Rochester Writers

My friend Alex did a rather unusual thing: he came to Rochester for Spring Break.  This blog is about the experience of living in Rochester; I can think of nothing better to contribute than to convey the musings of a friend who wandered here for a while. Read on for the experience of one traveler in this city.

This has been a very good Spring Break, one that exceeded my expectations immensely. I'll go into gorey details about my weekend later, but for now, I'm kind of enthralled with Rochester and how much it has to offer for a city that is seemingly on the verge of no longer existing.

I'm staying here, at the Ant Hill Co-op, started by my friend nibot during his (ongoing) stint as a Physics graduate student at the University of Rochester. The house is very cool, upon my arrival, I ended up in a Nyquilled haze jamming with people playing violin and guitar, and sleeping on what must be the most comfortable futon ever made. Tobin took great joy in driving me around the city pointing out things that were abandoned, in spite of being in essentially perfect working condition. In particular, abandoned power plants, abandoned subways, abandoned greenhouses, abandoned hospitals of all stripes, and scores of abandoned homes and office buildings.

Of course, not everything in Rochester is abandoned, in fact, it's far from it. This is the Wagner Castle, which the city purchased for $37,000 (Tobin was jealous), and then proceeded to convert into a regional hub for gardening. Around back there are sunken gardens, and there is a phenomenal mural (made up of a $25,000 wallpapering job, actually) covering the foyer and spiraling up the staircase. The best thing about it, however, was that we had virtually no idea it existed. There are many exceptional things in Rochester, but you don't know that, because everyone is convinced the city is an awful place to be. If I didn't have a collection of skilled Rochesterians guiding me, I could see how I would come to that conclusion.

We went to a very classy cafe called Open Face, which served us a cookie sandwich (!), and has an entire wall devoted to the glory of Moxie.  It has exceptional design and was constructed by some past RIT students.

Across the street is an exceptional store that sells parts of houses. You can see the huge row of bathtubs in front—they also had hundreds of doors, pillars, windows, furnace grates and pretty much anything else you could imagine. Only in a city that's half abandoned do you find such neat shit.

Later we headed to Tobin's loft, which he doesn't need, but can rent because in a city that's half abandoned, you can rent two places for the price of one. His rent and utilities for a loft and a room in his co-op are still less than mine in Cambridge for a small room in a small house. The loft is an incredible thing, with the most random assortment of (awesome) crap you can imagine. I particularly like the way things dangle from the ceiling, such as a fan, crates, a globe...

Rochester has also afforded a large number of awesome diner experiences, which are pretty cheap (you can get out with a bill less than $5) and very diner-licious. This one had tremendously good music and a kitschy 50s atmosphere.

The true hidden gem of Rochester, however, is Artisan Works, which is a cross between a museum, a gallery and a workshop. It is a converted cannon factory, which is fucking amazing, and has floor upon floor of incredible stuff. A few highlights include the victorian dining room, which they encourage you to use, the artsy cat that allegedly talks to you, and the phenomenal rooftop patio that's likewise overflowing with art. The place is mind-bogglingly huge, and I haven't seen anything like it anywhere. When we drank a pitcher and jammed by the fire outside the Lux, the favored local bar, locals had heard of it, but never been there. Only in Rochester.

I don't know if I'd want to live in Rochester, but "exceeds expectations" is an understatement in this case. Rochester is bustling with art, because artists can afford to live here, and if I wanted to take a few months to write a book or record my masterpiece, I think the ROC would be a really great place to do it. It has a sort of charming decay to it, as though you can pick up what's left and do whatever you want with them, and for people with energy and enthusiasm, it's clear how this place can be lovable. Then again, everyone I've talked to has told me of their plans to leave, hopefully sooner rather than later, but it's easy to see how this city could turn into something very real and very cool given the right clientele.

And finally, I invite you to investigate this statue:

The inscription reads:

EPILEPSY
CAN EFFECT ANYONE,
ANY AGE, ANY TIME
IT DOES NOT STOP THEM
FROM REACHING THEIR
FULLEST POTENTIAL

Why does this inscription make so little sense, why did anyone make a gorilla as the statue of liberty, and why are the two connected? This was at the Rochester Psychiatric Hospital, which has an abandoned 19-story building, and the eeriest row of identical abandoned homes I've ever seen.

I’ve always had a more-than-passing interest in regional accents and colloquialisms, and relish the fact that my current speaking voice is a mish-mash of the accents of all the places I’ve lived. I had a girlfriend in college whose South Jersey accent I would imitate so much, that I now frequently and unthinkingly say, years later: “Can I have a glass o’ wuhder?” After a few months of living in Baltimore, I had already assimilated into my speech patterns the untypeable Bawlmer pronunciation of the “long o” sound. After an equal amount of time in Albuquerque (you know, the town where even the gringos talk like they’re from south of the border), I picked up the local take on the “short i” sound, especially when I was dreenkeeng.

