Answer: Yes. Just take a look at the slideshow if you’re doubtful.
Fall is my favorite time of year. I love bringing out my sweaters and boots; cooking spiced acorn squash and mulling wine; watching football and drinking pumpkin beer; breathing in the smell of wood fires.
But most of all I love the changing color of the leaves.
I took a walk around Carroll Gardens the other day and snapped a few pictures of the vibrant yellows and reds. The neighborhood’s tree-lined streets and brownstones make for a truly gorgeous setting during my first fall here in Brooklyn.
As I mentioned in another post this evening, I finally made it to the Occupy Wall Street protest at Zuccotti Park. The following are a few photos of the faces I saw there.
UPDATE Nov. 15:Looks like I got this post up just in time. After an early-morning raid that removed the protestors and their tents and tarps from Zuccotti Park, the New York Supreme Court ruled today that the protestors may return to the park but not encamp. What does that mean for the future of Occupy Wall Street? Will the movement fundamentally change, or retain its heart if not its home?
Although I finally made it to the Occupy Wall Street camp in Zuccotti Park, it’s taken me far too long to actually blog about it. (My visit was on Oct. 26, more than half a month ago. I’m still planning on blogging about Halloween, too. Prospective employers: My excuse for tardiness is that I’ve been applying non-stop to you. Please take pity.)
In any case, I had been trying to get there for a while (see the result from my previous failed attempt) and I was eager to catch a glimpse of this chapter of history.
My initial reaction? It was much smaller than I thought it would be. Zuccotti Park is only 33,000-square-feet and although tents are densely-packed — the Wall Street Journal estimated about 200 tents on Nov. 8 — the number of protestors are far less than the thousands I’m used to seeing at marches for a variety of causes in Washington, D.C., my hometown.
My delayed reaction? Duh. Of course there are fewer people protesting Wall Street in Zuccotti Park than I’ve seen protest the second Iraq War or President Obama’s health care reform legislation on the National Mall in D.C. And not because the protestors themselves seem to be different — at least not from the left-leaning protestors I’ve seen elsewhere.
But rather the protest is different because its essence is living the protest, day and night, in this park.This is a completely different animal from the single-episode events that seem to me to be the norm of dissent and ultimately have a low-level commitment for participation. Occupy Wall Street truly is an occupation, and therefore demands a huge commitment from its participants.
A tent in Zuccotti Park, home to Occupy Wall Street.
And with that commitment must come respect. It’s impossible to shrug off these protestors as only partially committed to their cause. They have completely dived in, have completely devoted their lives to the cause, and as such they stubbornly and forecelly demand attention (this protest will not be ignored lest we drum circle you to death).
However, it seems its own downfall may be encoded in precisely what makes it so demanding and alluring. The protests seemingly have to end in their current incarnation at some point. It’s mid-November already. It’s only going to get colder from here, and plenty of outlets have already covered the dangers the protesters may face living in the camp during the winter months (let alone issues like proper sanitation and health).
In any case, regardless of how long Zuccotti Park is home to the occupiers, I made it to see them while they were still there and going strong.
My interest piqued, I read the GQ article. I was expecting some longform pean of Brooklyn, some lyrical testament to the borough’s people and culture. But instead it was only a list of the best eateries (which, as the Gothamist pointed out, rehashed “tired territory”). I was a little disappointed.
Frankies Spuntino in Carroll Gardens.
Not that the food here isn’t amazing. When my boyfriend and I were searching for apartments in Carroll Gardens we ate lunch at Frankies and the cappuccinos were the best I’d had outside of Italy. But even with GQ-approved places like Frankies, Char No. 4 and Lucali, I’m loath to point to these places as the chief reasons why Brooklyn is “cool.”
Since I moved here, I’ve spent nights on rooftops with glittering views of the city. I’ve been to birthday parties in an abandoned warehouse-turned apartment and a townhouse’s backyard with local Brooklyn bands playing nearly until dawn. I’ve gone to rock shows in a venue run out of a guy’s garden-level apartment, with a makeshift bar reselling cheap beer bought at the nearest bodega and paintings from local artists hanging on the walls.
In short, some of the best times I’ve had here, and possibly in my life, have had a DIY quality about them, a feeling that what’s being created isn’t anything that could remotely be recreated in a restaurant that charges $30 for a bottle of wine. Instead it’s being created simply out of the urge to create — and once it’s for sale it’s destroyed.
If Brooklyn is great, which it most certainly is, it’s not because of all the experiences you can buy. It’s because of all the experiences you can’t buy.
Year in Brooklyn 