Over the weekend, my neighborhood association hosted a "Better Block" project. On our way to go check out this thing I was very excited to see I came across a series of posters indicating dissent towards the project because of concerns of gentrification. Maybe I don't have enough information and maybe I'm speaking from a place of ignorance but I just can't wrap my head around establishing businesses and cleaning up a neighborhood being a bad form of gentrification. Displacement of minorities is not what projects like this are about. And yes, rent and property values have a tendency to go up when a neighborhood cleans itself up and I get how that can be a bad thing for some people. What irritates me is that for this reason alone, we shouldn't make an attempt to make beautiful, sustainable, memorable places? We can't stop making progress towards a better environment for all people because of the fears of people who refuse to get on board with the idea of change. Simply accepting the status quo and expecting improvement is insanity and there are so many institutions and people in this country who want just that and it is irritating. I should do some more research on the negative parts of neighborhood redevelopment so maybe I can have a little more empathy towards these groups who don't believe in improving their neighborhoods. Okay, enough on that rant. It's been an ongoing internal rant for a bit. I had to put it out there.
I'm making vegetarian Thai summer rolls tonight and I'm super excited about it. Finally, I've started being able to properly brain storm good hot weather recipes. Let me rephrase that, good hot weather recipes for a girl who is going to be broke for the entire month of July. Whatever, it will be good to get used to slowing down my life for a month because I simply have no other choice. It should be a kick start to the slow my life down project.
I think I want to disappear for the month of July.
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