Mad Dogs and New Londoners

There is no pug more threatening than the ugly mug of a hungry New Londoner. When New Londoners travel to the suburbs, when they eat at the Olive Garden or Appleby’s they don’t like the food. They usually push away the half-finished plates of pabulum. Besides McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s and numerous Subway chains, New London is full of entrepreneurs handy with a spatula and a spice rack, No food out of a microwave will ever satsufy as much as fresh ingredients bought that morning and cooked under the broiler with devotion to craft.

New Londoners do things their own way, in ways they polished over the centuries since the city’s founding in 1646, You can tweak perfection, but you cannot really improved on it. New things are new, bur they are not better. If a New Londoner lacks patience, it is because he or she had perpspectve. If a New Londoner slavers, it is because he or she is rabidly hungry for something authentic and not out of a can. Give this beast steak, not dried nuggets out of a bag that make their own gravy when water is added.

Sweet Poison

Be careful what you wish for, New London. Be careful what you wish for. The New London State of Mind usually subscribes to a rose-tinted viewpoint. Tonight, after a long and tolerant incubation, a barnacle has broken the whale's back.

As gentrification sluggishly creeps into New London, things will be worth more as measured by property assessments than by honest values. Look at Waterford just past Jefferson Avenue. That is not a community, that is not a city, that is not progress. It is empty land no matter how many cars park on the blacktop lots. Travel Bank Street past the Charter Oak Federal Credit Union. Do we want those buildings in New London? Do we want that ugly Starbucks? Don't we already have enough coffee opportunities amongst companions, brewed and served by neighbors? Do we need to be part of a machine?

Where do I want my money to go? I want it to stay in New London. Where do I want to work? Close to home, where my heart is. Where do I want to live? In New London, Conn., of course. Contrary and flush with conundrums, New London satisfies communal and personal needs grown at home. He who transplants sustains. This is nowhere truer than in New London, Conn.

I don't want to be sold, I want to make. I want to be left alone to pursue my own interest, while not making a fuss. I am like New London, walking an oft-reapeated path and enjoying the action. Upset the cart and a barrell of sperm oil will fall off and spill all over in a mess that can't be mopped. If things are going well, be careful what you wish for. Things might get better. When they do, they will inevitably get worse.