Flipping Pencils

Goodbye Where, Hello My Athens

On June 1, I launched My Athens, a blog devoted to what living in Athens, Ga. makes me think about. I’ll likely be thinking and posting a lot about walkability issues, anti-poverty policy, local media, city planning stuff, infrastructure issues and my neighborhood.

I'm no longer posting at Where, though the blog remains one of my favorite blogs about cities. During my brief stint as a contributor there, I found I increasingly wanted to write and think about a particular place, not cities in general. So, I decided to shift what blogging energies I have to My Athens, which is very local and particular indeed.

Here’s an archive of my most of my posts at Where:

Q&A with "Mayor" of Opportunity City

Introducing Urbanism: Top Books for Curious Novices

Infrastructure Book is Heavy, Useful, Beautiful

A Space So Confined? Saving Grace of Impotent Hatred?

Notes About the Future of Urban Journalism, Part 1

Notes About the Future of Urban Journalism, Part 2

Notes About the Future of Urban Journalism, Part 3

Notes About the Future of Urban Journalism, Part 4

Is Urban Poverty an Acquired Taste?

Rain

It’s raining hard here in Athens, and the sound is amplified into something furious by the tin roof on our house. I can’t help but listen to the rain, and think of a poem I once read. Here it is.

Rain

By Francis Ponge, translated by Peter Riley

In the yard where I watch it fall, the rain comes down at several different speeds. In the middle it is a delicate and threadbare curtain (or a net), an implacable but relatively slow descent of quite small drops, a sempiternal precipitation lacking vigor, an intense fragment of the pure meteor. A little away from the walls on each side heavier drops fall separately, with more noise. Some look the size of a grain of corn, others a pea, or almost a marble. On the parapets and balustrades of the window the rain runs horizontally, and on the inside of these obstacles it hangs down in convex loops. It streams in a thin sheet over the entire surface of a zinc roof straight below me—a pattern of watered silk, in the various currents, from the imperceptible bosses and undulations of the surface. In the gutter there, it flows with the contention of a deep but only slightly inclined stream, until suddenly it plunges in a perfectly vertical thread, quite thickly platted, to the ground where it breaks and scatters in shining needles.

Each of these forms has its own particular manner of moving; each elicits a particular sound. The whole thing is intensely alive in the manner of a complicated mechanism, both precise and precarious, like a piece of clockwork in which the activating force is the weight of a mass precipitated from vapor.

The ringing of the vertical threads on the pavement, the gurgling from the gutters, the miniature gong-chimes, multiply and resonate together in a consort which avoids monotony, and is not without delicacy.

And when the pressure is relaxed, some of the clockwork continues to function for a while, getting slower and slower, until the whole machine stops. Then, if the sun comes out again, the whole thing is quite soon effaced—the shiny apparatus evaporates: it has been raining.

___ ___ ___

Source: The Random House Book of Twentieth Century French Poetry, edited by Paul Auster.

Photo credit: "rain drops" by Flickr user Austin Tolin.

At the Polls in Athens: A Photo Essay

First things first

 

Coffee and the newspaper on Election Day—Tues, Nov. 4, 2008—here in Athens, Georgia. To distract ourselves from useless anxiety, my wife Lori and I decided to visit polling places in neighborhoods all across town. We took a camera and a voice recorder with us. Here's some of what we saw and heard.

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Roadside electioneering

Yards signs lining Chase St. during early voting hours in front of Chase Street School, a District 5 polling place. The signs seemed to be no closer than 150 feet of the outer edge of the school (see next photo)—which means they were probably in compliance with election rules. But then again, maybe not: all the signs were gone when we returned to Chase Street School in the early evening.

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Posted

A warning sign displayed at every polling place we went to today.

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Early line

Voters in line at the Fowler Drive School polling place. It's 7:20 am.

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Traffic cop for a day

So many voters showed up so early (this shot was taken at 7:36 am) at Howard B. Stroud School's polling place that assistant principal Guy Cooper decided to help direct voters to parking spots. The polling place serves Athens most heavily African-American voting district.