Last week, the D&C declined to run a full-page ad criticizing Wegmans' egg farm, citing concern over the recent passing of Robert Wegman.  That's not surprising -- advertising isn't editorial, and I'm sure the D&C rejects ads all the time.  Nor is it shocking that we had to read about it in today's New York Times.  We can't expect the D&C to write a story every time they refuse to run an advertisement.

No, what's really chickenshit about this whole debacle is how the D&C's "news" division handled the underlying story, which is that a small-town jury let the lead activist off with a slap on the wrist.  The D&C ran a short "just the facts, ma'am" piece in Friday's section B.  That story was written by a wire service reporter and  neglects to interview either side or provide any other context for the reader.  The only way the D&C could have done less to cover the activist's trial would be to ignore it entirely.

In contrast, the Times' story is 1100 words longer, and it was written by one of their own reporters, who managed to interview the major figures involved in the case.  Not bad for a paper 300 miles from Rochester. 

Perhaps the D&C staff was tuckered out after long weeks of writing ever more orgiastic panegyrics to the memory of the Wegman  patriarch.   Whatever their excuse, this is the second time in a month that they've been scooped by the Times on a local story. 

I learned two things about Rochester at my first job interview here:

1. Kodak Park is not really a park.
2. Winters in Rochester are long and grey, so when Spring comes, people go a little bit crazy.

Is there anyplace on earth that smells, sounds and looks as good as Rochester in the Spring?  Well, yes -- but no place on earth has such a sharp contrast between an eternity of grey skies and a cacophony of sight, sound and smell.  The skies are never more blue than they are in Spring, the color of the trees and flowers are never as rich, and the birds' songs never sound so sweet.   No wonder we all go a little crazy in May.

On the crazy in Spring theme:  Springtime Can Kill You (mp3) by Jolie Holland.   And, on the contrast between Winter and Spring, Cold White Christmas (mp3), by Casiotone for the Painfully Alone.

If you want to see the difference between a critic and an enthusiast, or if you just want to learn about bars in our area, check out Monroe County, NY Bars.  Your host, Rochester Bar Man, started his blog in March with the goal of visiting a bar every day.  Though he hasn't quite achieved that lofty goal, he's still going strong two months later.  This blog has become one of my favorites because he visits an eclectic set of neighborhood bars and finds something interesting, positive and unique in each one.

Driving home from a weekend trip to Syracuse, I was surprised to find the parking lot across from the Public Safety Building populated by elephants.  Apparently the circus came through town, with shows this last weekend at Blue Cross Arena.  Who knew?

More Rochester stuff from You Tube:
: Festival Guy!
: Skaters
: Pogo Satan
: Wegmans Demonstrations
: Egg Farm Video
: Drunk Man
: Boats N Baits
: Hilarious Stan Munro video collage

If giving the maximum sentence to a first-time offender at the behest of a powerful corporation is judicial activism, I guess I'm against it. 

Also, it's interesting to compare that story to the D&C's seven little paragraphs buried deep in Section B.   Both the Finger Lake Times and the New York Times have out-reported them on this one.  Who's next -- The Penny Saver?

Friday's Talk of the Nation included a discussion of the new "green" mega-mall in Syracuse.  When the discussion turned to other city improvements, tearing down the elevated portion of I-81 was mentioned as a way to make the city move livable and raise the tax base.   One of the guests referenced a study showing that the value of real estate two blocks on either side of elevated highways was significantly less valuable than other nearby property.   

If this is true for elevated highways, it is probably also true for sunken ones like the Inner Loop.   Raising our tax base is just one more reason to tear it up.

Maggie Brooks says that she won't cap the county portion of the gas tax.  That's a good start.  Now, if she starts talking about doubling -- or even quadrupling -- the gas tax, she'd be talking even more sense. 

I hate paying $35 to fill the tank of my economy car, and I sympathize with the working poor who have to fund their commute.  Nevertheless, I think we all need to realize that gas in the US is dangerously cheap.  With the finite supply of petroleum under the control of the most unstable regimes on earth, and with developing countries like China and India increasing their consumption by record amounts, we need to get this monkey off our back. 

$3/gallon gas has our friends and neighbors thinking about ditching the Escalade.  $5/gallon gas may actually get us to buy more hybrids, and perhaps those hybrids will be pluggable so we can charge them overnight using off-peak electricity generated using nuclear or coal.

Funny that Maggie is one of the few politicians actually making sense on this issue.  The rest of them are trying to pretend that a few pennies off a gallon will make some kind of difference in the long run.