Friday, September 30, 2005

Optimism and Graffiti

We had done nothing to earn it, but the Saturday after Hurricane Katrina was a beautiful day around here. I talked one of my children into running an errand with me.  As we drove up the block we came upon a lemonade stand where a couple of kids were raising money for the hurricane survivors.  I stopped the car and asked for two drinks and a giant cookie we could share. We were the first customers, so when I paid the kids with a five dollar bill the father of these young humanitarian-entrepreneurs started digging in his pockets for change. As fortunate as my family was on that safe and sunny day, how could I ask for money back? I waved away the change and we drove on.  If the traffic’s not bad, you can easily count your blessings as you drive through our little city.

Or you can talk yourself into a pessimistic attitude toward Michiana – it’s not hard to do.  On my regular walk I see the work of two graffiti writers.  One of them uses blue spray paint down by the river.  He signs himself as “Risk” but he spells it with a Z – R I Z K.  I picture the writer as a classic American, a young man who wants some excitement, who wants to make a mark on the world, and I admire that. But he has found no role model to help him do it right, so all he has is his nickname, Rizk, written furtively here and there across the city and painted over by street department crews when they spot it.  Rizk travels with a friend sometimes, a shorter fellow.  His messages are a few inches lower on the wall, and they’re always obscene. So when Rizk takes his midnight walks, he’s got this very troubled companion by his side.  Will Rizk’s better self, with that hint of American individualism, be swept away?  Will the other America, the crude and midnight America, take him down?

On my walks I pass chain restaurants and gas stations and other small businesses.  The people who start small businesses are a special kind of American dreamer.  They risk so much of their hard-earned savings, carefully-raised capital, and sweat equity, knowing the whole time that the odds are against them. What bold, hard-working visionaries and optimists they are!  And what terrible decisions some of them make.  You see a small business open, sometimes, and because of what it sells or where it’s located you know instantly that it has no chance.  A year later, all the money and all the sweat and dreams are gone.

In spite of that, I have to say that if you are a pessimist, you’re not paying attention part of the time.  The same goes for optimists. There is plenty of evidence that for Michiana these are, and they are not, the good old days.  It depends what evidence you point to.  Today I’ll point to this:

I have heard on good authority that the beignet served at downtown South Bend’s new Chicory Café are among the best you’ll ever find outside of Louisiana. Beignet are the signature hot pastry dish of the French Quarter.  They are what glazed doughnuts wish they could be.  The batter cooks up into an airy rectangle, and instead of the heavy glaze of a donut shop you have a brilliance of powdered sugar mounded over the top. At my café table on Wednesday, we finished eating and delayed there over red mugs of chicory coffee.  We interrupted our conversation about New Orleans for a moment to congratulate the proprietor, the hard-working visionary who has brought the perfect beignet to Michiana. Then the topic shifted to race in America – our experiences, our questions, our hopes.  My companion and I have different shades of skin. The pessimist in me points out how rarely people cross the color line to have what can be, admittedly, a difficult dialogue about race.  The optimist in me proclaims that just two days ago, at the café in downtown South Bend, we enjoyed dishes of warm beignet and good conversation about one of America’s most challenging subjects.

Broadcast by Ken Smith on September 30, 2005
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