REALITY CHECK FOR THE PORTLAND NEW YEAR

Who writes the reality check for the new year?

Don’t ask. It’s you. And it’s your reality.

You can check it, ignore it, or pretend it belongs to someone else.

But, it’s you, it’s yours, and you’re not alone, as the top image shows.

2023 will be the year of getting over being afraid of the unknown.

Yes, it’s a big job, but who isn’t up to it?

In Portland Oregon there’s a fear of going downtown to broken glass and boarded up windows.

It goes with the fear of some methed-up guy looking like a zombie jumping out from a doorway.

Fears are confusing.

If you’re a guy out with your lady do you walk on the building side of the sidewalk to fight zombies, or the street side to take the splash of overflowing gutter water from passing cars?

Or do you stay put and hide in your garage while insisting you’re not afraid of nothin’?

How Portland Lights Up

From rows and columns of lit windows, the Portland night is alive.

That’s a view from up high in the South Park Blocks.

People are out there living their best lives, or as good as they can get it.

Not all of them live behind closed curtains, which is a bold choice.

Why not share? That’s a reality check for city living that gets misunderstood.

On one hand, no one wants a suburban creeper looking in a window, but an apartment from across the street is okay?

In a city you might see the same people on the sidewalk, on the train, waiting for the bus, and they feel familiar.

Even though you don’t know them and they don’t know you, there’s something there.

I think of the times I’ve been away from Oregon and came back. It felt like a homecoming.

After a six week run through England visiting the wife’s family I made a deal with myself to hug the first person I knew when I got back.

And I did.

The downside was it was a guy I’d coached against who was a bit of a cheater.

But, I was so happy to see anyone I forgave him.

Then I kissed the welcome mat at my front door.

Oregon Towns Of Orient And Boring, Why Not Reality Check?

I’d move to Reality Check Oregon.

It’s where everyone and everything assures complete transparency.

As if there’s such a thing.

Instead, we get Portland transparency and it looks a little murky.

The homeless sweeps work for a time, then it all starts over.

Boarded windows get new glass, then it all starts over.

I’m still working on the positives of walking down the street with a hammer to break things.

What if a large shard of glass fell on someone’s arm during their hammer blow follow through?

The protest that included breaking into a museum on the park blocks still bothers me.

Once you’ve done historical work, all history matters the rest of your life.

I like to keep it Oregon history since it’s a such a unique state.

The difficult part of living in and around Portland is when people visit and recall how nice it used to be.

I count the years since 1980. Northwest Portland was a dump when I moved in, but it was my kind of dump.

Once it started improving, getting a makeover, I moved to Southeast Portland.

It was a dump, the kind that improved once I moved out.

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My reality check for the Portland new year is that people who care about their town look at the measures taken to make it better.

I can’t keep moving for places to improve, but apparently I’m an urban catalyst.

I’m waiting for the time the dishes wash themselves when I leave the kitchen, or my clothes to put themselves away once they dry.

The measures I see to improve my place are my wife’s reminders to do better.

She says it in such a sweet way I always expect the dishes and clothes problem to snap out of it.

When they don’t, I get to work.

Here’s to doing good work in 2023.