When I was a kid, all of the houses, including ours, had 8 foot ceilings. It was the standard. The only exception I knew of was my grandmother’s house in Jackson, Louisiana. It had 13 foot ceilings. This bothered me. “Why doesn’t everyone’s house have high ceilings like Nana’s?”, I would ask. “Nobody builds houses like that anymore”, was the reply, which wasn’t a very satisfying answer. As I got older, I saw more and more new houses being built with ceilings up high like Nana’s. Now it’s all I see. It’s like they forgot how to build houses and then they remembered.
What bothers me now are the subdivisions. Not the people in them, who only want and deserve what everyone wants – a clean, safe place to live and raise a family. My wife and I often drive through Fairhope’s subdivisions and think that the people living here probably socialize and have more fun than those of us in the Fruit and Nut. At least in the subdivisions, the construction is over and they can enjoy their lives in peace. In my neighborhood, the chainsaws never stop buzzing and the 18 wheelers and concrete trucks never stop rattling our windows.
No, what bothers me about our subdivisions is that when I ask, “Why don’t they have their own downtowns with cafes, a hardware store, and churches you can walk to?”, the response is, “Nobody builds towns like that anymore”, which is not a very satisfying answer. We need to think bigger and remember how to make real towns. Ernest Gaston didn’t get people to come to Fairhope by saying, “Amenities include a fitness center”.
A lot will be said in the next few weeks about growth and development. We should all keep an open mind about what’s possible. Nothing is inevitable.
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