Posts Tagged ‘bickerdike’
You Can't Please Everyone: The Dubious Relationship between Logan Square and it's Bohemian Inhabitants
(Please note: this is rather long, props still need to be given and links need to be made. I will make sure to do so ASAP… I just needed to get it up here before it’s totally outdated.)
I love living in Logan Square. I love the tree-lined streets and the elote carts, with their awkward, honking horns. I love the lively Quince años parties in people’s yards in the summer. I love the candy that’s left over after the piñatas have been broken and the kids have gotten sick from sugar.
Most of all, I love that I can afford to have a bedroom, a painting studio, and an office. My boyfriend has a bike shop and a wood shop. My dog has his own bedroom. I have more than enough space and I only have to travel an extra mile out of my way to get it.
Often, though, my enjoyment is soured by subtle reminders that I am not entirely welcome here. To some of my neighbors, I am a blonde-haired harbinger of doom and my freshly renovated apartment with its’ granite countertops and hardwood floors is the lair in which I conspire my fascist agenda. Or something like that.
Although most of Logan Square has already been gentrified, the West end, where I live, is just beginning to turn. And so somehow, although this is my home too and I only want what’s best, my being here is apparently an open invitation for self-involved yuppies and money-hungry developers to come suck the life out of the neighborhood. I realize that some of my queasiness about gentrification can probably just be chalked up to white guilt, but gentrification is a real and hotly debated issue and discussions about it are not only valid but important, so I will forge on. Read the rest of this entry »