6 ms·

My experience is similar, but an inverse, of your own. :) I didn't have your childhood experience - my childhood was much like your current situation. I knew a

My experience is similar, but an inverse, of your own. :) I didn't have your childhood experience - my childhood was much like your current situation. I knew a couple kids in the neighborhood, but we mostly just played video games indoors (when we were younger, we would climb trees, explore the creek, or play with an extensive collection of GI-Joes). And then they all moved away, and I didn't know anyone anymore (and neither, I suspect, did my parents). Then I moved to Brooklyn. Not Park Slope, not Red Hook, and definitely not Williamsburg. I moved into what was up until very recently (in the last decade) one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in the borough, and which laid claim to the most dangerous block in the five boroughs: Bushwick. I moved in three years ago, several years after the neighborhood started getting safer. It's still not that safe: you have to keep an eye on who else is on the block with you. But now there's a nice coffee shop, a delicious bistro-bar, a wine/beer bar, and a coctail/dance club within five blocks. I don't work with anyone in my neighborhood. But I know several painters, several musicians, several photographers, a puppeteer, and several businessfolk. I'm also on a first-name basis with most employees of the coffee shop and bistro-bar (who, incidentally, do all sorts of other things as well). I met the woman who cuts my hair at the bar (price? bring a six-pack of beer over) - and she does a wonderful job. One of the guys who works at the coffee shop put on a play/concert with his band at the local performance theater. A small music venue (official, as opposed to all the ad-hoc venues scattered throughout the [il]legal lofts off the Morgan stop) is opening in the next six months: I know the proprietor. I've never known a community like this. It's fantastic. I don't know of any other neighborhood in this city that can claim a community as active, as friendly, and as full of vermont transplants (I'm from the opposite direction, however).

starkfist 17y ago
Many neighborhoods in NYC have great established communities, it's just that the community doesn't necessarily include you.
- warfangle 17y ago
  Very true. I believe the reason I could integrate so well with this community is due to one specific situation and a couple attributes of the community that I've not seen elsewhere: - I moved to the neighborhood when the community was just beginning - It is not based around typical cultural or ethnic norms (there are Haitian, Asian, European, Hispanic immigrants involved: this is not an affluent-white-urban group, though caucasian transplants to the city tend to be the majority) - It is not based around our job description or industry, though creative-types are definitely in the majority - It's not whether you're deemed cool by the American Apparel masses We're just neighbors. Awesome neighbors. (before this, I lived in northern Astoria - whose community was rather insular and comprised of primarily Greek individuals; there were yuppies there, but they weren't a part of nor 'invited' in to the community)

starkfist 17y ago

Many neighborhoods in NYC have great established communities, it's just that the community doesn't necessarily include you.

warfangle 17y ago
Very true. I believe the reason I could integrate so well with this community is due to one specific situation and a couple attributes of the community that I've not seen elsewhere: - I moved to the neighborhood when the community was just beginning - It is not based around typical cultural or ethnic norms (there are Haitian, Asian, European, Hispanic immigrants involved: this is not an affluent-white-urban group, though caucasian transplants to the city tend to be the majority) - It is not based around our job description or industry, though creative-types are definitely in the majority - It's not whether you're deemed cool by the American Apparel masses We're just neighbors. Awesome neighbors. (before this, I lived in northern Astoria - whose community was rather insular and comprised of primarily Greek individuals; there were yuppies there, but they weren't a part of nor 'invited' in to the community)