We arrived at the market, to unusually light crowds,
and this awesome guy, who is sometimes seen around town as a bee. This piece was designed as part of a fundraiser, fashion for food.
I didn't get a chance to speak with him much, sadly, as Will was uncharacteristically cantankerous, wanting to go back home, wanting to do nothing, wanting a root beer...
As always, we were greeted, as well, by the little speck of white, there, between the shed roof and the wire, the ever present, watchful eye of our overlords:
We planned to spend much of the day, mucking around, checking out the cut, and downtown Detroit days -- rumors of a biergarten, nothing at all to do with our interest!
The old Globe building -- shipworks, where Henry Ford cut his teeth in the maching shop -- is being preserved and incorporated by the DNR, into Miliken State Park, as an adventure and discovery center -- how cool is that?
It was also once known as a place that downtown brats liked to bounce around and, ah, play frisbee. Yes, that is correct...
Anyhow, moving on... As we approached, it appeared that preservation was a very loosely used term.
Gah!
One might think that an historic note of interest, such as with the machine shop, might perhaps be a selling point to such a project, but in true Detroit style, that portion of the building was completely razed...
Across the street from the Globe's skeleton is a nice marker showing what went on there, one hundred years ago.
Ahh!!
Not exactly what was expected from the mock-up, alack, etc.
The old dry dock with the backside of a still cranky William.
Who happened to find, as he grumbled into a grove, a rather magnificent specimen:
He was both fascinated, and freaked, but started to cheer.
The entrance, to what has become the cut -- Ma: Look what they've done to my train tracks...
Segway rentals!?! Good grief -- where am I?
The entrance, under Jefferson, seemed much creepier, and much darker, in the olden times.
Mostly cheerful people:
Looking Wight:
Left on Wight. Much of this was cleared out when A) This was going to be Casinos. B) This was going to be fancy, shmancy condos.
This is a strange picture, in that I still see the tracks, so many times walked along, or stared down upon, reflecting on the shine that denoted a train had recently passed -- usually on the right -- broken glass between the ties, weeds barely held at bay... We regarded those tracks on a near daily basis for many years.
They said they would allow street artists to continue unopposed, but there was little recent activity. One of the few:
Would that we could:
Will thought this guy was sweet! And insisted having a picture taken -- cheered, considerably by this point.
This cleverly tied in the eroding concrete:
Kid's looking pretty happy now, eh?
Faded courage:
You might notice a rather long stretch, here, between overpasses -- odd, certainly, to those of us that would cross near the jogger in the frame. The Pem-bridge is no longer present, and consequently, Javi will be saving no more birds.
This was the Pem-bridge -- most of it fenced off at one point in the '80's, as the bridge was beginning to crumble.
Whenever we bopped down to the tracks, we'd talk in hushed tones about the train cops, always joking you didn't want to mess with them -- they shot first, asked questions later! I don't recall ever seeing anyone that could be identified as a train cop, but everybody knew the rumor about the kid that got shot: "They just shot him!! Didn't ask questions or nothin'!!!"
There was definite "cop" activity along the cut, on our visit, mostly rasslin' up the folks, sippin' outta brown paper bags.
Under Lafayette.
Boy, beneath a bridge, under arches:
Leaving, strange that you can see Wight up to Jefferson, and -- what? What is that we spy?
Oh.. That guy again.
We made the mistake of parking right next to the Border Patrol, and while we wandered, got pinched by some pilferer, that saw an easy mark in some oblivious suburban whities, parking their easy-enter dodge, packed with pretty, passable packages.
I wanted to track down the guy, to let him know, I'm not just some O.S.W., that I grew up here, but then realized I'd sound frighteningly close to one of the "Glory-Days-When-Detroit-Was-Great" guys. It's a fine line.
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