End of an Era

It's now official. I was the last tenant to live in my perfect war-era apartment down the street from Highland Park High. Windows, ventilation, carpenter-built doors and cabinets, nickel hardware, polished lumber floors, the new era is having none of it.

It's not that I'm against gentrification per se, it's that it's been done so ham-fistedly. The dozen half-million dollar three-bedroom condos that will replace the beloved four-plex are certain to lack that - sensitivity - that the place had.

There's something so civilized about facing the street with a perimeter full of windows, a formal colonnaded porch, and the majestic views into the ancient tree canopies that's almost irreplaceable. Demolition starts June 1st, which left little time to scramble for housing. Campus will have to do for the next year. One wonders if state law had been any different if they'd have given us any notice at all. Why can't taste be made obligatory?