Old city to Rittenhouse Square when Walnut Street is blocked up. It is big city living, without the crazy crazy pace of say New York, or Chicago. Not to mention the relative absence of noise pollution, which is so evident in those larger towns. They tell me, they hug me, and think I somehow had something to do with their happiness. I am not going to tell them any differently of course, and waste the (ill gotten) adoration. I just ask them to spread the work far and wide. And maybe take up a collection for a new billboard along Route 1 "down under" touting the virtues of our fair city.

About the Author

A graduate of Bowling Green School of Business in Northwestern Ohio, Mark began selling in Philadelphia (Society Hill real estate and other Center City areas) in 1989 and has been in love with it ever since. He still resides in a low rise, four unit condominium building in Old City and loves the area!
Feel free to visit his website at http://www.CenterCity.com or send him an email at Mark@CenterCity.com

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