The Inner Birdseye.

I find it's kind of hard to wander in Edmonton, not only for reasons of weather and distance, but because of it's embedment into my subconscious.

Maybe this goes against everything this class is giving me, but I just can't seem to feel lost in Edmonton. It's incredibly large, yes, but it's still my home, and I know it well, even if it's a subconscious knowledge. I may not know the ins and outs of every street and alley, but it's familiar enough that I still have a solid sense of space and direction, and if I happened to get lost, I could simply walk in one direction towards a place that I am familiar with. (This doesn't include Mill Woods, where the cardinal directions don't exist.) It's almost as if, from wherever I may be standing, I can enter this mode where I picture the immediate area from above -- whether it's a block, neighbourhood, campus, or the entire downtown core -- like I'm a bird, or some omniscient being looking down at a maze. I can mentally locate myself within the area, and calculate where I need to go and how to get there. It's something that's done every single time I'm "wandering" and I'm sure it's something that all of you do as well.

Downtown Sydney is pictured above. It's fairly linear, and the blocks more or less intersect as they do here. It's fairly easy to navigate. When I spent some time abroad, I spent a few weeks in Sydney, and despite the fact I carried a map of the CBD in my back pocket, and I was able to find places, the city was still so foreign to my inner compass that I never had a clear understanding of size and direction, and I never knew where I was standing within the downtown core, or which direction I was facing. That's not something I feel in Edmonton.


In Edmonton, I always know which way I'm facing and (roughly) where I'm standing in the grand scheme of things, and I find this is a bit of hindrance to my ability to wander. I've never done so much amazing, fulfilling wandering as I've done in Sydney, where I truly couldn't pinpoint (even roughly) where I was.

Movements

I like to think that I have a good knowledge of Edmonton's neighbourhoods, and I got to be that way by wandering. Or taking detours. The Edmonton I live has three versions. The walking/biking version, the driving version, and my personal favourite, the public transit version.

I've got a pretty good knowledge of the walking/biking version mainly because of my affinity for detours. Rather than take the same route to wherever I'm going, my tendency to change it up has led me to see some neat places that would have otherwise never existed to me. It's not usually a conscious choice for me to go left rather than my usual right, it just sort of...happens.

The driving version, which includes the outer boundaries of Edmonton and beyond, remains more or less a mystery to me. Other than the libraries, I couldn't tell you where to find anything north north or west of downtown, or south and east of Argyll. On those long drives, I usually have one goal in mind: getting there. The journey is insignificant.

The public transit version, though my favourite, has its flaws. It is, of course, repetitive. Also the majority of my time on the bus has me headfirst into a book, letting the outdoors fly by me without me knowing. But the bus is how I integrate myself with the migratory pattern of the elusive wild Edmontontian.

It's these times that give Edmonton that big city feel, the times when everybody gets painstaking close to the stranger next to them, yet remaining completely anonymous. I've never heard more funny stories than I have minding my own business on the bus, or crunched up next to somebody on the LRT. In fact, I saw somebody with no arms get arrested on the bus today.

Needless to say, it was quite a sight.

Blocked.

I must admit gaining appreciation for Edmonton has thus far been a slow process, though I have enjoyed the new technologies that have been introduced to me. Sound maps, biomaps, walk scores, the highrise project; these are all projects that, despite my love for the urban, have entirely eluded me.

As much as I've enjoyed them, I still haven't managed to give Edmonton the proper credit that I'm sure it deserves. All of these maps, I'm sure you've noticed, are of cities far larger, far more cultural, or just far livelier than Edmonton. I'm not entirely convinced there there is a sound map that could truly set Edmonton apart from the sound maps of any other town.

However, Heather, don't fret. I'm not entirely a lost cause. I'm coming around, I swear. The incredibly humbling opportunity you've given me by inviting two established writer to class, has reversed a lot of the misconceptions that I've had about Edmonton, specifically with creative writing.

As somebody whose writing process is slooow slow slow, I've often attributed it to the seemingly bland city that I live in. In visiting Toronto for the first time this past year, I got a taste of what I thought was a writer's city. The infinite bustle of the several million occupants afford so much creativity to stream from my fingertips.

Minister Faust, with one simple thought, brought all of this creative potential to Edmonton. I'm sure it's well into the open that I am obsessed with the concept of what Edmonton could be, rather than what it is, and when he talked about writing about the Edmonton you want, and not the Edmonton you're stuck with, that figuratively exploded my brain.

So the point of all this is, the changes are occurring. Edmonton's potential has now suddenly stopped hiding from me. Or perhaps I've stopped hiding from it. Whatever has happened, I feel it's the beginning of something great.

The Rainbow v. The Right

Amongst the money-loving, tax-hating, unambiguously hetero populous that saturates our prairie province, there exists a (not so) hidden group of gay, lesbian, cross dressing, genderfucking body of citizens who -- despite the fact that they coexist with the young, forward thinkers -- are still somewhat susceptible to the conservative ideology that still lingers in the hearts and minds of the masses.

Edmonton has no Davie’s Village, or no Church and Wellesley. With no established district such as these, Edmonton’s gay population is still fairly translucent to the public. As far as City Council is concerned, it would make our city “terribly dirty” to allow us to hang rainbow flags from light posts, or paint giant hearts on the concrete.

Back in my days of cruising Whyte Ave, I saw many new nightclubs emerge from nowhere, become outrageously popular, and then fizzle out of existence in the span of a single summer partying season. Why was it that bars always failed? Lack of variety, of course. Don't open a bar that offers no more than the bar down the street. To give a little variety, I've said for awhile that if one wants to succeed in opening a bar on Whyte, they should make it a gay bar.

Seems like a good idea, n'est-ce pas?

Maybe not. I got to thinking. The nightlife downtown -- much more tame, much less dense -- gives the perfect opportunity for the gay crowd to flourish devoid of much hostility from the more unsavory of the straight crowd. Whyte Ave, for all of it's positives, transforms with the

appearance of the moon from a gathering place of friendlies to a villainous haunt crawling with drugs and alcohol mixed with wolfish bros just waiting to pounce on the first prey that they see. So maybe, with the thriving population of (Grade A Alberta)meatheads still prowling the Avenue, maybe a gaybar is not a great idea.

But enough with the negative. Like any other fundamental rights issue that has been brought to the forefront in the past 60 years, gays are slowly making their way into the positive light. However, change happens on a generational basis, so even if there are a few knots to untangle, we can sit comfortably knowing that our generation's offspring will be even more forward thinking than us.