In the beginning of my tenure in the Short North there was Marjorie and Yasue and Debbie and Carolyn and Dotte and Eva.  Then there was Spangler, Roberta, Beth, Nancy, Johanna, Libby, Vickie, Sherrie, Anna, Ruth, Judy, Zoe, Spirit, Melaine and so many, many more.

Now there is Carmen, Liz, Gina, Diesha, Barb, Misty, Chris (several Chris-es in fact), a Kris or two, Lisa, Sylvia, Suzy, more Judys, Marianne, Mary (again – several), Maren, Jeni, Gendala, Christina… well you get the idea.

What is it about the Short North?  Is it the lack of a glass ceiling, since here we can make our own way and build what we imagine?  Is it safety in numbers?  Or perhaps it is just that creativity is encouraged.  Vision is encouraged.  Or maybe it is just the adventure of it.

We are pioneer women. Following in the footsteps of women in bonnets and sashes and heels and gloves. We are not dainty. We are not retiring. We are feisty. We are no nonsense. We are ambitious. We are bitchy. If we were men, we would be forceful. We see things that we want to be better – and we make them better. The ones who only complain and never do don’t last long here. This is a neighborhood of dirty fingernails. Of put up or shut up. Of visions and reality. Of imagining big things and seeing them happen.

It really has nothing to do with being women. That is the beauty of it. Here we are shop owners, restauranteurs, entrepreneurs, artists, actors, writers, developers, rabble rousers, politicians, gallery owners, landlords, realtors, and so on and so on.  No “ette” or “ress”needed. We are just one of the faces of the Short North.

I am a little embarrassed to even notice that there are so many vital women here.  I should be gender blind.  Then, recently, I was on an important committee – and out of representatives from all over the Short North I was the only woman.  I have to say it felt a little weird.  The committee was dealing with serious infrastructure issues that will be affecting the neighborhood – and the city – for decades.  It was not a gender issue by any stretch.  But it was also not a men’s club, so where were the women?  This is a rarity, though.

Women are tightly woven into the fabric of the neighborhood, both business and residential.  I think it is safe to say we hold up our half of the arches.  Well, maybe a little more than our half.  Because this IS the Short North.

What if it succeeds?  What if it benefits us all?  What if it becomes a destination and people walk through the neighborhood to reach it?  What if people go out of their way to see this impossible thing?

This IS an impossible project.  But I have seen impossible projects happen all the time – most noteworthy are the arches and the cap over 670.  Impossible. Both of them.  Can’t put buildings on a bridge!  Can’t get rights to the airspace! If the bridge is too wide, then it is a tunnel and it will need ventilation.  Too expensive. Never been done.  Can’t do it.  Arches?  Are you crazy?  Who will pay for them, maintain them, own them?  Taxpayer boondoggle.  And they don’t work!  Too expensive to fix.  OK, we will fix, but you get an on/off switch and only white. Anything else is impossible!

And yet there they are – arches, lit at night in all the colors of the rainbow.  A cap over a freeway so successful that it is now a template for other bridges in the city with the future hope of rebuilding and reconnecting neighborhoods fragmented in the name of progress.

The Short North itself was an impossible thing.  Rundown buildings, scary and dirty. Tear it all down and start over! That is the usual and safe thing to do. It was done just recently in the University area. Level it, rebuild it, control it. However, most of the Short North dodged the wrecking balls. We had enough bones left to renovate.  And then the work started on filling in the empty spaces. This is an ongoing project and we look to the future for completion, not in months, or years, but decades. This kind of change is not quick or certain, but it will be lasting. The potential is great. We look at the North Short North. That is the future. That is the exciting part. Imagining what could be. Sharing that vision. Working towards making it happen – in small ways and in big ways.

I am not a developer. I don’t have the big bucks that can move mountains or take a vacant lot and make it live again. But I have a vision. I have hope for the future. I can see big things for those willing to take chances, get their hands dirty and pick up a hammer.

