Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Why I Won't Move Back to Arlington

Probably the best known description of Arlington, Virginia, dates back to the years when "Arlington" was basically a large farm. One of Martha Custis's grandchildren chose for an epitaph that, out of the years he'd been in this world, he had "lived" only during the time he was "a Bachelor in Arlington."

While George H.W. Bush was president, I was a bachelor in Arlington. I doubt that any of Martha Custis's family would have liked the three-story apartment block where I was staying, but this was the twentieth century and people I met seemed to agree that Arlington was a great place to be a bachelor. Most people in Arlington weren't actually from Virginia. Most were overcompensating by trying to show extra courtesy, generosity, and hospitality.

So Jonathon Seidl's videos come as a tremendous disappointment to me. Well, it was a dark, wet night. I've stood at bus stops like that one on many dark, wet nights, and three things used to happen: (1) I'd get tired of standing and walk home--any place in Arlington is within an hour's walk from any other place in Arlington. Or (2) I wouldn't have long to wait, and would catch the bus. Or (3) some nice neighbor would roll down a car window and say, "I see you missed the 9:05 bus. Would you like a ride?" Some neighbors and neighborhoods were nicer than others, but there were no bad neighborhoods in Arlington.

But, around the turn of the century, lots of people decided that the Washington metropolitan area needed more overcrowding and "development," yuppification, higher rents for decent places, more places that fell short of Washington's previous standard of decency...in short, more resemblance to places like New York...and these things have taken their inevitable sociological toll.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/shock-video-bystanders-walk-by-dying-man-as-he-lays-motionless-on-the-sidewalk-in-virginia/

I just hate that this happened in Arlington. I would have expected it in any part of Rockville; I wouldn't have been shocked if it had happened in some parts of downtown D.C., although most of downtown D.C. used to be almost as hospitality-conscious and tourist-friendly as Arlington. Lots of people would have expected it in Hyattsville, and I would have said their neighborhood stereotypes were out of date. But never in Arlington.

Well...let's just say I'm glad I left; I'm glad my ancestors chose to be buried closer to home.

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