Post-Flint
Rich Frost, who has blogged about the long-lost eastside and provided some artifacts from his work at WTAC, gives us a few thoughts on life after Flint:
"Anyone who has grown up in Flint knows that the first thing that you want to do when you're old enough is to get out of Flint. But once you get out of Flint the first thing that you discover is how much you miss the city.
"When I lived in Flint one of my biggest bitches about the town was how lousy The Flint Journal was, but it didn't take long to discover that the Journal was like reading The New York Times compared to the daily newspaper in the city that I moved to. Even with the Journal in the lousy shape that it's in today, I miss the old hometown rag.
"No matter how much Flint civic leaders try, Flint will never be a tourist destination, but there will always be a sense of pride about the city for anyone who has or is still living there. I look at Flint like having an ugly sister — you know she's ugly and everyone else knows she's ugly — but you still love her and you don't take kindly to people talking unkindly about family.
"When it comes right down to it, I'm from Flint (Damn It!!!!) and proud of it! Flint, where a brown grocery sack is still a Hamady bag, where a coney island is still a meal and, even though many of us now live miles away from her, Flint is the place you still call home."
Rich Frost, who has blogged about the long-lost eastside and provided some artifacts from his work at WTAC, gives us a few thoughts on life after Flint:
AMEN!!! I left Michigan 17 years ago. I have visited often but about 10 years ago I would say I started to think of TN as 'home". Now that I have children and take them back for visits, I find myself engulfed in emotions and memories I had long forgotten - 99% of which are good memories. I was just there mid July for 10 days (actually Fenton and GB where my family now lives - but I was a South Side girl). It was such a great trip. I felt a lot of pride, and overwhelming sorrow at the same time. This time when I left "the ugly sister" I was so sad. Once again - you think you want to leave, and you do but it never really leaves YOU. Like we say - you can take the girl out of Flint but you can't take the Flint out of the girl!
ReplyDeleteI will hop a plane to Flint this Friday, for the first visit in about 9 years. I left Flint 23 years ago (or, really, 26 years ago - I spent 3 years in Pontiac before decamping for MA). I have been utterly immersed in this website, the Journal website, and numerous linked sites for a few weeks now. Yup, pride and overwhelming sorrow, and I'm not even there yet.
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