Hey all,
I'm a newbie to the cellar, and it seems like a great place!
I went to Temple University in the nineties as a mature student, and I'm still living in the same apartment. The only difference between then and now is that I now have all three bedrooms to myself!
The landlord used to live here and he's a carpenter. He re-did all the woodwork in this old house... so although the outer door looks like a normal N. Phila. rowhouse, the interior is a palace! Yeah, it's the hi-tech Bat Cave!
Y'know, living in N. Phila. for nine years has been rather interesting. Despite the blight, guns, beggars, drugs, crime, useless/dangerous warehouse educational meat-processing system, and overall climate (Zeitgeist?) of abject hopelessness, it has it's moments. It's almost like being in a foreign country...
I see children out on the sidewalks skipping rope in the summertime at 1AM. Some of them have never eaten at a place *other* than McDonalds. Some folks can't read the number/sign on the SEPTA bus that goes into center city, they just know *that's* the bus they have to take and it stops *here*... and if that bus route is re-directed for any reason, they're stuck, because that's the only way they know how to get home.
In the summertime, someone will go outside and fire their gun into the air, maybe four or five rounds. Someone *else* a few blocks away will hear that, and fire *their* gun into the air. A *third* will hear *that*, and so on, like birds marking territory with song. And occasionally, one will hear the fully automatic weapon...
I find that N.Phila.'s greatest natural resource (other than dirt) is heubris... some of these young boys have nothing to live for, and thus are capable of feats or demonstrations involving tremendous danger.
And it has moments of great beauty - last summer I spotted an older couple sitting on their steps - they were obviously still very much in love, and were very much at peace. gawd, i wish that i had a camera for that one.
I'd love to go through here with a camera and photograph My North Phila. Mebbe Soon. Then mebbe My Frankford Avenue and the corpses that walk along there.
Daktari