Is it art?  What is art?  Is art in the eye of the beholder?  It may not be art, but you know what you like?  Is art for art’s sake? Does your art have to match the couch?

This is something I ponder. I am one of those people who sees patterns and art almost everywhere. Those transitional moments of bliss unique to conceptional art. I see art in the way the clouds frame the moon. The way gravel is pushed into patterns by water. The litter left behind after the snow melts. Rusted metal set into concrete.  Usually what I see is beautiful.  Sometimes it is sad and ugly. But it is still… something.

I ponder why art is important. Does it humanize us? Connect us to the minds and souls of others? Offer a glimpse into the collective zeitgeist? Recognize our common experience and give it a visual expression? And if it is so important, why is it so often either under-appreciated and underfunded or, even worse, shut up in ivory towers where only the favored and privileged can gain admittance?

I believe that art is everywhere. Underfoot. Containing our coffee and our casseroles. Enclosed between slats of gilded wood. On pedestals and in windows and sometimes the windows themselves. Attached to refrigerators with magnets and behind glass with armed guards. Some art is precious, some is transient, some lasting for the ages, some gone with the heat of the sun. I want us to be surrounded with art. Not the kind that only the very wealthiest can afford, but the kind that gives lightness to your heart, or makes you think, or changes your mood, or challenges you or makes you angry or brings you peace. Art made by a person. Touched by a person.  Touching a person.

My youngest son has decided he is going to be an artist. It is a distinct possibility. He is creative and very aesthetically minded. He likes found objects, as I do. He thinks about how things are constructed, as I do. He just built a better mask, with a moving mouth than I did.  Out of a cereal box, duct tape and elastic. I hope no one ever tells him that art is out of reach. That he can’t appreciate it because he doesn’t have the money to buy it. Art is not just for the elite. It is for everyone. Don’t let anyone tell you differently.

Art is everywhere. It is not always good art. Or great art. And it doesn’t need to be. For me, it would be unbearable to live in a museum, surrounded by exquisite beauty that was never meant to be touched and used. I would rather live in a house, brimming with things that please my eye, my palate, my sense of humor, my need for color and texture and patterns. Things for everyday use.  Things meant to be observed from across a room, that change with the light. Paintings, yes, and sculpture, but also glassware and pottery and furniture. Let’s have some fun with art. Let’s make art. Let’s buy art.

My view for the last 30 years!

The following paragraph was written a year ago exactly.  I have not revisited the blog in progress since then, for a variety of reasons – personal loss, stress, life in general.  Funny how the more things change, the more they stay the same.

“We are all familiar with the fame clock.  That clock that counts down your fifteen minutes of fame.  I think my clock is a little over that time.  I added a few more seconds yesterday, although it was for the 4:00 news, so maybe that only counts half.  The media has been running some fairly negative press about the economic outlook for the Short North, emphasizing the empty storefronts and diminished sales and increase in shoplifting.  Our NBC affiliate decided to do a more upbeat take and came down looking for some good news.  The fact of the matter is it is not all bleak out there.  Some businesses go out, others go in. Business is off from last year, but last year was incredibly good.  So the cycle continues.”

Fast forward a year and the fame clock is still ticking.  The New York Times ran a lovely article on the Short North last Sunday, in which I was quoted.  Our local CBS affiliate picked up the story and did a fabulous, upbeat story on the neighborhood, in which I appeared.  I am also in a WOSU (local PBS affiliate) documentary about the neighborhood, which aired for the first time last week. They are doing six documentaries on city neighborhoods – it just happened that the Short North was the first in the series.

Those vacant storefronts from a year ago are filled.  Even the food service spaces.  The store fronts that emptied just after the holidays are also filled. Brown paper and new signs abound.  One space, formally retail is going restaurant.  Actually, the one restaurant is taking three spaces, 2 retail, one office.  Concerning, but not fatal, as far as the fragile mix goes.  A jean store went out, a jean store goes in.  A futon place goes out – another jeans store goes in.  A clothing store goes out, a boutique goes in.  It is all good.  It is all new. And old.  The clock ticks for us all.

