Let's play a game called actualizing the ideas sitting in my noggin.
So I'm a, the word is "Phoenician" when you're a life long Phoenix native. So this southwestern city means a lot to me.
I am obsessed by the cultures and subcultures that make it run. The freeways, the snow birds,the goths, I'm obsessed with the coffee culture.
It's kind of complex they way they create a little community should they so choose.
I drive a lot. It's crazy to me the car culture across the valley. (Cannot begin on hispanics and their automotive engineering art) One, you need a vehicle in the desert. The public transit system has its limits and the freeway system is intentionally so complex. The airport now has a couple of loops connecting the east and west ends of the valley before they drift off even further north and south.
I've lived here for 20 years. Driving the same valley, watching it change. It's been incredible watching places upgrade. Plazas becoming more dense. An empty lot became a women's center. I watched it be built every day on my way to school. I didn't get to watch the fields that rotated cotton, pepper, and corn become various structures. Mostly housing, apartments, and hotels.
Change can be good. I've got a lot to say on it though. Firstly, welcome to the desert. It may not be kind, so we must be.
I always love meeting people. We are so filled with stories. Even if we have nothing in common, by chance, we share time and place. And what are those odds. I met a lot of people at school. In state tuition was cheaper and it wasn't a bad school, maybe it did used to have a worse reputation though. Most people just wanted to go out of state and maybe had family here already. Lots of people tell me they visited once and fell in love. I understand why. That community of people exists very heavily throughout the southwest. It's breathtaking.
I love hearing from my elders who tell me the state has been under construction since the 80s. Before the loops, and it was just Grand Ave. I don't think the east valley was a developed thing but I recognize by bias when referring to that area. There's a neat street system.
In Downtown, Central is the name of the road that the light rail runs on. Cars can take it too of you're trying to hit up a bank or restaurant on the surface. Going west, the streets are numbered as Avenues. Going East, they're numbered as streets.
I know there's more than that and i look forward to learning about it.
I just miss my mountains. That's the reason people come here. This valley is surrounded by Camelback, South Mountain, Tempe Twin Buttes, Papago Park, you'll hit the White Tank Mountains if you keep going west, Superstitions and the Dutchmann East, our gorgeous flagstaff journey north.
I want to share maps for the sake of visual reference, it's beautiful how they all sit together. And it's interesting the way our road wrap around them. Food for thought next time you go outside. Thanks for reading
