The Loss of Urban Grit...

These days it is hard to tell NY and LA apart what with all the shiny stores and streets and people. Not many will pine for the old days when NY was filthy and gray and deadly, but who can deny it had good teeth? I remember being truly scared walking around certain parts of Alphabet city after dark when I was a teen. Today the only thing that might scare me in that neck of the woods is an $18 mojito served by someone so cool I would have to slit my wrists in a gesture of sacrifice to their fashion sense. NY might have been dangerous and grubby in the 70s and 80s but ironically it somehow seemed more innocent, or at least more purely corrupted in its pre-branded phase. Actually, I would say that of the two cities, LA retains something far more pure and lovable in its sprawling awfulness.