Gentrification Gone Slightly Awry

There's a crossroads in the city where our family calls home. Just before the crossroads, the long narrow plot of land went to a drive-in theater. This was in the 1970s.

Then in the 1980s a state-of-the-art multiplex movie theater sprang up on the plot with ample parking. We saw Who Framed Roger Rabbit? there.

Time went by, and the multiplex got a bit ragged at the edges. The parking lot buckled with potholes. We continued seeing movies there, the last one being George Clooney in The Perfect Storm.

A decade into the new millenium, change was again in the air. The powers that be in their infinite wisdom decreed the multiplex was unprofitable and a blight.
So the wrecking balls and dozers were brought in, and they leveled the multiplex.

What replaced it? Boxy new structures housing botiques and apartments have loomed up, creating these shadowy, canyonesque streets. The flat, open plot of land allowed in the sunshine. But now the dim new urban canyons leave me skittish. They're too damn noirish.

By Ed Lynskey
Twitter: @edlynskey
Author of Lake Charles
"Satisfying."
The Rap Sheet/Kirkus Reviews