{"id":13229,"date":"2015-10-01T02:54:09","date_gmt":"2015-10-01T02:54:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/?p=13229"},"modified":"2015-10-01T02:54:09","modified_gmt":"2015-10-01T02:54:09","slug":"michigan-left-wayfinding-in-a-new-city","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/michigan-left-wayfinding-in-a-new-city\/","title":{"rendered":"Michigan Left?! Wayfinding in a New City"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Thankfully, I was prepped by Michiganders before I arrived: <strong>&#8220;There will be times when you want to take a left, but you&#8217;ll have to turn right first.&#8221;<\/strong> What?!<\/p>\n<p>I am not a native Detroiter. I&#8217;ve lived most of my life in Arizona where construction is new, streets are rectilinear, and I have years of experience in finding my way around. Six weeks\u00a0ago, I packed my car and drove from Scottsdale to Detroit. I thought I could minimize disorientation by studying\u00a0the city beforehand,\u00a0<em>but I quickly realized nothing can prepare you for Detroit\u00a0except to live it<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>So on my first day in the city, as I drove to an apartment I had never seen before, I was faced with a Michigan Left. \u00a0I was ready: I&#8217;d watched videos, studied diagrams!<\/p>\n<p>And with a Detroit PD car behind me, I\u00a0turned\u00a0right, paused at the median, and merged with oncoming traffic. My first challenge, however minor, complete.<\/p>\n<p>Since then, I&#8217;ve found myself in more uncharted territory: discussing race issues in the city, driving down Mack Avenue with a chair strapped to the back of my car, zip lining on a ropes course, fixing\u00a0a flat tire, and meeting incredible\u00a0people doing cool things in the city.<\/p>\n<p>There seems to be an art to\u00a0living in a new place and\u00a0getting comfortable with disorientation. Very few things are the way I expect them to be, and so I watch and learn. I think that&#8217;s the best way to find out what exists and how I fit into the larger picture. It&#8217;s wayfinding without a compass or a guide.<\/p>\n<p>There are thousands of stories in Detroit, each person navigating her\u00a0own challenges, and now I am\u00a0just another person turning right to turn left.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thankfully, I was prepped by Michiganders before I arrived: &#8220;There will be times when you want to take a left, but you&#8217;ll have to turn right first.&#8221; What?! I am not a native Detroiter. I&#8217;ve lived most of my life in Arizona where construction is new, streets are rectilinear, and I have years of experience [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":268,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,260,89,282,65],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-livedetroit","category-new-beginnings","category-observed","category-reflection","category-thoughts-on-cities"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13229","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\/268"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13229"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13229\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}