Amy Middleton Loves New York

Dear City of New York,

It breaks my heart to even think it, and it’s been a weepy weekend as I’ve considered exactly what this means, but I feel we need to break up.

This does not mean I don’t love you. For these many years, I have loved you as much as a girl can love a city, sometimes to questionable levels. And you, of course, have loved me back, giving me opportunity, independence, and experiences without which I wouldn’t be who I am today. I will miss you deeply, and I’m sickened by the pain I feel when I think of leaving. After nearly seven years together, surrounded by transience, I am seriously unprepared to say goodbye.

You are magic and energy and in overdrive even in your quietest moments. I don’t know how you do it, and my pace has quickened as I’ve run to match your gait. You, more than anywhere I’ve ever been, know how to fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds’ worth of distance run. I cannot fault you for that. But I’m no longer interested in going where you are going. More accurately, I’m losing interest in your treadmill marathons. All of this energy expended is not getting me where I want to be.

I don’t imagine this comes as a surprise to you. I’ve tried to break up with you before. I’ve threatened to leave, flirted with other cities, and had the occasional cross-coastal fling. I may have seemed unfaithful, but each time I’ve come running back, clinging to your dysfunctional, familiar patterns. Even this past winter when things were icy between us and all I did was plan my escape, my exasperation was no match for you and your list of why we are so good together. Everywhere I tried failed because it couldn’t measure up to you, faults notwithstanding. I could never move on because there was nowhere to move on with. But it had become clear that ultimately, my future would not be with you.

Please forgive me in this. I am only thinking of myself. May I remind you, though, that such has been the foundation of all your relationships, and is the only way we’ve survived together so long. You are one of the better things that has happened to me, and I know you will be fine without me. You will continue to charm and impress all who know you, and those who don’t know you will speak of you with envy and awe. You are brilliant and complicated and powerful and inspiring. You, of course, are New York.

Years ago , I read an article attempting to dispel the theory that advertising sells sex. If it did, went the argument I can’t find to properly reference, people would have sex more and that would be it. Instead, advertising sells dissatisfaction with sex, and subtly positions products as the solution. We buy, spend, and consume more as a result, but in the end aren’t any more satisfied.

I have been wondering lately if my dissatisfaction with, well, “urbaness” generally and my neighborhood specifically, is truly the call of the wild it’s felt to for the past year. I love the idea of working the land, caring for animals, and living more honestly and simply. But such a life is not inherently found in all places outside of Manhattan. I’m not even sure whether it exists anywhere. Even California has seasons, and I have yet to find the perfect city that can offer me a yard, an airport, and a reasonable alternative to a personal vehicle.

I love this city. Admittedly it can be a seasonal affair, but it’s hard to not feel that New York is the blood that runs through my veins, and without it survival would not be possible. Its taxes, rent, rudeness, apathy, effort, shared walls, infestations, attitude, costs, artificiality, pollution, “customer service,” hedonism, selfishness, and vulgarity can certainly take its toll on me. The thing that’s keeping me from running for the hills is well-explained by John Steinbeck. “There is one thing about it. Once you have lived in New York, and it has become your home, no place else is good enough.”

We were leaving the 28th Street station when he sat down to my left. Not that I usually pay attention to seat occupation; other than being cognizant of a physical presence, I don’t much notice my subway neighbors. But I could tell this man was older by the arthritic manner in which he wrestled to open his bag, his right elbow jolting into the territory I would ordinarily consider my “personal space.”

I continued to calendar as he fumbled with the flap, then the latch, finally reaching the inner treasures of his bag. As our space overlapped, my thoughts meandered from my day planning to his monumental effort to retrieve a simple object. How will it feel to combat the ever-quickening pace of the world with motor skills that betray and shut down?

His shaking hands again caught my attention as they emerged from the bag with a softbound book dressed in a worn, plain black cover. I was curious whether the built-in tassel marked a page of belabored journal entries, or a page of his readings, now out-of-print. Either way, I was proud of my neighbor for trying to stay sharp in this “boat against the current” era of technology and progress. I rather anxiously watched him open the book. It contained no pages at all, but an Amazon Kindle. I vacated my seat at the next stop, properly schooled, paper day planner still in hand.

I’m happy to announce that I’m going to be heading up the JustFood subcommittee for Online/Social Media to promote Pollinator Week and of course the legalization of beekeeping in NYC. Appointment to this position was the result of a rigorous process including:

• being one of ten people who showed up to a meeting last Thursday
• being one of two people who volunteered to serve on the committee
• being the only person who volunteered to head up a group

Now, the meeting was weird, and I felt completely out of my element. I was surrounded by people (nine of them, in fact) who were passionate about the global implications of dying bees, monocrops, and politics. I had come without personal agenda other than an interest in getting involved beyond petition signing. And here we are.

My role in this process is:

developing marketing materials and messages, working with Just Food’s Communications Committee to finalize outreach materials, conduct outreach through online social media and networks to disburse campaign materials and messages and broadly as possible!

Awesome, right?

One thing I noticed during all the buzz and brainstorming Thursday was the lack of any real campaign focus. Honey tasting events and petition signing are great, but if that’s where the story ends, we can’t expect any momentum. At the core I think there needs to be a unified and branded message that evokes a response more passionate than “I feel favorable about honey.” I’m totally open to ideas here- whether you want to join the committee or just forward on a slogan you could imagine as a sticker.

The teaser from ReadyMades’s April/May 2009 cover reads “Hoe Your Own: Farming In The City.” I don’t know what I expect from things like that, but I always manage to be disappointed when I flip to the article. “Oh look. You have a backyard. And it’s about an acre. How ever did you manage to grow that chard or find room for that chicken coop?” But really, what kind of magical DIY farming instructions exist for those of us without access to yard or roof or balcony? Such an article could be complete with just one word. “Move.”

