D. T. Pennington
Midland also happens to be where I did a bit of growing up. Nothing further is worth noting other than Midland being one of the many homes of the Bush family. They, semi-ironically, pay for the libraries. It’s like donating to a soup kitchen even though you may never actually have to eat at one.
My time spent in Midland may or may not have anything to do with where I’ve ended up today.
My folks eventually moved us out of Midland and settled in Arvada, where I experienced the anguish and anxiety of being a teenager in the suburbs. I then lived in Greeley for a spell, all the while spending the summers living out of the back of my ’92 Jeep Cherokee while traversing a variety of mountain and desert towns. It was nothing short of impossible to attempt to send me mail.
College ended and I was infected with the idea that maybe it was time to settle down in one spot, buy a few sticks of furniture, maybe pay some taxes. Even that wasn’t enough to hold me down. In the three short years since I left Greeley I have changed residences no fewer than five times.
Of those five residences, four of them are within a six block radius of each other. I’d get a new mailbox key even though I was still walking to the same grocery store and dispensing eerily similar driving directions to my apartments.
The fifth residence? A shit condo I rented in Boulder. That’s a rant that requires a special kind of liquor and, therefore, a different night.
Granted, each move was spurred by a change – different occupations, varying economic circumstances, the politics of living with certain people. I am also far from the only one who jumps addresses like I do. Since I’ve known my girlfriend (going on 2.5 years) she has had four different addresses. College roommates change locales at least once a year. Apartment buildings I have lived in ship off and welcome handfuls of new residents every month. At the end of every month in Capitol Hill every street is lined with borrowed pickup trucks loaded with battered furniture and haphazardly packed boxes of histories – all ready to make their way to the next address.
For as much as we move, we never seem to actually go anywhere.
Green Mountain Submitted by Veronica White
Then again, what can one expect from a city like Denver? A town initially established as a midway between the east and the west – the last stop before you were absorbed into the treacherous Rockies where you went to look for gold, silver, a way of life.
Over a century later, we’re still a midway town. A place for skiers to gas up their SUV’s before heading up to the resort towns. A stop for touring indie bands to play a show, hock merchandise, and hope to draw enough cash for another tank of gas. Denver is, after all, a town nestled at the intersection of two major interstates, several major rail lines, and a major international airport. The edges of our city are lined with storage warehouses and distribution centers. The goods: They come here, but they rarely seem to stay here. I guess the same could be said for most of the citizens.
I could have moved anywhere. Yet I wound up here. Why? There could be a mass exodus at any moment for cities and places with a richer history, more active cultures, and more secure opportunities. Yet, we don’t. The answer is written on a building most of us pass every day, but rarely notice.
Wellington E. Webb Building at 14th and Colfax
“What is the city, but the people” stands tall, proud, in maybe 10 foot engraved letters on the south face of the Wellington E. Webb Building at 14th and Colfax. The quote comes from Shakespeare’s Coriolanus: “What is a city, but the people; true the people are the city.”
There is a certain comfort that comes with knowing your neighbors. As a largely introverted person it takes a great while for me to know people. It’s not a matter of meeting people or being shy, it’s a matter of trust. And in all of my years in living in Colorado and Denver, I can count my trusted friends and colleagues on one hand.
The rest of this town, I dream the lives they might live. From the aged booksellers on Broadway to the dangerously adorable baristas that saturate my beans. To know that every day will present a new-yet-tarnished cardboard sign from a panhandler, or that a cop will pull you over for absolutely no reason at all. Denver is the kind of place that’s safe – you pretty much always know exactly what you’re going to get.
There will always be people. History? Maybe not – as long as Denver keeps developing we will bulldoze our old buildings and replace them with something cleaner. Publications rise and fall, sports teams come and go.
But the people? The people make this town no matter how long they hang around.
You can follow D.T. Pennington on Twitter. @Courier_New
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