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L.A. Observations 4: Adventures in Downtown Los Angeles
It’s April twenty-fourth and I’m on my way downtown. The day is warm and inviting. Just right for wandering around downtown to shop.
I leave from Los Angeles Trade Tech Community College (where I teach) and head west on Washington Boulevard to get Dash Bus F (the Financial District bus) which will take me north on Figueroa to get to Dash Bus E which will take me to the Fashion District, my destination. The bus comes quickly. The driver gives me the free transfer I ask for after I pay my twenty-five cents and I sit behind him on the long seat that allows me to look back, forward and out the windows.
On the bus, I settle down to observe the sights and people. At one stop, a brother who’s dressed like he’s a "stone playa" from the wilds of Ohio or Indiana gets on. He’s wearing a casual suit, checked pants topped by a matching top and sporting a wide-brimmed black hat with a little feather in the band; he has the requisite cell phone plastered to his ear which identifies him as “urban-cool.” He sits in the back with a couple of other brothers. They begin a conversation about gangbanging.
I tune them out and think about the style of clothing the brother is wearing. It reminds me of the way the guys dressed in Evansville and The Midwest years ago. For some reason, a lot of these brothers like to wear what I call, for lack of a better descriptive term, “the pimp suit.” This style, cut very much like the Zoot Suit of old, requires that the suit pants be very roomy and the coat hit a couple of inches above a man’s thigh. Color and design varies. Striking, bold colors are mostly the rule. Designs range from solid colors to checks, stripes, and pinstripes. I remember that a couple of T.V. celebrity brothers favor this kind of suit. Maybe that’s why it’s popular.
As I glance around at the other riders, I notice the way others are dressed. A Latina of middle age sits just across from me. She has cellophane red streaks in her dark, long hair. In my mind, the color gets labeled Day-Glow Red. She is busy chatting in Spanish with another Latina. I notice her black blouse, short straight skirt, and wedge heels. Her blouse is see-thru black chiffon with shiny black and white sequins in the shape of flowers that give the blouse its peekaboo effect. I glance at the others aned a blonde woman near me catches my eye; she compliments me on my earrings. I smile and thank her.
At 7th and Figueroa, I get off at the Metro station. People in business suits, cutoffs, casual wear bustle and hustle this way and that. I walk a couple of blocks east toward Macy’s where I’ll pick up my next bus. But I’m suddenly hungry and I spy a Coffee Bean on my way. I duck inside and gaze at the baked goodies under glass. Bran and Blueberry and Cinnamon Muffins. Brownies without icing. And there---giant chocolate chip cookies. I order one, pay the tab, and munch down as I walk out. It’s delicious and I munch happily, squelching guilt feelings that try to gather to attack me.
I go in for a quick look around in Macy’s Plaza. It’s so seldom I get downtown. December was the last time I was at Macy’s Plaza. Unlike last time, now, I see summer clothes being hawked in larger-than-life banners on the stops and in the store windows. Inside the plaza, the flower sellers have set out their wares for sale. Along the corridor going toward Macy’s they’ve put giant orange sunflowers, red roses, yellow daffodils, and bunches of purple flowers that I don’t know. My eyes are drawn to the colors, drink them in, wanting to take me in for a close up. But I resist. No buying flowers today. I’m on a mission to buy a hat, belt, and neck purse. The neck purse hangs around my neck. People use neck purses for all kinds of things: to hold cigarettes, money, ID, credit cards, and cell phones. I’ll use mine to hold my eyeglasses.
A store catches my eye. It looks like the kind that would “trap” tourists or people looking for gifts. I decide to browse inside it for a few minutes mainly because I’m intrigued by the toy animals in the window. Among others, there’s a brown chipmunk and a white furry cat. A toy gray dog wags its tail, moves forward and backward, and barks in a cage that resembles the kind that you see in pet stores. I watch the little dog wondering about how it moves. With some mechanical thing inside it, obviously. I go inside. At the back of the store, high up on a shelf, I see a huge lion. It almost looks real, as if it’s lolling on the plain under the African sun. I think about asking how much it is because I have a very good friend whose astrological sign is Leo. It would be a kick to deposit it on her floor as a surprise. As big as it is, the lion would scare the hell out of her. I chuckle at the thought. She wouldn’t chuckle though. No, sir. Besides, she lives in another city and I’d have to ship it to her. It would be an expensive “joke.” So I pass. I can use my coins in a better way. I drift around the store, looking at greeting cards, purses, jewelry, toys for a while. It’s good to let my mind wander, to let myself drift “off the clock.” The clock is a dictator that I’ve let take over my life. Right now, I’m letting myself stop to smell the coffee, pick the roses, and enjoy the day.
Twenty minutes later, I catch the bus for the Fashion District outside of Macy’s Plaza. As I ride east on 7th, I notice shops and people and buildings. On Grand, there’s a tall building with a rooftop garden, I notice. It startles me when I see the little trees sprouting up from the roof. It startles me because I didn’t think Los Angeles was doing that kind of thing. I knew that in downtown Chicago there were gardens on roofs in an effort to counteract air pollution and other things we’ve done to poison ourselves and the earth. But L. A., I’d thought, keeps missing opportunities to do things to become “green.” The little garden tells me that I’m wrong and I’m glad to be.
