An acquaintance recently tried to cure my "horrible musical taste" by playing a few modern songs for my consideration.  Featured prominently in this brief playlist was someone named Fergie; I have decided that Fergie is, essentially, Eddie Arcadian's girlfriend from The Last Dragon.
***

Several mornings this week, I have visited the Santa Monica Pier.  I have nothing to accomplish by visiting, but I like watching for dolphins and seals, as well as seeing what the fishermen catch.  I'm particularly fond of a tiny man who always wears a light brown, broad-brimmed hat perched at a jaunty angle and securely tied under his chin, his huge glasses covering most of his face; I'm fond of him because he always smiles and waves at me, which makes me feel fairly welcome, as though despite my inability to fish, I'm one of the regulars.  He and a few others call out to each other from time to time, with no stimulus I can see; one calls out, the others echo:

Ang-hela!  Ang-hela, ang-hela!

Le le le!  Le le le le!

I don't know what they mean, but it's somehow very comfortable to hear.

This morning a new face appeared: a doddering old man shuffled to the water carrying a few tattered plastic bags.  I wondered what he meant to do ... I've seen people fish with the standard poles, with modified pool cues, with weighted nets, with string tied to the railing ... but this gent reached his shaking hand into one of his bags and pulled out what appeared to be just the handle of a pole.  I thought, at first, there was some assembly required, but no ... one deft flick of his wrist, and this was Fishchaser: the Legend of Orin.  He extended it into a full length pole and cast all in one motion, and within ten minutes had three fish in his other plastic bag.  He was a Master, and I hope I see him again.  Jedi.  It was neat.

***

My gym has acquired new weight machines.  I tried them out recently, and they are about as close to amusement park rides as weight machines can be.  Ride Oriented or some such; part of the weight you lift is your body weight, and therefore the seats rock, rise, and fall as you exercise.  They are my FAVORITE machines ever!  I'm sure the attendant thinks I'm a complete goofball, but I had a lot of fun playing on those machines!

Recently, Kathryn Maese wrote an article about a shocking experience she had in downtown Los Angeles.  As you may have noticed in my first post, I live in downtown LA, and have done for quite some time.  I've seen this "gentrification" in all its glorious stages, and I can't help but question some of the attitudes involved.  I wrote an email to Ms. Maese, the gist of which I will reiterate in this post.

To summarize (and you really should just read the article in her own words), Ms. Maese and her husband had a shocking, frightening encounter with a homeless man near their downtown home.  The first point I would like to make is that I in no way find the conduct of that man acceptable or pardonable.  My issue is with the writer's attitude to my neighborhood in general, and to the homeless in specific.

What Ms. Maese fails to realize in her piece is that the homeless population are her neighbors.  As much as the new kids on the block would like the earth to open up and swallow them, as much as the new gentry would prefer to not look at them or acknowledge their existence, as much as these more fortunate would like the homeless to just go away ... they are our neighbors.  Everything Ms. Maese points out about helping out our neighbors is true.  If we see someone being hassled, if we see someone in trouble, we should help.  Her mistake is in excluding the homeless from this policy.

Think, for a moment, if she had acknowledged all of her neighbors, and not just the ones who live in shiny new condos.  Chances are the homeless man who shouted at her baby would never have been permitted within range to cause any trouble.  I can't even recall the number of times one of my homeless neighbors have provided me with a warning or with protection while I was out and about; they know who gives trouble, they know what's happening better than I do, as I walk down the street with my head in the clouds of some ancient civilization or my latest video game exploits.  In a strictly utilitarian sense, if nothing else, my homeless neighbors are far better able to contribute to my safety than my newer neighbors.  In a more personal sense, the majority of my neighbors are pleasant, polite, amusing people.  Do they ask for money?  Certainly, they did at first.  It isn't my policy to give money to anyone at random, and I don't always have time to saunter down to the nearest Subway to buy a sandwich for a hungry person.  Few of my neighbors have a problem with that ... what they want most from me, and from anyone else, is acknowledgment.  They exist, but spending so much time having people ignore you and look through you must be trying.  Most of what I offer them is conversation; I remember names, I ask after children ... I treat them as they are, as human beings, as individuals who share my living space.  They've taken excellent care of me in return.

Is it too early for families to live downtown?  Ms. Maese, families have lived downtown right along.  Some of those families are quite poor, but their bonds as families and their worth as people are not the less for that fact.  Your family is not special because of your income ... it's special because it's yours, and in this every family on the planet is your equal. 

Ms. Maese's husband and child I welcome to my neighborhood without reserve.  As for Ms. Maese, she had a frightening experience, but my impression from her article is that she is, at the very least, a devoted and loving mother, and disinclined to violence.  These traits lead me to believe she may simply have an immature experience of the world, so on the strength of her very positive qualities and her potential to grow beyond her dehumanizing, elitist perspective, I also extend my welcome to her.

Let me first state that I have only the most cursory, feeble knowledge of what I'm writing about.  This entire affair is a mildly frustrated response to Borders not having any books by Hector Munro Chadwick.

I've made a conscious effort, within the past week, to introduce myself to the more social aspects of the internet.  I've started a blog, I've splashed around a bit in Friend Feed, I've joined identi.ca.  While I'm not ready to dive into the deep end, where reside legendary beasts like MySpace and Facebook, I find what I've seen very entertaining.

My fevered, twisted brain often forces associations where none exist, and while reading a book about Lower Mesopotamia it informed me that the internet is in the opening gambits of a new Heroic Age.  Since I can't get my paws on Chadwick any time soon (I placed a hold at the library, but those take ages), I'm making these comparisons from memory.  As I mentioned ... I'm pretty much making it up.  Take that, serious students of anthropology!

