30 January 2008 | Alameda Community, Alameda Community Development Forum | John Knox White
The SD&R crew watched “Garden State” last night. (It’s fun talking about yourself in the third person as if you were a group of people. I can see why some people do it!) It was an okay movie. High points for effort and concept, middling points for execution. But don’t worry, I’m not about to start reviewing movies.
Near the end (and I don’t think this is a spoiler), the main character is speaking with his father. The father says “All I ever wanted was for everyone to be happy again.” And Andrew (Zach Braff) replies:
“When were we all ever happy, Dad? You always say that, but when was that? When was this time that we were all so happy? ‘Cause I don’t have it in my memory. Maybe if I did, I could help steer us back there. But I just… You know, you and I need to work on being okay…”
It all struck me as what many of the discussions that take place in Alameda are like. A harkening back to a time when everything was perfect and Alameda was just a quiet small town that had no worries. But the place never existed. Up until ten years ago, the Naval Air Station was active pumping massive volumes of traffic onto the streets, congesting the west end. Prostitutes walked Webster St. The stories of the bars on the west end and what happened when a ship came into port are enough to make some people’s hair curl (or straighten if they are naturally curly).
Before WWII, Neptune Beach was a huge tourist draw, bringing thousands of people to the island. Huge, smoke billowing trains ran the length of the island. Corruption at the City Power company was so bad in the first part of the 20th Century, that city council people went to jail and the PUB was formed. I could go on….
Every so often, the sturm und drang of the BANANAS in town leads one to think that Alameda was Catalina, a tiny, island community that is being dragged, kicking and screaming, into some urban hell. I think it’s healthy to look at where we have been occasionally, and recognize that it played an important role in how we got here.
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