Downtown Los Angeles reminds me of Manhattan. Dirty sidewalks. Lots of buildings. Monoliths. Crowded together. Tall, sparkling new buildings. Old buildings---grand dames, sporting Art Deco design. Hotels. Office buildings being constructed. Restaurants, coffee shops, eateries looking like they’ve been shoved into holes in the wall. I see Subway, Starbucks, Corleone’s Pizza. Then, at Los Angeles Street, the bus turns. We’re going south now. You can see the signs that you’re in the Fashion District already. Shops. Everywhere. Dingy, small, cramped. Whatever is being sold inside them is displayed outside to lure us in.
Textile shops lure us first. Outside the shop, top of the line, luxurious fabric—linens, brocades, silks—are displayed next to bottom of the line cheap stuff. “Come on in. I’ll make you a deal,” it beckons to us. I think about my friend, Kellii who loves to sew. She’d be in heaven around all this fabric.
Men’s clothing shops next. In the windows and outside, there are manikins posed with hands in pockets wearing pimp suits in so many colors—gold, green, white, beige—shirts and ties are in coordinating shades. The suited manikins seem to say, “I’m so cool. Wear me and you will be, too.” Salesmen lurk about the entrance, waiting to pounce on whoever passes. I wonder if they’re paid on commission.
I pull the cord and get off at Olympic Boulevard. As I walk east on Olympic, the first thing that catches my eye, of course, are the shops that showcase jewelry and accessories. I have such a weakness for baubles, bangles, and beads. I slip inside a shop filled to bursting with earrings, watches, rings, bracelets, belts—all glitter and no gold, but who cares? Earrings hang in rows on the walls. Small ones. Medium ones. The large ones intrigue me because I love large earrings. Light catches in the prisms of the stones. The false-stoned earrings wink at me seductively—especially the chandelier babes. I lick my lips looking at them, wishing I could buy and wear them all. I resist the temptation. Earrings are not what I’ve come for, I tell myself and march out the door.
On the corner, a pale-skinned goth boy dressed in deep black with orange hair shouts at passersby, “Hey, anybody got a fucking cigarette?”
People pay him no mind. I don’t either as I cross the street, looking for a particular accessories shop that carries the rhinestone baseball caps I want to buy. In a few minutes, I find it and go in, heading straight for the back of the shop. At the back, I see rows and rows of hats—all kinds, baseball, cowboy, sailor. The hats are colorful, made of fabric and straw decorated with appliqués, rhinestones, bands, feathers, etc. I find my preference and try on several rhinestone baseball caps in acqua, rose, lime, dark green, pink. I notice two, older White women that I take to be “Red Hat Ladies.” They are shopping for wide-brimmed hats in red with purple accents. Their arms are filled with other kinds of hats as well. At the counter, I pay for my hats while admiring a huge variety of displayed rhinestone reading glasses. Out I go. On to the next place that wants to relieve me of my money.
I browse on Santee Street until I find another interesting looking accessories shop. It looks to be specializing in belts and handbags. Their merchandize is exotic and unique to me. Shelves and shelves of handbags of every texture, hue and design decorated with stones, beads, lace, and appliquéd flowers. Walls of belts that sparkle, shimmer, and shine. I find the little neck purses that I want and a white belt with big, clear stones. The saleswoman who takes my purchases asks for ID to validate my credit card. When she sees my last name, she asks me if I’m kin to John Lennon. I smile and shake my head, used to the little witticism that I’ve heard most of my life. The only thing that surprises me is that she is Asian and very young, too young to know who John Lennon was, I would think. Guess not, though. He was a celebrity, after all. And if there’s one thing we can be sure of, even if they don’t know history, young people know celebrities.
Pleased with my purchases, I leave the store. Outside, I check my watch and decide to head toward the bus stop. I’ve enjoyed people-watching and bus riding. Plus, it’s been a good afternoon to shop. I’ve found what I wanted and the prices were right.
What more could I woman ask?
(end)
L.A. Observations 5: Paradigm Shift
The world has changed. Global Warming. Energy Crisis. High Gas Prices. This stuff is not going to go away. A paradigm shift is in the driver’s seat.
What's a paradigm shift? A paradigm shift is a change from one way of thinking to another; it’s a revolution, a transformation and it’s driven by agents of change.
Think about it. A paradigm shift introduced the personal computer and the internet. Two things that have made an impact on our personal and business lives in multiple, myriads of ways. Used to be that you’d write letters to be delivered by the post office. Now, you email. Used to be that I’d go to the library to research jobs and find special kinds of information; or I’d use the Yellow Pages to find out what household services were available, where to purchase a mattress for my bed. Now, I do all that via the internet. Which also lets you do your taxes, apply for Social Security, get a college degree, balance your check book, and pay your bills. All via the internet. Foreclosures on Homes. Jobs Disappearing. Wall Street Collapsing. The Economy Crisis. People are pretty scared right now. Times are uncertain. We’re going to have to make adjustments. Learn how to do things in new ways.
