Gurachi's interpretation of the author, hard at work in Cafe Yesterday. See more at www.berkeleybeings.blogspot.com
I have a friend who – because I’m about to reveal that he wears women’s clothes – I’ll call Alfonso instead of using his real name. Now here’s the thing about Alfonso: he looks fantastic in women’s clothes. In fact, I was trying to describe him to my mother one day, and I couldn't quite sum him up without mentioning it: he used to work in a bike shop but now he designs solar systems for a growing company. He’s got a giant mop of curly hair and is really good at random things like roller-skating. And he pulls off wearing women’s clothes better than anyone I know.
This year, he went to Burning Man for the first time and wore a flowered women’s onsie. He introduced himself as Pancho Flora and didn’t take it off the whole time.
Now, here’s the other thing about Alfonso: he’s a professional who makes a good salary and basically has his shit together — probably as much as anyone I know.
But it's in a weird, Bay-Area-ish sort of way: he still goes to punk shows in garages and house parties that screen foreign films, much to the delight/consternation/self-admiration of the guests. Nothing makes him happier than free stuff, and taking advantage of things that don't cost money plays a large role in shaping his social landscape. He rides his bike everywhere and could be mistaken for a high-schooler by someone who didn’t know better. And he likes it all this way. He’s living the good life in very quintessential Berkeley fashion, to the point where, in describing Berkley to his mother, he says this: it’s like paradise.
And in a number of ways that might not be immediately obvious, it is. Sure, there are bike racks and bike lanes everywhere, and nice weather pretty much all the time, and trees that grow food right in people's yards. And there is, indeed, an abundance of free activities and resources here and in the larger Bay Area, ranging from slackline yoga workshops to movie nights to bike kitchens to soup kitchens, plus free clinics and mental health organizations and spaghetti dinners and the Berkeley Tool Lending Library, just in case you need to borrow a posthole digger.
But there's more: warehouses converted into performance and art space for circus schools and glassblowers, urban homesteading and hacker collectives that teach people real-world skills, and impromptu meet-ups, gatherings, and workshops all over the city, that are underwritten by the same can-do meets anything-goes attitude that is so common here . . . the one that allows people like Alfonso to exist and thrive, peacefully undisturbed as they head to work sharply attired in tight brown twill pants, black ankle boots with just the right amount of scuff, a sage green blouse with pheasants and pearl buttons (on the left), and a tweed vest.
It's an attitude that I see every day, in new ways that surprise and delight me. If you live in Berkeley, or in a place like it, you already know about this kind of magic. And if you don't you're saying either, "I don't want that kind of magic; Alfonso sounds like a freak," or you're saying, "so what?"
Here's what.
Making space for the free, the unusual, the unencumbered in the day-to-day urban landscape is the same as making space for growth and progress. Because growth and progress stem from innovation, and innovation stems from weirdos being weird – and letting that weirdness, whatever its particulars, shine through.
Right now, I'm sitting in my neighborhood coffeeshop, Local 123, where I have never once failed to delay my work by entering a hopelessly interesting and esoteric conversation with a fellow café-goer. Mathematical modeling of sacred geometries in nature; early childhood development; last week, it was an architectural student who spent her youth traveling internationally as an equestrian vaulter. The week before, it was also an architect. I noticed him working outside in the courtyard on some beautiful colored drawings. We got into a conversation – it turned out, he had designed the coffeeshop, teasing its current form from the walls of an abandoned painters’ union, hence the name – and he promptly invited me back to his firm to interview with the three managing partners for a job.
And just moments ago, it was an unaffectedly outdoorsy looking fellow (flipflops, torn jeans, striped cotton shirt with world-may-care wrinkles and tousled blond hair that could perchance use a cut) who started rearranging the tables next to me and rolling up the glass garage-style door that faces the street. When I asked what he’s up to, he replied, “Meat.” In a snap he unpacked coolers of organic free-range pork chops, spareribs and sausages, hung a sign (“Highland Hills Farm”), and attracted a gaggle of similarly flip-flop clad urbanites to his pop-up market.
Why does this kind of thing happen so often in Local 123? And why does it happen around the corner in Café Yesterday, where amid the dozens of regulars who make their offices, no-doubt engaging in dozens of equally esoteric conversations, an entrepreneurial young story-boarder who calls himself Gurachi uses the spot to base Berkeley Beings, an online collection of sketches of the characters he encounters? (If he happens to draw you, he’ll snap a photo of the drawing to complete and post on his website, then hand you the original – all the while regaling you with an overview of his professional talents, which include weaving from just a few seed words – “princess,” “treasure,” “spaceship” – a tale to interest, should you happen to be one, even an A-list producer.)
And why, more importantly, does it not happen at oh, say, Starbucks?
I don’t know the specifics of the arrangement between the coffeeshop and the Meat Man, but clearly it is a coming-together that benefits both — the coffeeshop building its character and street presence and the Meat Man, a former building contractor gone save-the-world-type-rancher, attracting customers in the effortless sort of symbiosis that happens naturally. We got to talking – about the state of organic agriculture, world population growth, his latest project to document nontraditional farms across the region – and vowed to keep in touch. Now, to be sure, this is the “coffeeshop dynamic” that is frequently touted by urban theorists (a la Richard Florida), wherein people gather, ideas are bandied about, connections form, and prosperity blooms. But I’ve rarely seen it work so well in the trendy, pre-fab chain coffeeshops that are the obvious extension of a deep faith in this belief, plopped haplessly into urban developments with the vague hope of producing a similar sort of generative (or at least, robust economic) interchange.