The Columbus Dispatch had a small tip of the hat to the Short North this morning based, again, on the Times article.  The author reflected that it is so great to see recognition from the outside, and bemoaned the lack of appreciation in the old hometown.  This is a valid concern and one that I always have.  We are here because of Columbus.  We will stay because of Columbus.  We can not survive without local support.  Yes, we are not the same place as back in the ’80s. Back when we were young and hip.  You do not stay young and hip forever, as much as you may want to.  You get married, have kids, a mortgage, a garden.  The things that anchor you to a time and a place. You need to remember, when you want to have a night out, we are here, so long as you keep coming to visit.  So long as you use us as a resource, for culture and cuisine, inspiration and a tiny bit of dissipation, unique and fabulous gifts for yourself and for others.

The Gallery Hop is still going after 25 years.  We are still here after 30 years. Watching the clock tick, the seasons and faces change.  The Short North really is an amazing neighborhood.  I am honored and proud to have been able to see the changes from my store front window, looking west down Buttles Ave.

Well, actually, we just had a really good time.  And it was the simplest of ideas that became the biggest of events.

We put on a show.

A talent show.  Not a contest.  A show.  Owners and employees of the businesses of the Short North got to show their stuff, shake their tail feathers, rattle the beams.  We started off with restaurateur, Tasi Rigsby, doing a samba with her professional dance partner.  Ekklesia did some wonderful gospel, as did Bree Perry, from Blazers (a bar). Dave Weibel, financial adviser from Edward Jones, played banjo – both as a soloist and accompanying Joe Baer, of Zen Genius, during his take on Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah.  Chris Hawker, Trident Design, also played solo – on a handmade guitar,  before joining Joe and Dave.  Phia Hair Salon had multiple talents on display from ballroom dancing to improv cello/drums/vocals.  Gendala, also of Phia,  was particularly fantastic as she partnered with Short North Business Association director John Angelo for some dirty dancing, before morphing into a politico rapper partnered with DJ Moxy from Kickstart.  We had interior painter Doug Joseph doing a show tune from Hairspray, Shawn Slivinski, from Touch of Earth in the North Market doing amazing acepella Italian opera, and Scott Hanratty, from Collier West, playing the best bassoon I have heard in years. Blue Level, featuring Tracey Smith from Cameron Mitchell, had original music with mandolin and vocals.   The bands McCallister, featuring Bob Corkwell from Europia, and Help Is On The Way, featuring Jason Montgomery from Wood Companies, blew the roof off.

Personal favorites were Heather Leonard, from Cameron Mitchell Restaurants corporate office, doing a song from Evita.  Heather has not performed in public in years, despite being classically trained.  I have been waiting to hear her sing for ages!  My husband, Michael, also sang one of his original compositions, to raucous applause and laughs.  Intentional laughs, as befits a song called “Peanut Butter Junkie”.

Unintentional laughs included the Power Point projection not wanting to cooperate, a few missed cues, and a lot of “what does this plug go to?”.  Which just shows that we don’t do this for a living, and did not take away from the experience at all!

This would have all been wonderful all by itself – but there was a goal – raising funds for a permanent art project in the Short North, either a mural or a sculpture.  And the support was phenomenal!  We will do this again next year.  Once we recover.  And get a new act together!

I am reading the signs.  There are mixed signals out there.  I see large groups of people out SHOPPING!  This is interesting on a lot of levels. Camaraderie amongst friends, the need to get out and have some cheap entertainment (browsing can be very cheap).  And sometimes you get a snowball effect.  One person finds something and it is contagious.  If I only get one or two sales out of a lot of people, it is one or two sales I would not have had otherwise.  Plus every time you get a group of people, you get hint dropping, which can translate to business down the road.

Back to signs.  The signs in the neighborhood right now are “SALE”, “Construction Ahead/Sidewalk Closed”, “Going Out Of Business”, and “For Lease”.  We always have a certain number of the last one.  But there are a lot more of the second to last one then there have ever been.  A sign of the times, for sure.

