It\u2019s hard to describe how I feel about leaving Detroit. Four years ago, I would have never pinned Detroit as a place I\u2019d live after college. Two years ago, I\u2019d never have guessed I\u2019d be there a minute after TFA. But here I am after three years in Detroit finding it extremely difficult to say goodbye, and even more difficult to describe my feelings. This entry is a hodge-podge stream of consciousness, but I guess that best mirrors my emotions.<\/p>\n
I have tried to generate several hypotheses about this city and why it\u2019s so special. Maybe we find comfort in its struggles and embrace the fact that Detroit, like us, faces seemingly insurmountable challenges. Perhaps\u00a0we empathize with the fact that\u00a0Detroit is misunderstood by people who don\u2019t really know it. Everyone loves an underdog story, so maybe it\u2019s that. Or maybe it\u2019s just that it\u2019s so damn easy to drive anywhere you want and park within 50 yards of your desired destination for little to no money.<\/p>\n
One thing I\u2019ve decided is that people*<\/em> (*I\u2019m defining \u201cpeople\u201d as young, educated professionals for the next paragraph) can be themselves here. They can follow their own pursuits. If you want to be an active contributor to the movement that is \u201cDetroit\u2019s Revitalization\u201d (which I use as an umbrella for many other, more accurate movement names, which I don\u2019t have the energy to generate or research) there are literally hundreds of avenues for you to do that. If you want to have a corporate job and a nice apartment in a city where you can be a consumer, there are more and more opportunities to do that. \u00a0But something really exciting\u00a0about Detroit is that you can literally be anywhere on or outside of that spectrum. You don\u2019t have to be one or the other. You can be a teacher on the east side and enjoy craft beer at Hopcat. You can be a Detroit native and work at Quicken Loans. You can start your own nonprofit benefitting Detroit children and live in a loft apartment.<\/p>\n But as I mentioned, these opportunities and choices are afforded for people<\/em>*, not people. Not for my students, at least not yet, and not for their families. Not for many native Detroiters, at least not easily. Despite the progress that\u2019s been made, there is so much more to be done. There are so many untouched neighborhoods. So many students who have never seen the Joe Louis Fist. So many families who mark \u201csuccess\u201d as making it as far across Eight Mile as possible. So many employees losing jobs because they can\u2019t rely on public transportation to get them there. So many Detroiters who deserve so much more from the programs and changemakers in their city.<\/p>\n I used to feel kind of silly leaving Detroit now, when things are \u201clooking up.\u201d But I don\u2019t think I look at it that way anymore. Things have always been looking up in Detroit, not because of bagel shops and beer bars, but because of the Detroiters who have been here all along. Detroit was looking up long before I arrived and will continue to long after I leave.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It\u2019s hard to describe how I feel about leaving Detroit. Four years ago, I would have never pinned Detroit as a place I\u2019d live after college. Two years ago, I\u2019d never have guessed I\u2019d be there a minute after TFA. But here I am after three years in Detroit finding it extremely difficult to say […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12983","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12983","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12983"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12983\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12983"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12983"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12983"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}