Summer is actually, finally, for real here, and that meant a sweaty ride down the hill and up again over to Federal Hill, making sure to take a hit of water at every red light. It’s no joke, riding on hills in this heat, so if you’re out there, do not forget the water. Or the sunscreen. Seriously, people–bring your supplies with you, and get a rack so you don’t have to lug a bag around on your back. Alright, enough preaching. Continue reading
politics
Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake Marching in the Gay Pride Parade at Charles & Chase
Saturday’s ride was a short one, down the hill to find Baltimore’s Gay Pride Parade. They moved it this year, so it was all spread out and felt pretty empty, and it definitely felt more sober as the party wasn’t right in front of the bar. In fact, drinkers had to stand in line, get a wristband, and drink inside the beer cage. That took care of the vomiting in the gutters and alcoholic littering, sure, but it also meant, for me, that it felt a whole lot less organic and a whole lot more like a police-orchestrated public space. Continue reading
US Coast and Geodetic Survey Benchmark Medallion on School 33 Art Center at Light & Birckhead
Monday was a day of appointments all over the city, which actually means a day of riding all over the city, if you are lucky enough to commute by bike. I started early, joining the morning traffic as I snaked my way south and east and south and east for an appointment at the eastern edge of Fleet Street. I skipped the usual route and got to ride through neighborhoods I normally don’t hit, including a bonus morning skip through the Old Town Mall, suddenly slated for redevelopment, thank goodness. I’m a suspicious li’l worry wart, though, so I should probably hold that thank goodness until we see what the city decides to subsidize there. Continue reading
“Excuses Are Tools of the Incompetent” Sign at Carver Vo-Tech High School at 2201 Presstman Street
I rode my bike a lot last week–it’s how I get around 90% of the time–but I didn’t write, giving my typing hands a rest. I saw some good stuff while off the blog: another round of snow, the first crocuses of this slow-in-coming spring, suburban potholes being paved over and city potholes growing wide enough to see the brick of past roads showing through, and, on Saturday, another debate tournament. It was spitting rain when I got up that morning, a little more when I got on the bike to head to Carver High for my first high school competition. Continue reading
Temporary “Mural” by Greenpants at the Open Walls Baltimore Opening Reception at Metro Gallery in Station North
The temperatures have dropped again, spring break is over, and most of today was spent being a grading machine after yesterday was a wash–thanks, food poisoning! None of that meant I didn’t get to ride the Surly one last time before heading back to classes. I took her out for an afternoon ride around Waverly, running errands and remembering how important it is to remember gloves, and then out for a second ride, a short one down to Station North for the opening reception of the Open Walls Baltimore (OWB) project’s second year of events. OWB is a giant art project in the Station North neighborhood of Baltimore, which was designated an Arts & Entertainment district in 2002. That designation means tax benefits for redevelopment that targets artists, and tax breaks for artists who choose to live in these districts. The designation encourages new people to move into neighborhoods that are seen to be struggling due to a lack of residents, or, at least, a certain kind of resident. The arts district is great for tons of people–for artists, small business owners, and anyone who wants to see a vibrant creative scene get nourished in their city. And of course it has its problems–housing designated for artists is another kind of segregation, and isn’t that what we don’t want? And there’s the fear of gentrification–who wants to keep renting to non-artists when the real money’s in redeveloping and calling it “artist’s housing”? As the neighborhood becomes a site of value, property taxes also go up, and folks who have owned and lived in the neighborhood for a long time can find themselves priced out of their own homes. Like anything, it’s always more complicated than just saying YAY! ART! Same goes for OWB. It is a wonderful project that brings street artists from all over the world to paint ridiculously wonderful murals on some of our many, many empty walls. Who wouldn’t be excited by that? Well, there’s the part where murals and street art have become the sign of a blighted neighborhood; others argue that the project should employ some of the many Baltimore-based street artists who certainly have their own stories to tell on these walls of ours. Or maybe murals should be designed with community input–we’re the ones who move among them, after all. And then there’s the part where this year’s selection of 14 murals includes only one painted by women. One. In 2014. Wow. Now, it is certainly true that Station North Arts and Entertainment supports many women and trans artists in other ways through funding projects in the city, but OWB is what they’re known for, and that other support doesn’t change the fact that only one mural–and these things are huge and permanent–will be painted by women. The art world has a long history of just this sort of thing–check out these folks for evidence and some good history of this persistent problem. Tonight’s bike ride took me to the artistic intervention by the collective Greenpants. They projected their short video on the wall of the building that held the OWB reception, and it was howlingly good–funny, on point, and drawing attention to a thing we’re not supposed to notice–that yes, it’s all men, again. I watched a few rounds, chatted with the crowd, and then got back on my bike and headed up the hill to home, glad to live in a city that has such art, and such critical artists, and is willing to have these conversations. Now if they could just turn the heat on.
