Of course. I start writing and the airplane begins going up and down like a horse on a carousel. It figures. But I’ll tough it out. This week I’m reporting on my “Impressions of Seattle” and I want to get all this down while it’s fresh in my mind. Those of you who have been here for a while may be wondering why this week’s subject is not “Impressions of the Pacific Northwest” as I had originally intended. The fact is that, other than the two days I spent on Orcas Island wrestling cows, my entire fortnight – I love that word – was passed wandering aimlessly through the self-proclaimed “Emerald City”. It was easy to do that and I left this morning feeling like there was much not done. I rationalize this by convincing myself that – absent a major tectonic event – the rest of the Pacific Northwest isn’t going anywhere soon. Other than some restaurants which I probably wouldn’t have missed anyway the region should be intact and ready for my next visit. So, on with Seattle.

First off, Seattle did not give the impression of being a “real” city.  Hold on, hold on. Now don’t go getting your knickers all torqued up. Not just yet anyway. It came across as more along the lines of “City-Lite”. I am sure that this impression is due to my having grown up in New York City against which I measure all pretenders. Consider for a minute that if you took the entire population of Seattle, some 620 thousand, out of the City of New York you would still have some 7.8 million people in New York. In fact if you took the entire population of Washington State out of New York City there would still be nearly 3 times more people living in The City That Never Sleeps than there are people currently in Seattle. City-Lite.

The flip side of this little demographic diversion is that Seattle is trying hard to be a real city. There’s a little section of town with a kind of Upper East Side of Manhattan vibe. There’s a Chinatown where I was able to find all sorts of Chinese delicacies – jellyfish, yum – except dim-sum. The woman at the dim-sum place had a very good command of the word “no”. Whenever I would point to a picture on the menu she would say “No”. I finally got an affirmative when I reached something that I think were steamed prawn heads but that was it. I ended up at the sushi place across the street. I digress. There is the International District, a business and financial district, an artsy-fartsy district, a retail district with two, count ‘em, major department stores, and about three or four cinemas. All this diversity is packed into an area of about a ¾ of a mile square so is eminently walkable and is also served by a free public transit system about which more next week.

The defining feature of the city, which really makes Seattle, well, Seattle, is its collection of neighborhoods. Originally most were towns in their own rights and then grew together as people moved in – prior to the mind control rays – and settled for the amazing environment, scenery, and, not to put too fine a point on it, the weather. Seattle’s roots are really in the diversity of its neighborhoods rather than its identity as a city. The truly startling thing to me is that each neighborhood is as different from the others as San Francisco is from San Diego. Even within some neighborhoods there exist sub-neighborhoods with a completely different feel than the section which starts just across the street. Obviously, it would be impossible to confuse Belltown, a downtown residential neighborhood, with Beacon Hill, also residential but nowhere near downtown. But Ballard, out of downtown and residential, is night-and-day different than Fremont, having a similar geography and demographic, which Ballard is immediately adjacent to. From the core group of neighborhoods the city spreads north and south in a seemingly endless patchwork of others. This diverse tapestry is spread across a series of hills that afford surprise vistas of salt water, mountains, and the city center. That is, when it’s not raining. All-in-all, Seattle City Government tabulates some 106 distinct neighborhoods and sub-neighborhoods. 

There is a dark side to all this diversity though. My friend told me, “In Seattle it’s all about the hills.” Not the up and down travel but whether you live on one of Seattle’s seven hills, or don’t. Consider the neighborhood of Queen Anne – which is centered on the hill of the same name. There are Queen Anne, North Queen Anne, East Queen Anne, and West Queen Anne. All of which are on the hill. But “South Queen Anne” doesn’t exist because that area isn’t on the hill. They call that area “Lower” Queen Anne. Subtly insulting don’t you think?

There also seems to be something of an identity crisis in a few neighborhoods. Between the aforementioned sections of Ballard and Fremont there exists a sort of no-mans-land where the sign marking the western boundary of Fremont is well to the west of the sign marking the eastern edge of Ballard. I’ve heard the disputed territory referred to as both “Balmont” and “Frelard”. I guess the different versions are based upon which neighborhood center you are most fond of. The Central District, just to the southeast of downtown, has gone through at least four different names within a generation. All of which are still in use. Your Tom-Tom is useless here.

Taken in total, though, Seattle seems a very special place.

What sets the city apart from others I have lived in or visited, though, are its Residents. Seattleites – so-called due to the local aerospace industry – are people who match the diversity of Seattle’s neighborhoods. They are, in a word, different.

No, no, no. There you go again. Different, yes. But in a good way more like “quirky”. My first day in the city was spent meandering jet-lagged through Downtown looking for some new shoes to walk around in. When I returned to my room I had the distinct feeling that something was wrong and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Until. Ah Ha! My internal clock suddenly reset itself to Pacific Standard Time. Everybody’s homeless!

Not actually but a vast swath of the wandering populace looks like they are. Seattle – much to its municipal chagrin – is the very seat of Grunge. Their official policy is that Grunge went away when the surviving members of Nirvana started working at McDonalds and Starbucks but the style lives on to this day. Walking down Pine Street along the “Half Block of Fashion” you notice that nobody is wearing the same couture as is on display in the windows. On the outside everybody looks like they’re on the way to the soup kitchen. After a couple of days of this I had it figured out. The chronically under-dressed fell into five distinct categories. 

First, as in all cities, there were the truly homeless. Lost to society they make their way through life on the Kindness of Others and the Department of Social Services. When they interrupt whatever internal dialogue they’re having to ask you for spare change they are very polite and, very much unlike New York City, don’t get all up-in-your-face should you decline. 

The second group consists of the Panhandlers. These are distinguished 1) by looking very well fed and 2) by holding a sign. Other than the signs they look very much like group five of which they may have been former members. With this group you feel like you’re being had for your change. The signs say things like “Skippy, my dog, is hungry. Please Help!” or “Aging Hippies Need Love Too. Please Help!” or “Will design websites for food. Please Help!” Occasionally one will set up on his or her corner in a wheelchair and hold up their sign. The giveaway that all is not what it seems is the foot tapping out the rhythm of whatever it is that’s playing on their iPod.

The third set are the Street Workers – no, not that kind of street worker. These are the musicians, jugglers, shoe-shine guys, and firewalkers that set up their shtick on the sidewalk or in the Metro tunnel (for the great acoustics) and actually do something in exchange for your tips. There were some talented performers and musicians among them as well as some who would be better advised to take a job in high-tech.

Fourth are the youthful émigrés who wash into town as students or potential rock stars. These starry-eyed youngsters can be seen thumbing their dog-eared copies of Lonely Planet with one hand and sipping caramel macchiatos with the other. Lonely Planet says Seattle is the Home of Grunge and Coffee. They’re just trying to fit in.

Last are the Software Zillionaires. These are the guys (usually) who you’ll find standing next to their discharged Tesla sports coupes waiting for a tow or a charge from AAA. They dress the way they do because “I can and fuck you if you can’t take a joke.” It is this nouveau-tech smugness that results in many of these people ending up in Group 2 when their high-tech, loft-based start-ups tank because Apple just came out with something cooler.

But all of these people, from the humblest to the most elite, are very, very, nice. There is no “Seattle Attitude” of obsequious superiority like the one I carry around from having cut my teeth on the Big Apple.  Seattleites elevate social politeness to Rainier-like heights. They are so unusually nice that the locals even have a name for it.

They call it “The Seattle Chill”.And that’s where we’ll start next week.