Though I realize that a title of “Farming In The Suburbs” has less hipster appeal, it would at least win points for accuracy. City and Suburb have different working definitions, and moving from the former to the latter carries with it the coveted opportunity to plant, build, hoe. But there’s some sacrifice involved as well. Sacrifices of very real and very green city benefits.

Worldchanging.com recently published an article, Does City Living Trim Greenhouse Gas Emissions?, which compares energy consumption in urban and suburban neighborhoods. Not surprisingly, living in a smaller space, sharing construction resources, and relying on public transportation result in fewer greenhouse gas emissions per person.

While the personal benefit of planting may potentially be offset by the environmental cost of a personal vehicle, my plan is not to trade conscientious city life for an over-sized house, car, and tomato crop. It seems worth acknowledging, though, that it’s pretty easy to maintain a small carbon footprint when your shared apartment is only 600 square feet.

We have made
unscheduled service changes
on the line

you were probably
hoping would
not make you
twenty minutes late

Please be patient
as you sit motionless
between stations
during this unavoidable delay

Tonight I helped set up Mark Mabry’s Reflections on Christ exhibit that begins its tour in Manhattan.

I love the images. Equally powerful, I think, are the stories of the people who participated in the photos. I had read a few on Mabry’s blog last year and was surprised tonight to find out that there are no words accompanying the pictures. They are quite compelling, but some of the testimonies like this one about John the Baptist make the photos even more meaningful (go read that, I’ll wait).

This is apparently the first time in the tour that the official crew was not handling the installation. We got to decide where to place the artwork, which, due to spatial limitations, was sometimes not in the same order as the original sequence. I have no curation experience, but it was interesting to see how a slight variation in the arrangement influenced my reaction to the story.

At any rate, if you are in NYC, come check it out.

• West Side: 125 Columbus Ave. at 65th St.: Thurs. 4/9 - Sun. 4/12
• Downtown: 144 West 15th St. between 6th & 7th Ave.: Thurs. 4/16 - Sat. 4/18
• East Side: 217 East 87th St. between 2nd & 3rd Ave.: Thurs. 4/23 - Sun. 4/26
• Harlem: 360-368 Lenox Ave. at 128th St.: Thurs. 4/30 - Sun. 5/3
• Inwood: 1815 Riverside Dr. near the intersection of Broadway & Dyckman: Thurs. 5/7 - Sun. 5/10

Exhibit hours are available here.

I’m officially foregoing my attempts to study from the Ecovillage Design Education course. For today, my “organization of matter” focus will be on the 25th annual GrowTogether Conference I attended on Saturday with Ned and Ladd. I almost didn’t know about it–for all of its strengths, GreenThumb is not the best at publicity and communication. But I’m probably to blame for that one since I’m not a member of a GT garden; the place was PACKED with those who are. Excitement for the cause was palpable, due in no small part to:

• the first day of spring (cheers and applause)
• a National Geographic writeup featuring Bronx-based urban farmer Abu Talib and his chickens (screams and applause)
• an NYT article announcing Michelle Obama’s plans to grow a garden on the white house lawn (wild applause and yelling. It gets me all emotional)

Passionate city commissioners and council members addressed us with enthusiasm I’m not used to hearing in NYC. Leda Meredith was the keynote speaker, and she spoke well, though I remembered very little of it even minutes after. She said that “Victory Gardens” is an outdated name, suggesting instead “Gardens of Joyful Defiance.” It doesn’t have quite the same ring to it, and I don’t see why “Victory” no longer applies, but whatever branding it takes to get people to want to garden, I’m in favor of.

The day was big, from 9am to 4pm. Long, but with enough time for Ned to get his hero Talib to autograph his NatGeo page. Somehow $5 for late registration covered breakfast, lunch, and two workshop sessions (cruelly, from the dozens of enticing workshops, we were only able to choose two). I attended:

• Improving Your Soil Quality
• Beekeeping Basics (boo-ya)

More on those in upcoming posts.

I am once again inspired by the goodness the city has to offer, overwhelmed at how difficult it is to access, and reminded that the changes needed to make urban communities more accessible start here.

so i have an identical cousin in the city and for a party we had recently, we choreographed this little number. in the live version, May was holding a mirror frame for us, but here she is filming for us and thus there’s no frame. Use your imagination, and be prepared to be blown away:

ps. yes, i know i can’t do the snake. i guess deep down i’ve always known it, but i thought i could learn it for the dance. turned out i couldn’t. but i thought it was a funny idea anyway, so i didn’t change it even though my self esteem wanted me to.

I’ve been trying to grow an apartment garden for the better part of 2008–partly for fun, mostly to provide a foundation for my hopes of eventually cultivating a sustainable garden. The basil grows steadily, the noble attempt to rescue dying strawberries never stood much of a chance. Potted lemon and lime trees (mutant leaves jetting from awkward branches) fight for sunlight with a tomato plant tied to the window, towering above them. None of them bear fruit. For a while it served as a disturbing metaphor for my life; in spite of my desire, attention, diligence, and labors, my garden was barren. My personal law of the harvest was a broken one.

What do you do when all you want to do in life is to produce fruit, and you are not in the position to do so, and you have no evidence that suggests you will ever be capable of doing so? For as frustrating as it is, you become humbled and grateful for the littlest of wins, the tenderest of mercies. Had it not been for the desperateness of the situation, I may have been disappointed in my meager harvest of one small tomato. Instead, it serves as a small miracle, proving that there is cause to hope and even rejoice, and reminding me that life finds a way.