Pedro Noguera Speaking at Centerstage on Calvert & E. Monument
Tuesday was all meetings in the city, all a couple of miles apart, the perfect day to take the bike. I can’t believe people think it is easier to drive those short trips rather than bike. Lucky me, I have a bike, so I hopped on it first thing and pedaled through the changing leaves over to Waverly for a most excellent meeting with R. and O., two of my favorite co-conspirators. Then it was time for a ride down to Mount Vernon to meet B. and N. for a meeting about redesigning the website and using social media strategically–they pay people for that, but I think we can manage the twitter account without too much trouble. The last stop was at Centerstage for a many-hour symposium, brought to us by the Open Society Institute–Baltimore. Continue reading
Dancers at Federal & Calvert
I spent this most delightful first fall Sunday working on a big project due on Monday and thinking about the exceedingly lovely weekend I had. Oh, and how much I needed a bike ride. So I finished up a draft of the thing in front of the Ravens game, and then it was time to get on the bike for a ride. I headed down the hill to see if I could luck into an Akimbo performance before going somewhere south and east. A volunteer handed me a map, and I snaked my way around to the park at Federal and Calvert to catch the Effervescent Dance Collective. Their performance was delayed by a sea shanty singing quartet that is probably funny if we’re all friends and we’ve had a few (in which case I have no doubt they are amazing), and I wondered about the location of the dancing. And then they danced, and I couldn’t stop smiling, thinking about how clever they were, how free and happy they helped us feel–like when Lily matched her breath to the beat of being pulled up from the water, a sly look–oh, it was so good. I thanked them after–“You just made me so happy inside, thank you”–and then it was back on the bike. I passed a tent on the sidewalk across from the city fueling station on Fallsway. I wondered about why the tent owner’s reclaiming of public space will undoubtedly be criminalized, the home torn down, while the dancers will make me feel just so happy inside. Are we worried the tent is privatising our public space? But wouldn’t we want public space to be used by those with the need for it–I want that in case I need it at some point. Or have we gone so far with our love of private property that we can’t imagine a use that wouldn’t in some way declare ownership? I thought about those and other things on the rest of my ride, over to The Shops at Canton Crossing (it’s still just a Target), up through Brewer’s Hill and down through Highlandtown, up and over and up and over through so many neighborhoods with so many people loving this cooler still-sunny weather. Ravens win!
Assembling Bleachers for the Baltimore Grand Prix at the Inner Harbor
I was long overdue for a long bike ride, so that’s what I got on Tuesday. I had an appointment on Fleet Street, so in my head it was just down the hill. Then I looked at the map–Fleet Street goes all the way out there, to the edge of Canton, and I needed to get on the bike and pedal fast to make it on time. I did, down the hill and up Baltimore Street since I never go that way; just because you’re in a hurry doesn’t mean you can’t take a new route to see what you see. This way east is a longer hill than I’m used to, but it felt good to just pump up there–there’s a downhill on the other side. Continue reading
Fan at the Top of the Stairs Crossing President at Fayette
It was another surprisingly cool and totally perfect late summer day (I can’t say “fall” yet–too real), so after a lazy morning I hopped on the bike and headed down the hill to Little Italy to take in a second day of fried dough–I mean the Feast of St. Gabriel. I’d been down the day before with N. and R. in a car, if you can believe that. Guess what? Way easier on the bike, though having those two to share the fried dough was a wise move. I locked up to a street sign next to the heavy police presence called for at events like this, apparently. I got my fried dough, ate it too quickly over Bingo, and slugged down their specialty cocktail, my blood finally running at full-sugar. That didn’t stop me from eating some of N.’s candy at the movie, however. Continue reading
Monument to the Confederate Women of Maryland in Bishop Square Park at Charles & University Parkway
Tuesday started out a shady and soggy mess, but all was cleared up in the afternoon, just in time for a quick bike ride around the neighborhood. I rode up to one of many entries in the Charles Village Sandwich Shoppe Wars (Quiznos was rightly the first casualty), lunched, and then continued on up the hill and over toward Roland Park to meet S. for coffee. I am up in this neighborhood all the time, but for some reasons, this was the first time I’d noticed the monument set back behind the trees circling that tiny sliver that gets to be called a park. It’s a monument to the Confederate women of Maryland, “The Brave at Home” who “In Difficulty and Danger/Regardless of Self/They Fed the Hungry/Clothed the Needy/Nursed the Wounded/and/Comforted the Dying.” Continue reading
What I Saw Riding My Bike Around Today 