So why is Local 123 better at fostering spontaneous cultural expression than the local Starbucks? Well, for one reason, like truffles that only thrive wild in certain old growth forests, the climate for growth has to be specific and authentic. That is, what makes local coffeeshops unique – not just the Meat Man, but open mics, comedy shows, local art on the walls, dogs, live DJs and more – helps create an environment that caters to all types of creative exchange, even if it’s just vibrant conversation. The unique character of the space acts as a signal for participation, which is neutralized, sterilized, once that space is coopted and reproduced generically.
It’s like a major clothing label that may look at what “cool” (ie: countercultural) skateboarders wear, then copy it and re-market it for mass consumption. People may buy the product, but those people are rarely the ones who authenticated the look. Similarly, Starbucks may see what a dynamic neighborhood coffeeshop looks like, copy the couches and tables and art on the wall, and create an environment that mimics the original (and to be sure, they do – teams of corporate designers are scouting for new ideas to update that trendy vibe all the time) but the people who populated the original space are seldom the same as those enjoying the canned version on every street corner.
Landscapes that support the unexpected are not just about coffeeshops where anything goes, free events to attract artists and innovators, or free services support them when they're underpaid for their creativity. And it's not just artists and innovators who benefit from a diverse and fluid urban environment. It's that, in a sense, good communities turn everyone into artists and innovators. On every level that a community comes together to create, to serve, or to support, more connections are made, more inspiration is generated, more people find ways to connect in work and play, and happier, healthier, more productive communities are born. Wherever there is open dialogue, people interested in what everyone else is doing, confident and passionate in what they're doing.
Berkeley certainly fits this model, with a unique urban fabric that seems open to spontaneous intervention by community members at all levels.
Just blocks from the two cafés, a self-proclaimed Junk Man oozes his wares onto the sidewalk most sunny days, displaying racks and racks of books, rounders of antique clothes, old tools, and an assortment of irresistible odds ‘n’ ends spilling from the bed of an antique truck. Chat with him for a minute, and you’ll find yourself pulled to the side of the house, where he propagates succulents, stores salvaged building materials, and displays collections of everything from old tin buckets to Corning Ware to sprinkling cans – all available to passers by for a low, low price. Does the City of Berkeley bother him for his unlicensed and off-the-cuff business? “They used to,” he says, “but they’ve sort of stopped. They can see I’m not doing any harm.”
The City of Berkeley does still bother another longtime resident, sending him a $6,000 bill monthly for a garden of “rescued” plants that he’s allowed to overtake the sidewalks surrounding his corner home in an elaborate tangle of arches and canopies – mind you, the sidewalk is still perfectly navigable, it’s just covered by a bower of junipers and figs and resuscitated Christmas trees found abandoned on the curbs of Yuletides past. On his roof, the plot thickens: bins and buckets of composting avocado skins and eggshells from local restaurants cradle fruit trees sprouted from pits and seeds discarded at the local farmers’ market. Thick hedges of kale and collards support tangles of tomato vines, and bees oversee the whole mess, buzzing through their empire then retiring to a royal palace of whitewashed plywood to produce their golden elixir.
The architect of this magnificent streetside garden believes that food grown in the public right-of-way is an imperative, and when he takes groups of neighbors and schoolkids through the jungle he’s created, he’s teaching them, he says, not just how to grow food, but how to feed a rebellion – one which Berkeley is apparently none-too-keen to actually squash, seeing as all those unpaid six-thousands have resulted in no further action.
Then there’s the Gorilla Chorus (yes, it’s a play on words) that practices on Thursdays and Saturdays, doors flung open to welcome passers-by, just kitty-corner from my house. Their motto is that everyone can sing, and to be honest, they sound pretty good – key to this, I believe, is the generous basket of tambourines provided for those who may not be fully aligned corroborate their core operating principle. And their mascot is a barnacle. They claim he enjoys the music, and I hate to say it, but it seems true. When they get to really wailing, he extends feathery fronds from the top of his little stovepipe body and waves.
There’s a pay-what-you-can flower booth with a rusty mailbox nailed to a picnic table for donations, morning yoga in the median of a major thoroughfare, plus weirdos and musicians of all stripes milling about performing for spare change. A lady down the street has a sign nailed to her fence advertising a women’s spiritual support group on one day a week, and ceramics classes on another – simply stop on in. None of these things is, in itself, unheard of for any urban area, but the frequency with which I see it – even on quiet suburban-type Berkeley streets – never fails to amaze me. These are not the organized events pinned to community boards and posted on online calendars and listed in the weekly newspapers, though Berkeley has those too, in great numbers. This is a more homegrown phenomenon, a little more impromptu and raw. It’s the sort of thing that can’t be found on an iPhone app. It has to be discovered where it grows, sometimes in the most unexpected of places – and because of that, it touches every person in the community, making the whole shebang more connected, vital and, yes, just a bit closer to paradise.