Your rent is overdue, what to do?

middle-Michigan, mid-July 2016

A relatively high proportion of dwellings in this county seat of 7,000 persons are rental properties; either because building wealth by owning houses is a favorite route, or because the income base includes lots of people with too little savings for mortgage down payment or weak credit scores, or all the above.

     The past several weeks this apartment has been a hotspot for 19 or 20 somethings, including a baby or toddler. The comings and goings seem to be at all hours, with a variety of vehicles parked next to the one car that seems to be there most consistently. Perhaps the overall laxity of time schedule also extends to use of space, and control of money and material goods, too, since visually there seems to be disorder.

      And then suddenly all activity stopped and the “Demand for Non-payment of Rent” form shown here with two colors of highlighter applied was duct taped to the front door, signed by the landlord.

     During the past many years a dozen or so renters have come and gone; some with children, others without. Some with pets, others without. The longest-term residents seemed to keep things visually in order and seemed to have followed a repeating time schedule. The shortest-term residents did not.

     What does it mean that the scenes here display lack of control of material things? The litter, loud shouts and profane punctuations were a source of irksome nuisance to me; but perhaps that reveals more about my (Middle Class, bourgeois) frame of reference that comes from long years at college and in white collar work places than it does about the world view for normal, or at least acceptable, standards of life among the young renters here.

     Not all young people show such little concern or control of time, physical space and materials, credit, currency, or personal reputation. So perhaps this laxity of boundaries is idiosyncratic rather than historically true of the present generational cohort, or true of this developmental state, or true of people less well-educated by formal classroom training.

     Whether idiosyncratic or a wider trend, it seems consonant with other “anywhere, anytime” and mobile communication trends that disregard the old boundaries that define one’s schedule, method of conducting one’s life, expectations of self and regarding others. In place of landlines there is the cell phone. In place of broadcast TV there is view on demand. In place of sit-down meals at fixed times and places there is take-away or solitary eating. All of these examples contribute to a sense of fluidity, relativism and desire-driven decision s instead of ones dictated by circumstances or rules or propriety or precedent.

     For the people who used to live at this location, the reality of being locked out and being labeled risky tenants is sinking in. Personally relaxing the old boundaries may work in a world of one’s own making, but everyone else still has to follow society’s old rules still on the law books.

Summertime, public beach on a hot Saturday afternoon

Crystal, Michigan (postal code 48811) is in the middle of the lower peninsula, in the northeast corner of Montcalm County, about 6-7 miles from Carson City in neighboring Gratiot County. The beach front of the public beach, just 150 yard from the small town's Main Street includes a small sand beach, a few tables and benches, and on the hilltop a little ways from the water's edge is a public park with fixtures for grilling food with self-supplied charcoal, along with picnic benches, a shelter with sturdy roof and paved floor with room for 7-9 picnic tables if the weather is inclement.

Around 5 p.m. many of the visitors have had their fill of sun and water, socializing, seeing others and being seen. So a few benches and tables begin to open up for others to occupy them. A steady parade of cars, pickup trucks, bicycles, (ruggedized) golf carts stream past on the road that circles the sand-bottomed, shallow shore lake. A handful of boats from the surrounding houses, cabins, and cottages have motored over to this side to drop anchor in the 3-4' water to swim, read, talk, play loud music, and so on. A few dogs on leashes go in the water accompanied by their owners. So recreation takes many forms, but peace and quiet for thoughtful reflection will have to be found during other hours of the day, perhaps from 4-8 a.m.

Profusion of twilight cellphone zombie walkers - cell phone game, "PokeMon GO"

trawling the sidwalks to catch Pokemon shown on the mobile phone screen

About a week ago the national radio carried a story of people congregating at odd places and times around San Francisco in pursuit of particular creatures to add to their own phone's collection of PocketMonsters, poke-mon. Thanks to the wonder of electronic (download) distribution of the game, now for a few days I have noticed individuals, pairs or a handful of (mostly school-age) people strolling up and down the mainstreet sidewalks, parks and other locations with cell phone held in front and occasional glances down to detect desireable Pokemon triggered by the phone's GPS location reported.


This video clip shows a few people trawling for the imaginary menagerie at the downtown park where the former train depot was located. https://goo.gl/photos/Suii4VazRyYoyFs59

Some came on skateboards, others on bicycle, car or on foot. Altogether there were maybe 15-20 young people between the ages of 11 and 20 gathered in the fading light of the Thursday night, around 9 p.m., July 21.

