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Detroiters Live On A Diet Of LoveDetroit is a spiritual city. No other place I have known cultivates the strength to see the divine within, in quite the same way. This claim may seem counter-intuitive. We do not live in great beauty or have access to expansive natural resources. On a day-to-day basis it’s hard to see divinity amidst despair, vacant houses, empty lots and lost dreams. This is not New York City. There one can draw inspiration from thousands of artists and successful entrepreneurs. You can be dazzled by the fineries that wealth attracts. Nor is it San Francisco where like-minded people push one another to create more exciting art, food, products, and ways of living. Nor is it Portland or Seattle, surrounded by natural inspiration.
This is not a city for those who want to hide from the truth. Therein lies the gift. I live in Detroit, run a business in Detroit, raise a family in Detroit. This forces me to create a positive reality every day. I have few social structures to support my vision of a sustainable, healthy and happy life. Most of these have left with the middle class resources flowing out over the past four decades. But so too have the distractions of that life. My daughter does not grow up at Target. She doesn’t walk down the street looking for things to buy. Our conversations are about the people, the struggles and the questions that emerge from our environment. With so little to distract us, we notice each blossoming daffodil. We delight in the erupting lilac bushes. They not only enhance the beauty. They give us beauty. So, too, the people. The Detroiters who choose to stay. We stay despite the daily hardships of stripped down urban living, crime, poverty. We stay despite the comedy of grocery shopping, buying clothes for our kids, going to a decent restaurant or finding a vibrant park where our children can play. The many who stay because every day we/they are able to find the beauty and strength that inspire us/them to live a good life. We find it from looking into the soul of our neighbor and our children’s teacher. We find it at the corner store and the bakery. The smallest positive connection can fuel the day. We find it at the Riverfront and at the Riviera Court in the DIA. We are reminded of the transformative powers of art. We find it creating visionary futures together out of seemingly impossible toady’s. Mosaic Youth Theater, Greening of Detroit, Alternatives for Girls. Recently, I found it watching young children. Black and white, they chased each other, giggling with abandon, between the raised beds of a community garden. (They had just helped to plan it in the Cass Corridor.) Mostly we find it in each other. Because one thing the Detroiters share is our intimacy with the truth. This can cause great despair but also some comfort. We know what the bottom looks like. And we know that we can bring ourselves out of it every day. On a great day we can lift someone else’s spirit, bring them out as well. I have experienced the power of this intimacy first hand. I am the co-founder of Avalon International Breads, known in the city simply as “the bakery”. No customers in the world could have supported a dream the way our customers have supported ours for the past ten years. They taught us most of what we know. In our early days, we would open at 6 a.m. When the prized baguettes weren’t baked yet, a loyal customer patiently reminded me, “When you open at 6 a.m., you really should have all your products ready then.” And she continued to support us until they were finally ready at sunrise. Once our oven broke down on the
busiest day of our first year, the night before Christmas Detroiters can see beneath the surface. We/they can see beneath the illusions of wealth, physical beauty and consumerism. We can see truth, inner beauty and do whatever we can to cultivate it. Detroiters live on a diet of love: homegrown in the barest of soil. But therein lies the preciousness and therein lies God.
Reprinted from the Michigan Citizen, 2869 Bagley; Detroit 48216 | |
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Fall
2007
No. Detroit is the
most basic of cities. As my dad would say ( in “Yiddish) “tuchus
aven tish” ass on the table. It’s here for all to see: the poverty,
neglect, disappointments, contradictions, the cracks in America
society, the broken promises of capitalism. We understand the
degradation of industrialization and the disease of racism.
Eve. Our
customers gave us money for raw dough that they baked off at home!
That way we would have the finances to stay open. When my partner
and I, both women, had a child together, even the most skeptical,
conservative customer celebrated with us. And they welcomed our
beautiful daughter into our city. And on and on….