It makes for an interesting vulture moment for us.  Show cases and shelves are now available.  Some too expensive, some nice, but beat up, some lovely with heaps of potential.  The glass gallery has some jewelry cases for sale.  Good price, but they are red formica.  Still, we are eclectic.  I can work with it.  It is a sign that I need to seriously redo my jewelry displays – something we have known for ages. You can’t sell jewelry if it is not well displayed.  Our old cases are cluttered and hard to see into.  The tops are cracked and scratched.  There is one I just can’t get the lights to stay on.  Re-imagining the gallery space is not something that is easy for me.  I am too familiar with it.  And it is hard to rearrange the furniture when the house is full of guests.  And their luggage.

More interesting signs.  At last month’s Hop, almost everyone paid with cash. That is very unusual and is a sign of nervousness.  A sign of an unwillingness to spend beyond means.  This month’s Hop was the opposite.  I saw very little cash.  And we were having more big single item sales.  This is a sign of optimism.  (And a high number of out-of-towners, thanks to the Arnold Classic.)  Still, I find it interesting and very hopeful.

Today is a lovely day for early March.  Warm, a bit overcast, but very pleasant. People are out and about.  Families with cabin fever, more convention visitors and neighborhood people happy to get finally get out and meet and greet. The restaurants are starting to put the outdoor seating back out. A sure sign of spring.

People cannot continue to be pessimistic.  It is to hard to stay scared, as we learned under all those orange alerts.  People are resilient. We will come back – as a neighborhood, a city, a state, a country.  We are strong. We are smart.  We are determined and we will not stay down. This economy is like a hard freeze. It kills that which is marginal making room for the strong to grow stronger.

So tell me, what’s your sign?

And yet, there is opportunity here.  Four empty storefronts, in a variety of sizes and locations.  What business will find that spot to be just the perfect place?

We all have our personal wish lists: a bookstore, a hardware store, an Apple computer store, more galleries, a custom jeweler or some kind of specialty store that we can’t even imagine since it has never existed before.  There is always someone who has been thinking “Wouldn’t it be nice if I could: be my own boss; run my own business; set my own hours; make my store into the kind of place I would like to shop in?”  And this is the right time to do it.  Rents are a bit more negotiable, which gives the entrepreneur a bit more room for experimentation.  Two of the soon to be empty storefronts are in the middle part of the district.  If I were opening a gallery at this time, that is where I would be.  Or even farther north, where it is a bit edgier.

And, the newest news is that the most far north storefront has been rented.  It will be a women’s plus size resale boutique.  Huh.  I would not have thought of that.  But someone did.  Someone with vision and a business plan.

And I will probably be one of the first people through the door!

700 N. High St. - work begins

Interesting things are happening.  Symbolically and actually.

One of our neighboring building used to be called The Old Time Religion Hall.  It was not a particularly attractive building, cinder block construction covered with square yellow tiles and tiny windows.  Various rehabs through the years had sandblasted the exterior so it could be painted, and enlarged the windows and doorway.  The interior had been gutted and redone several times.  It has been a jazz club, a nightclub, a Kosher restaurant and, most recently, a seafood restaurant.

Now I see that the tile is being removed.  Workers were out today with sledge hammer and crowbar going at it, peeling away a layer of ugliness.   The facade will be refreshed and more open, the doorway moved again and brick more suited to the surrounding buildings will replace the old tile.

I see this as symbolic of what we need to do internally as well as externally.  Peel away the ugly.  Replace with something better.  We have lived for a long time with something that was not pleasing, and never thought to change it because we were used to it and it was easier to stay the same.  It is hard work to shed your skin and even harder to grow a new one.   But it must be done from time to time.

I am watching the process of this building shedding its skin in preparation for its new life.  It will be a restaurant again – what kind and who will run it is a closely guarded secret.  Which is symbolic, too, if you think of it.  This building has a future, and it will be the same as before – but different.  It will be re-imagined and reformed and become useful again.