Observation: Buses, People and Walking Home. The buses in Los Angeles are crowded nowadays. Very. You’d think that people would be cranky and rude. Not necessarily.
I’ve found that bus people can be polite and considerate. You’d think otherwise when people are smooshed together, standing wherever there’s a smidgen of room, lining the aisles, clutching overhead rails to keep balance. A young, Black woman offered me a seat the other day as I climbed the front steps, thanking God that this sardine-packed bus had stopped to let me on. She motioned to me to take her seat and I took it gratefully. There is, I see, something to be said for graying hair and telltale lines on the face. Other standing bus people made room for mothers with children and folks with walking canes. It was a gratifying sight. I’d all but lost hope when it comes to social graces like politeness and consideration in 21st century urban settings.
Crowded bus have meant that the drivers have taken to passing people up at the bus stops. I can understand why when your passengers are so numerous that when you do pick them up, they’re packed like sardines from front to back, standing right at your shoulder as you drive the city streets.
Not long ago, I stood and waited on Adams Boulevard outside of Mount Saint Mary’s Doheny Campus in 90 degree heat for a bus to take me home. Two of them passed me by. One at 12:30 p.m. and one at 1 p.m. Since buses had been passing me up more or less (mostly more) for most of the month of September, I had begun to follow Plan B in order to get home. Plan B is, simply put, start walking when a bus passes you up. So, by the time the 1 p.m. bus trundled by, I had made it to the Vermont and Adams bus stop—quite a few blocks away from where I’d started out. That day, I never saw another bus going west on Adams the whole time I was walking home. I made it home in 60 minutes.
Now, I’m in pretty good shape. But the heat and the distance were, to say the least, something that I don’t want to have to deal with every time I have to come to work at Mt. Saint Mary’s three times a week. And the bus service is so uncertain that I don’t want to take the chance. So I have started driving to work again after two years.
I hear that the reason the buses are late, crowded and passing people by is because they’ve taken 40 of them off the fleet. Gas prices warrant a cut in services, the reasoning goes. I can understand when a crowded bus passes me up, but right now, I am not a happy camper. The thing is… how are we to go “green,” to cut back on energy use, to change the way we drive if there’s no public transportation for us to substitute our cars for? Why should I vote to yes in November for a proposition that will fund public transportation projects that supposedly will help Angelinos park their cars, save energy, help sustain the environment when the folks in charge of public transportation aren’t taking care of business right now?
It’s frustrating because I want to park my car and take the bus. But who has the time or stamina to walk to destinations that are far apart? So. I’m back in my car. But for how long? Gas prices may go down for a moment, but I know they’ll shoot back up again. Higher than before. Then what?
Observation: Cell Phones, Conversations, Driving. Change permeates our lives. We’re no longer a mechanistic, manufacturing, industrial society. Now, we’re service-based and information-centered. We’re moving at an accelerated rate of speed. Technology seems to push us to go faster and faster. It’s the monster tsunami that rushes in, grabs hold to pull/push our lives, my life, in directions we/I can’t imagine.
We’re going fast. Very fast. With Cell phones in our hands.
The other day, as I sat in the waiting room at the University of Southern California Dental Hygiene Clinic, a heavy-set white man pulled out his cell phone, pushed a button and proceeded to talk to somebody in a tone of voice loud enough to reach Washington, D.C. I looked up from the book I was reading, an annoyed look on my face, and checked the man out. He seemed oblivious to the attention his loud conversation was drawing from me and other people in the crowded waiting room. He went ahead with his conversation and clicked off when he was through. Oblivious. Clueless.
My question is this. Why do I have to listen to somebody’s loudly intrusive and utterly boring conversation in public? Privacy. Is it a thing of the past?
When things like this happen—and they happen all too frequently—I inevitably wonder why somebody would think I’d want to listen to their personal and/or business conversation? It just puzzles me when people do that. Is it because they feel insignificant, invisible even and wish to make statements that say: Look at me. Listen to me. Whether you want to or not, I demand it. This kind of behavior makes me hate the use of cell phones in public where the user feels obligated to disregard other people and shout out a conversation on the phone.
The other thing about cell phones is that I also fear them…being used behind the steering wheel, I mean. People are already acting/feeling crazy on the road…in too big a hurry… angry and ready to use their cars as weapons…multitasking and defocused. Add a cell phone to the mix and there’s your big trouble. In California, unless both hands are free to drive, it’s against the law to use it. But that doesn’t solve problem of driving while talking on a cell phone.
The problem is that you really can’t focus on talking on the phone and driving at the same time. Driving requires focus, keeping a sharp eye out for: the pedestrian who darts out in the street between cars or after the light has changed… the car that comes tailgating at you out of nowhere… the driver that floors the accelerator to run the yellow-red light at the intersection. Using a cell phones when you’re driving is just dangerous. Period.
(end)
