New Home

Since leaving New York, many of my pals have expressed interest in seeing where I live now and what it's like here.  I've been carrying my camera around with me for the past few months, trying to capture the feel of the area, but it's hard. Really hard.

My favorite house in the neighborhood

A cute Minneapolis 4-plex

My neighborhood is pretty interesting, a mix of white hippies (young and old), black middle and working class, recent Mexican immigrants and lesbians of all stripes.

There are a lot of art cars around.

A little heavy handed, maybe?

Luck be a lady tonight!

Thelma and Louise?

And several community gardens.  People are seriously into gardening here, maybe because summer is such a short and treasured season.

It's been fun to see the  flowers growing here, and I've been surprised at how different they are from the ones I was used to seeing in Brooklyn.

Hibiscus!  The first I'd ever seen.

My neighborhood is called Powderhorn, named for Powderhorn Park, which is just across the street.  I love the park, and it  makes me miss Prospect Park just a little bit less. Powderhorn Park is about 60 acres and has a lake, jogging paths, several baseball diamonds, five playgrounds and 10 tennis courts. What?! Awesomeness.

Oh yeah, and a kids pool. More awesomeness.

The park is really well utilized by people in the neighborhood. Soccer games and BBQs have been popular activities this summer, and there's a rec center where they have pottery classes and you folks can check out canoes.  Oh, and some hippies hold an outdoor church-like service in the park every Sunday.  I can see them from  from my living room window and hear their tambourine and guitar music.  Yep.

Can you spot the Great Blue Heron?

I'm excited to see how people's use of the park changes in the winter.  In the early part of the last century, it was several times the site of the US Olympic speedskating trials!  Neat, right?  And there are some great hills, so I'm thinking sledding will be popular.  Personally, I'm hoping their might be some cross-country skiing.

Lovely as it is, the lake in Powderhorn is a small one.  There are a lot of lakes in Minneapolis, and one of the ones I visit the most is Lake Calhoun.  It's just over three miles in circumference and is ringed by running and bike paths.

Oh! Sad surfer.

It's not apparent from these photos, but Lake Calhous is usually swarmed with people in the warm weather, sailing and kayaking and canoeing and swimming. It's so healthy and inspiring

When you live in Minnesota, there are somethings you couldn't avoid if you wanted to.  One of those things is the legacy of Laura Ingalls Wilder.  There are traces of her everywhere.

Another is the Scandinavian influence (although if you know me, you know how much I LOVE all things Scandinavian).

One thing that I haven't been able to get used to is the super creepy ice cream "trucks" here.

I mean, really?  Have you ever seen something more clearly reminiscent of a 1970s pedophile's "party van"?  Who in their right mind would buy ice cream from a tinted-window conversion van? Not this sister.

So that's a little about things here, the stuff I see most every day.  Next time I'll tell you about some of the things I've been doing here out (mid)west.