Cincinnati

I was originally planning to write about 9/11 and its aftermath and its impact on my optimism, but I'll post on that some other time. Instead, I'm writing about Cincinnati, Ohio.

Cincinnati has been my hometown these past ten years, after moving from New Jersey in my late teens. I have a love/hate relationship with Greater Cincinnati. It's where I went on my first date, made a go at college, made new friends, first ate Indian food, and began a productive career that has sent me to distant lands. Presently, most of my friends but none of my family call it home.

I've learned about its history, about its people, and about its culture, but in some ways I've always remained an outsider, an alien. The East versus West mentality means nothing to me. I care nothing for the Bengals or the Reds. Church festivals hold little attraction to me. The chili has sweet stuff in it! Getting a good pizza involves considerable driving time. And I find the city to be much more socially conservative than I.

As I thought about it one day while far away on business, there are many positives. There is the Cincinnati Museum Center and its free lectures on science and history, the Cincinnati Art Museum, the Zoo, and the aquarium just across the Ohio River. There are theaters and performance places. The parks of Cincinnati and Hamilton County are impressive, and our friends across the river in Kentucky have some nice ones, two. The public library system is top-notch, with a staggering collection. The University of Cincinnati offers numerous free and low-cost events, artistic and intellectual. There are symphonies and artsy theaters. The Cincinnati area really does have a lot going for it, but you have to go out looking for it.

I'm not going to try to fit in by going to church festivals and Bengal games, but there's a lot more to Cincinnati than that. It's not New York, Chicago, or even Philadelphia, but it does have its own cultural and intellectual life, and I plan to embrace that life more fully. Maybe I'll find some way to make my own contribution to it, eventually.