Afternoon drum circle and dance ring near the Bay

The summer breeze kept things bearable on this Tuesday of the 90th National Cherry Festival in Traverse City. Walking past the screened and fenced performance space for ticketed audience members, the sounds from the MC and drummers floated on the air, less than 50 yards from the lake shore where the west branch of the Grand Traverse Bay meets the land.

See also the man in ceremonial dress walking toward the venue soon after the lunch hour,

https://www.flickr.com/photos/anthroview/28101294276

From an historical point of view, this amplified, ticketed, fenced form of an old undertaking for young and elderly alike has some family resemblance to what may have been done 50 years ago, when WWII was still in living memory of lots of people; or 90 years ago when the Cherry Festival got started; or 250 years ago when Native Americans moved more freely around the lakes and rivers of this part of the world. Who knows, perhaps one summer long, long ago there were similar ceremonially dressed dancers and drummers not far from Grand Traverse Bay.

Ancestor Investigations Performed Here

This curious sign above the side-by-side computer stations along the wall nearest the bookshelves that have been dedicated to genealogical study and reference materials caught my eye. It would be interesting to measure the extent of interest in ancestry among people in various societies: immigrant countries like Australia, Canada, USA, South Africa, as well as most of Latin America would seem to have the most urgent motivation to learn about family lines before, during and since the moment of immigration. But perhaps even among non-immigrant countries there are demographic patterns in the study of one's ancestors; for example, it could be keenest among those with landed property or those poor in cash, but rich in ancestry, noble or ignoble.

click for full-size image: "Ancestor Investigations Performed Here" at library

There are several building materials available for making meaning of one's life, the aspirations projected for one's children, and the longings for continuity to one's ancestors. One's life meaning can come from achievements, worldly and economic on the one hand, or more intangible markers on the other hand. One's purpose can come from one's occupations and preoccupations, whether they are gainfully paid and require vocational training, or whether they are avocational in nature. One's significance and consequence can derive in peer respect given and received, or rooted instead separate to peer approval or disapproval, governed and estimated instead by other measurements attained. One's direction in life can come by benchmarking one's peers or one's (extended) family members to show one's position relative to theirs: adhering to the precedents or on the contrary purposefully not conforming to those patterns.

Looking at the many journals, newsletters, reference books of ships' passengers, marriages, deaths, census and church records, in principle all names since record keeping began (and earlier still when the reference book brings data from overseas sources before that) will appear in one or more of these publications. So one should be able to identify and trace all appearances of a given soul from first instance to final disposition. And by this same logic, those of us alive today, will be recorded in various forms so that future generations may discover our presence in publication form the same way.

While there is hardly a crowd of hobbyist or professional researcher filling the space of this specialized treasury of names and dates, still there are many who do have some degree of interest in one or more lines of their own families' trajectories that intersects with the living descendants contemporary to the genealogist herself or himself. These quiet shelves hold the answers to many peoples wonderings about who they are, who they could be, how their lives measure up to those before (and by implication, too, measuring up to those who will follow in turn).

books, beaches, imaginary worlds

¨Books can take you places¨ used to be a catch phrase at libraries, Public Service Announcements, summer reading programs, GED and alternative education promotional posters, and so on. It is still true today, but the phrase is not so much in circulation these days.

[click for full size image: display top of cabinets on 2nd floor of Traverse Area District Library to promote reading at the beach: 6 July 2016]

Whether the printed page appears in pocket-size, magazine size, serial or all in one edition hardback or softcover the cultural significance is the same: one or more authors, and likely one or more editors pored over the manuscript (seldom written by hand; so more true-to-say typescript) and then a chain of technical experts and logistical processes connect the finished work with the final distribution in print or electronically for reading on portable electronic device. There is the technology of inks, papers, the graphic design to interpret the title and story inside, the pricing and promotional efforts by marketing specialists. There may be price points for book launch, then the rates at brick-and-mortar retail sellers, a 2ndary market for used books online and at stores, and the tertiary market of yard sales, free boxes and donations.

So when faced with an impressive collection of books like this, it is worth remembering what is implicated far in the past when author(s) cherished an inkling of a story and finally months or decades of life experience later produce a draft to work its way to the printing and distribution stages. And the implication stretches equally far in the opposite direction, too; toward an indefinite future in the life cycle of a particular edition, or maybe extended with multiple reprintings, as well. But in the release of the camera's shutter, that long timeline from conception to final disposition of a book is frozen momentarily to display the impressive cumulative result of many hands and minds.