posted 2007/09/05 at 21:23
Last night after work I went up to Ann Arbor to try out a new dance game location. (Yes, Ann Arbor is still standing after this past Saturday, hard as that may be to believe.) Although I've made a few trips up to Ann Arbor in the past, and used to pass through town back when I was still visiting my grandparents up in the Jackson area (I think yesterday was the first time in over a dozen years that I'd traveled on I-94), this was really the first time I'd ever driven through the suburbs of Ann Arbor. My previous trips there all involved me going downtown and through the odd office park, so this was my first chance to see this side of Ann Arbor. For the most part it kind of looked like the suburbs of Toledo that I grew up in (and still, for the moment, live in), except that the stores looked somewhat nicer (probably because they're newer buildings), and of course Michigan does their traffic lights and lanes differently from Ohio. (They also do their highways a lot differently up there ... I swear you have to slow your speed in half while you're still on the highways just to be able to take those tight exit ramps without spinning out.)
At first I was somewhat comforted by the sight of familiar stores and locations. (Seriously, I think I'd be lost if I didn't have Meijer and Kroger stores to go to.) Like all of my previous trips to Ann Arbor, things just seemed a lot nicer up there, although I'm sure Joe Petrow will be along at any moment here to tell me about all the problems he had while he was living there; I hold no illusions that Ann Arbor is this picture-perfect paradise, and I'm sure I'd find plenty of faults with the city were I to live there, but right now I certainly like Ann Arbor a whole lot more than Toledo. I think it's the combination of the college-town atmosphere provided by the University of Michigan, plus the fact that there are enough people in the area to make sure that the city has all of the conveniences I'm used to here in Toledo, that makes Ann Arbor so compelling to me.
After I woke up today, though, I kind of felt sad when I thought about Ann Arbor. I think that the thought of possibly moving up there one of these days just served to remind me of how soon I'll be moving out, and how I'll be on my own soon. Not only that, but the comforts provided by Ann Arbor come at a price; the cost of living and real estate prices in Ann Arbor, while hardly the worst in the nation, are pretty darn high. Given that it'll be at least 2012 before getting a job at Antioch and moving to Yellow Springs is a possibility, I guess that now I've kind of foolishly pinned a lot of my hopes and dreams on Ann Arbor, and I doubt that they're going to be realized anytime soon. Even if I did move up there, it would mean living on my own, and as much as I know I won't be able to avoid doing that for much longer, it's still something that I'm not really looking forward to for a lot of reasons.
I told Mom about my trip to Ann Arbor as I was making lunch and how it just seemed like a nicer Toledo to me, and right away she used the word "homogenized" to describe what I saw up there. From my trip to North Carolina last year I know that things between Toledo and Raleigh are a whole lot different than between Toledo and Ann Arbor, and I think I'd even put Cleveland in there as being more unlike Toledo than Ann Arbor is. The small towns I've been to in southeast Michigan as I've driven around there getting familiar with the area are also more unlike Toledo than Ann Arbor is. Still, it makes me wonder if maybe there are other places I could go to where I'd get a similar feel to Ann Arbor, without the high living expenses. Maybe this is just a passing thing, but right now I can't help but think wistfully of Ann Arbor an awful lot here.
Actually, I thought/think Ann Arbor was/is a fantastic place. Lots of book stores (more per capita than anywhere else in the US last I heard), lots of smart and open-minded people, and lots of fun things to see and do. It's a great place to live whether you're wild and single or raising a family.
Any problems I had during my four years there were not the result of the town itself. If anything, they were in spite of the town. I go down there at least once every time I'm back in Michigan, and I'm never disappointed.
So, like, go for it.
copyright © 2008 Sean Shannon