Out Of Stock Pt. 2
(Continuing a paper for the 244th Congress of the Forum for American Folklore.)
2.9.15.138 “Sticky”
A city proceeds as a polypus, and is always having throwing out tentacles as it thinks to go in more directions. Anything it touches becomes stuck fast to it, and is indeed another link of chain, another cell’s‑worth of strength.
Verity Denford, “Taming the Metropolis,” Drafting Table (January 1941), p. 147.
2.9.17.153 “Takanakuy”
Public places, every time, appear to me as a battle of all against all, the sort of barroom fight in a Western picture where everyone manages to get thrown through the window, just to keep fighting in the street. Each man sets out to fight the man in front of him, and he only turns when a stray blow lands from another direction.
-Delbert Pinckney, Naked I Shall, Brock, 1952.
2.10.23.188 “Contract Bridge”
Imagine two suburban neighbors. They start with unbuilt lots, and have to guess one another’s intentions. One plays two bedrooms, and the other answers with three. One plants two Japanese maples; the other, only one. One fronts the street with five windows; the other answers with seven.
- Drea Tedeschi, “What Development Wants,” Masthead.com, April 18, 1999.
2.10.25.236 “Stock Photo”
…all the asset wants is to anticipate something that you’re already thinking. It’s the same with houses. A developer knows that when you think of a house you are thinking of a peaked box with three windows and a chimney and a front door in the middle. They can meet you halfway there, but then you can’t get a good mason anymore for the chimney.
-Elinor Pietruski, “Bracing for the Crash,” Circuit (November 1978), p. 29.
2.11.27.255 “Pen & Paper”
In a large, windowless room, the community sits in small groups at card tables, playing through fictional zoning appeals, reviews of erosion control plans, and curb cut approvals. One community leader at each table patiently leads the rest with the help of copious notes.
-Della Drinck, “New Program for Civic Engagement.” Boulder Intelligencer, May 30, 1995, C1.
2.11.31.269 “Sealed”
The code to the city has been locked away in a safe. The safe is in an office, in a little bank building, off on the edge of the city, up above the road on a little ridge. A few people work at this bank but one elderly man alone knows the combination to the safe. Every morning he comes to the office where the safe is and looks through a telescope, between two trees, at the city growing beyond. He checks the results against the code and clucks to himself every now and again.
Jane Barker, “Fable,” 30 Stories, Sutton Long & Sons, 1988, p. 40.
2.11.33.274 “Sweater”
Put on a comfortable sweater and venture out on an average day. The sweater will lend you an air of trustworthiness and allow you to successfully approach any passerby you may meet with. Don’t pass out fliers, don’t make demands – just extend a hand.
-Charles F. Wrighton, “A Neighbor’s Guide to Planning Your Community,” Our Home (July 1965), p. 14.
2.12.34.280 “Adversity”
Access to food, shelter, and medical care of the highest quality shall be guaranteed as a basic right, with the sole provision that everyone availing themselves of these benefits be made to appear as shabby and deprived as possible. The free hospitals shall be hidden in cinder-block warehouses, and the windows of spacious duplexes shall be covered with ragged boards and old sheets.
Ian Chalke, Leylines, Du Fey, 2011.
TO BE CONTINUED.
