NEVER suburbs. downtown or boonies.
We are meant to be thrown together in great numbers. it is what urges the excellent & insane out of us so we get to really know who we are and the world gets to receive the most of what we have. i've even got a song, "Madness", about that in the musical i've been writing for the last six years (which is basically Alice in Wonderland set in Manhattan).
"This place keeps a killing pace
The rat race weak & willing face is maaaadness
The chase to make your every dream come true
Could waste the final ounce of grace in you"
etcetcetc
i luvluvluv Manhattan. Don't know if i'd live in it these days, though. I certainly carved out my slice, my patterns, my wilds during the times i lived there so i cant begrudge others doing the same, but i fear all the slices have been carved out by now and it's just artisan excuses for the upwardly mobile to be gaudy. My Manhattan (late 70s, early 80s) had places one just didn't go so you went and you weirded, thrilled & regretted. And you met folks who were the greatest at stuff - mostly @ being contentious, pretentious assboils, but still - and seeing so many 120mph topspin serves kept you on your toes or twirling like a top. That's the very best of life.
And the neighborhoods, your neighborhood. The generations, the ethnicity, the congregations, the eccentricity that made them what they were could not be got for gold.
Can't say if that's there anymore. What i'd probably do now, if i retired with enough dough to live in Manhattan (which would only come with a musical success), is go to a still-decayed city and buy a big, brick building and live/record in half and turn the rest into studio/performance space for the community and make Wheeling or Flint my Manhattan '17. Get my fruit from Mrs Angwewoue instead of Antonelli, coffee & paper from Mr Bok, takeout from the Echeverrias and dodge crossfire in peace in my own slice of madness. Boonies i get, suburbs are no more or less than volunteering to be a bug, but downtown's for me.