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Following through even if God's in control

LaJonya Lett sits in a folding chair outside the polling place at Howard B. Stroud School. Here's what she said: "I'm waiting in line for my husband because he's at work. He'll be off in about 20 minutes. I already voted. I had enough sense to go ahead and vote. I'm holding his spot. I voted on Thursday. It's in the Lord's hands. I see that the polls show that Obama's going to win. But you never know. God's in control."

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Possible global celebration pending

At the Timothy Road School polling place, where George W. Bush beat John Kerry in 2004, voter Dirk Magwitz said: "If he [Obama] does [win], I think there's going to be a national and global sort of celebration. It will be a very precedent-setting day for an endless number of reasons. There's a lot of energy around this one."

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A name to note

Parshall Bush has voted in Athens since 1972, and for many years he's cast his ballot here at Whit Davis School, which recorded the city's largest turnout in 2004. Mr. Bush says he doesn't expect to be celebrating tonight. No sir.

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Meeting neighbors is under-appreciated benefit

Before voting at Whit Davis School Kirk Willis, a history professor at the University of Georgia, explained why he likes to show up at the neighborhood polling place on election day:  "If you go downtown and vote early, you're standing in line with people from all over Athens, which is fine and you can kind of meet new people. But given the way we live these days, usually you only see your neighbors in a place like this or a school function…or at the market or the liquor store or some such place."

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As easy as 1-2-3-4-5

Voting instructions and assorted warnings posted at every polling place.

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Impacting the future?

An Obama volunteer at the Clarke Co. Democratic Party Headquarters on Prince Ave. checks-up on get-out-the-vote (GOTV) progress while Clarke Co. Democratic Party chair Mac Rawson (not pictured) says, "All the effort that's gone in [to campaigning for Obama] registering voters and getting people active and excited is going to have a lot of long-term consequences for Democrats."

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Hard times ahead

"Whoever gets in office, it's going to be a tough four years," said Brian Cartwright, who works for Cartwright Properties, a commercial property management company. "Circuit City just closed 155 stores yesterday—and that's before Christmas." Cartwright Properties' offices are located in the same building as the headquarters for the Clarke Co. Republican Party.

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The loneliness of a campaign volunteer

A lone volunteer works the phones at Clarke Co. Republican Party Headquarters. She was the only person in the office when this shot was taken.

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Hello. Photo ID, please

Patsy Faye Lewis was an official voter greeter at the Clarke Central High School polling place.

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First time voter

This is Hillary, who didn't want to give her last name, just moments after she cast her first ever ballot in a presidential election at the Fire Station #3—Five Points polling place. The University of Georgia senior voted for McCain because she was leery of  Obama's lack of experience.

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Cheerleaders

Two young women wave Obama signs at the intersection of W. Broad St. and Milledge Ave.

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Boredom of poll watching

Gay Williford served as a Democratic Party poll watcher at the Athens Transit Multi-Modal polling place. Her job was to report suspicious activities and, periodically throughout the day, report on the number of people who had voted. As of about 5 pm, she said she had seen no suspicious activities whatsoever. "Another year, I wouldn't mind registering people or driving them to the polls," Williford said. "I think I'd prefer working at the polls. Watching is too boring."

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A normal Tuesday, business-wise

According to Homer Wilson, it was a normal Tuesday for business at Wilson's His & Hers Styling Shop in downtown Athens. But that's not to say the day was normal in every respect. "No, never have [seen an election like this] before," Wilson said. "We had a voter registration drive here [in the shop earlier in the year], and we registered a lot of people. We have never registered that many people before. Never. I voted in advance. My whole family voted in advance. Everyone here voted in advance."

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Early voting bad for bake sale

Kathleen Killian (left) and Rachel Julian staff the Chase Street Elementary School Parent Teacher Organization's bake sale table adjacent to the Chase Street School polling place. "Last time they were running to the grocery stores to get treats because we ran out at the primary, so we were all geared up," Julian explained. "And look!" she said, gesturing to all the unsold goodies. "But you know, people waited two and a half hours last Friday. That's where all our customers went."

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The projection

CNN calls it around 10:57 pm.

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Outward reflection of our inner feelings

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NOTE: All photos by Lori Ringhand.