Portland, OR

Sometimes, I really need to remember that not everyone is interested in “what we do in Portland…”

Not only am I a proud Portlandian, but I tend to talk about it too much when I visit people in my home state of Michigan. I need to learn to just shut up, but it’s not like I am bragging per se, but instead, I see many things that Portland does as neat and cool and that most of the people I know would really like Portland. But, most people I know in Michigan are stuck there, for lack of a better term. I just happen to be one of those people that has no qualms about moving across a continent, but most people like living close to home and family and friends — or at least that is what they say. Not that I think that anyone is envious of my nomadic lifestyle, but I remember when I was stuck in Michigan and how eager I was to get the heck out.

Not that Michigan or any home state is a bad place, but some people, like myself, feel a need to explore other lands and experience different lifestyles. We need to move away from home. We are not running away, like my uncle accused me of, but rather we are not content staying in one spot our whole lives.

However, not everyone is impressed with what we Communists and Hippies are doing out West. Most people are polite about it, and simply look bored when I bring up Portland’s propensity for gardening, our city’s incoming gay mayor, our many farmers markets and how everything is organic and local, how I can go to the store in my pyjamas and slippers and no one even bats an eyelash, how I can ride my bike almost everywhere, and how polite everyone is on our bio-diesel buses and our electric streetcars…

Yeah, I’d probably get annoyed with me, too. And since I am in Brighton, Michigan (outside of Detroit), I stand the risk of getting a ticket for annoying people with my incessant “in Portland” sentences.

I try to keep my fondness for Portland in check, but it is hard because I am and have been a little eco-nazi for years, and with Portland being such a green city (in more ways that one), I usually point out that Portland is a good place for someone like me, and then I try to work in an environmental lecture into my conversation. I would find that annoying, so I really need to find other ways to answer the question, “How’s Portland?”

From now on, I will politely say, “Come see for yourself.”

Portland, Oregon, Michigan, Brighton, Detroit, farmers markets, organic, biodiesel, environmentalists, communists, hippies