First the music.

I was out in Oakland yesterday for a spell to meet a friend who as relocating out here for a while. He’s a performing artist so I agreed to check his gig out and then go hang.

We found ourselves in Jack London Square at a block party which was part of the Megapolis festival. As a testament to how out of touch I have been with Oakland over the last few years. I was surprised to find out this was the 4th year for Megapolis.There are lots of reasons why  have been disconnected from the community.Work, parenting, my own projects, to name a few.

As my friends observed, things have changed significantly. Oakland is well on its way along the path of gentrification, ah yes gentrification, that special code word. BTW Why do we speak in code so much ?

In any event, Oakland has changed, and I am slowly  wrapping my head around the fact that some of this change change might wind up being good for Oakland despite my frustration around the how and the who.

P.S. And then there is our new mayor. The honorable Libby Schaaf who getting her feet on the ground and teasing us with some of her true colors. The comments at the end of the linked piece are interesting as well.

It always seems hard for people to account for the frustrations people develop around not being heard, or worse, recognized; and how those frustrations can often times provide an environment in which protest can often time also be the space for random venting as well.