What is a Heroic Age?  For those of us with a Euro-centric perspective, the most memorable such ages were the Greek, which Homer tells us about, and the much later Teutonic.  Heroic Ages, a form of societal adolescence, have occurred at various times in various regions.  There was, for example, a rather thrilling instance in India, and a terribly interesting one in Lower Mesopotamia. 

Several factors contribute to and define this period in the development of a civilization, including:

• The Catalyst:  A Heroic Age is the result of a few specific factors, in the way that a tornado is the result of certain atmospheric conditions.  When a relatively primitive, barbaric civilization comes into contact with a more advanced one in the moment (moment being a very broad term here) of that advanced civilization's decline, the less developed of the two may learn and grow into power, assimilating knowledge, skill, technique, and refinement, eventually taking over the alpha position.  This can be seen in the Teuton growth during the decline of the Roman Empire. 
  

What does that have to do with this webmonkey business?  Well, I see several examples, but let me specify the one I've read about most in my first steps into the social web: Traditional Journalists versus Bloggers.  From what I've seen, it certainly seems that traditional journalism (say, newspapers and the like) are fading from their position on "power" somewhat.  Bloggers, however, seem to be both growing in influence and actively gleaning what they can from traditional journalism, even going so far as to discuss and impose ethical standards on themselves in a move toward refinement.  How long will it be until bloggers conquer?  I haven't any idea.  To me, the pattern is the interesting thing.

• The Focus: One of the most recognizable, the most defining elements of the Heroic Age is the focus on the individual.  The city-state, the community, exists and is important, but the real meat of things, the real focus is on the actions, triumphs, and fates of the individual.  Name and fame are extraordinarily important, feverishly important, obsessively important.  Feats are undertaken not only to be accomplished, not only for the benefit of a person or a community ... they are undertaken to be spoken about, to be remembered.
  

Here, again, the bright, shiny social web reminds me of this pattern with its concept of personal brands, with its idea of lifestreaming.  Certainly, personal success has long been a goal within our communities, but the personal brand is another level altogether.  The competition for recognition, for attention; the urgency of it is essentially Heroic in my, admittedly inexpert, eyes.  It's brilliant to watch.

• The Rulers:  Often referred to (on FriendFeed, at least) as "Early Adopters," with a sort of upper echelon known as the "A-List," the rulers of the social web's Heroic Age have many things in common with their ancient counterparts.  Split into numerous small kingdoms, these petty kings and princes (and I mean that in a gender non-specific sort of way) gain and hold onto their power through skill.  In the ancient world, this was largely military skill; on the web, the skills used differ, but the concept is the same: a place earned, a position taken and continually at risk of being taken away by someone more skilled, be it in writing, marketing, or whatever else makes the social web ruler successful.  They constantly compete for dominance, vying for a better-known name and a more pervasive fame than their peers, shifting ranks continuously ... the unique aspect, however, the bit that makes this fit into my imagined comparison, is the interkingdom interaction.  They talk to each other, are often quite genial with their rivals, and have a sense of unity among themselves which excludes their subjects ... that is, their traffic.  The power struggles and the interaction of the rulers is key in creating the interkingdom aristocracy, a brotherhood (again, forgive the seeming gender specification ... both genders are included in my thoughts) of class rather than city-state affiliation.

I'm certain a conclusion should follow, but I'm no more a writer than an anthropologist, and I've finished what I wanted to say, except to note that there are loads of other elements of a Heroic Age that don't spring immediately to mind.  If you're interested in the subject, my sources lead me to believe that this book is a good place to start.  It's not in copyright, and so is available electronically.  Don't ask me why I prefer to read it as a bound paper book ... I just prefer that format for a first time read.

There has been a recent effort to revitalize downtown Los Angeles.  The homeless of our fair city have been quietly carted away to an undisclosed location, hideous new architecture abounds, luxury apartment complexes and condominiums may be seen at every turn.  While the area retains its refreshingly familiar fragrance of exhaust and urine, the urine now comes from people who are simply too lazy to use the toilets available to them, rather than people who have not toilets available to them at all.  Who are these lazy public urinators?  The youthful patrons of LA's newly popularized Night Life.

One of the many amusements available at bar-closing time (between 2AM and 3AM) is the observation of drunken, youthful antics.  Oh, the things I've seen ... the hilarity, the unabridged stupidity of drunken children is amazing.  Have you ever seen a tipsy girl gleefully stumbling down the sidewalk barefoot, having chosen heels beyond her means?  Have you seen the excruciatingly slow dawn of horror as she realizes she's just stepped in a warm, squishy pile of human excrement or a stream of fresh urine?  Have you heard the choirboy falsetto of a drunken man's scream as he's nearly run over while jaywalking in his edgy, dark club attire?  Have you wondered just how he manages to (thankfully)  escape without so much as a scratch?

The comedy is almost unbearable.   So entertaining are these random incidents that one can almost fail to see the few homeless who survived the Moving Day.  One can almost ignore the unmasked disgust and contempt these youthful revellers give to any of the less fortunate who manage to catch their attention.  One can very nearly overlook the phalanx of waxed, lotioned, perfumed, scantily clad women marching down the sidewalk when they crush a man's hand with their heels, or the small pack of men who urinate on a crippled woman because she didn't move quickly enough. 

I've seen downtown LA before and after this influx of party-goers.  I don't begrudge them their fun, if fun is what they call it, but I preferred things before.  What has changed?  The defecators, the urinators, the vandals, the thoroughfare obstructors, the problem makers, the property damagers, the drug users, and the noise polluters are still there.  They just have nicer clothes.