Let us imagine ourselves changed, but the same.  In the same place but with a different attitude, perhaps.  It is hard.  But it is what we need to do to survive.  Difficult times require facing challenges and adapting to them and seeing the possibilities.

I would not have thought of peeling the skin off a building.  Now that I see it, I wonder why I didn’t.  What skin do I want to peel off?  And what will be underneath?

Stay tuned.

I am not sure how frequently I will be blogging, but my goal is to document the changes in the Short North as we face uncertain times.

The Short North is an amazing neighborhood, often taken for granted by those that live here and always appreciated by those that don’t.  Primarily an arts district, we are also home to some of the best restaurants in the city, and lots of other specialty retail – almost all of it owner operated.  We are in an easily walkable area, as well.  Long and narrow.  Put on your hiking boots, park at one end and walk to the other.  Turn around, repeat.  Along the way you will see limited edition toys, adult toys, antiques, folk art, gardening stuff, wine, lamp shades, vintage stuff, fine art from contemporary and challenging to pretty and decorative, fine craft from functional to fun, kitchen stuff, fair trade imports, cigars, art supplies, dog biscuits, people biscuits (cookies, sweet rolls, breads), Greek groceries, expensive and trendy blue jeans, cheap and trendy blue jeans, scented candles and so much more.

The question is who will still be here in a year.  Being owner operated means no sugar daddy, no deep pockets, no safety net.  We can turn on a dime, though, and adapt.  Perhaps that will save us.

As I write this one of our artists just delivered a lovely packet of paintings priced at $20 a pop!  They are going to go like hot cakes!

Here is to the future, uncertain that it is.  Challenges await.  I think we are ready.

Although, I can add a bit of a backstory.  The area just north of downtown was once a vital area, full of restaurants, and all sorts of retail – tailors, candy shops, grocers, dry cleaners.  All the businesses that make a neighborhood tick.  There was housing for the railroad workers, since Union Station was right there.  White Cross Hospital was also a big draw, so there was rooms for let to serve not just the staff, but relatives of the patients.  Doctors and dentists had offices on the upper floors of the building at the corner of Buttles and North High Street.  Then, the suburbs took over, the downtown area hollowed out, White Cross was torn down, as was Union Station.  All the mansions on Neil Avenue and Buttles Avenue, once some of the grandest in the city, were turned into rooming houses.  You could buy one for $5000 in 1980.  If you were willing to put a LOT of work and money into it.

So, back to our beginnings.  There were many vacant storefronts and derelict buildings.  Vacant lots full of rubble.  Union Station is gone, but the Convention Center has taken it’s place, and North High Street has just reopened.

Yet, there are pockets of life.  A grocery store/deli.  A few art galleries.  A lot of junk stores.  Some diners.  Some really scuzzy dive bars.  A couple of strip clubs.  And us.

Our little block housed one of the dive bars, a coin shop, a rugby club (the building’s owner son was a member), and a dead or alive TV store.  We stood out like a gem or a sore thumb, depending on how you looked at it.  That first year saw us renovating the space and stocking the shelves and paying a full years rent for $6000.

The neighborhood advanced very slowly.  The big leap forward was in 1984 when the south half of the block sold to a developer who renovated it, and the coin shop went upscale(ish), some more galleries opened, and the rugby club left.  (Alas, the dive bar is still there to this day.)  The Gallery Hop started in October of 1984 and we were off!

The next summer more buildings were renovated to the south, bringing more galleries and incredible restaurants and increasing our critical mass.  Success came to us, a reward for persistence and hard work.

Now, the rents have increased to the point that many galleries can’t always afford the south end of the district.  The north end is a bit rawer, with some funky energy and a world of possibility.  A lot like the south end back in 1984.

We are at a tipping point.  Businesses will close.  Restaurants will close.  Rents might just come down, making it easier for us to remain an arts district.  Or the economy may just crush us as it crushed all the vital businesses of the earlier generations.  This is our challenge.  This is our future.