It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness………Charles Dickens, a Tale of Two Cities.
I wasn’t born in a city. I didn’t live in a city until I left home at eighteen to attend university in Leeds, England. I don’t think I even visited a decent sized city until I was a teenager.
Most of my childhood was spent on a small island, Anglesey, off the North-East coast of Wales: a beach-strewn haven for tourists foolhardy enough to brave the rain-soaked, chilly summers. Anglesey is also the inspiration for my DI Tudor Manx crime fiction novels.
It’s a long way from that windswept Welsh isle to Oakland, California, 5,148 to be exact, but culturally and spiritually, that journey seems a lot longer.
Now, in my early sixties, I couldn’t contemplate living more than a twenty- minute subway ride or a short commute from a big city.
After stints living in London, Lubijana in Slovenia, and San Francisco, my wife and I moved across the Bay Bridge to Oakland twenty years ago. We’ve witnessed some huge changes in the city during that time. Some good, some great, others that compel you to tear your hair out and leave the city in the rearview.
Let me explain.
I chose the Charles Dickens quote because living in Oakland can feel like living in two cities at the same time; the best and the worst, the foolishness and the smarts, the darkness and the light. It’s all here in Oakland, a city that comes with its own set of preconceptions.
Living in Oakland is like holding two conflicting thoughts in your head at the same time and agreeing with both of them depending on the day.
Each time a stranger asks where I live and I reply ‘Oakland’, there’s a few beats before they respond, as if they’re not sure how to react. They inevitably mutter some banal platitude: oh cool, right, sure, nice. I can almost hear the grinding of the cognitive cogs from six socially distanced feet away.
I get it. They’ve heard stories, read articles, heard it from a friend of a friend that crime’s out of control, homelessness is a plague with no cure, you can’t walk to your favorite restaurant without being mugged or worse.
Bipping and Bopping.
While we’re on the subject of street crime, can we talk about ‘bipping’ for a moment?
‘Bipping’ is the cute term some smart ass came up with to describe the criminal act of smashing car windows; sometimes for what the owners left inside, sometimes for the sheer hell of it.
I’ve seen it happen live on busy streets, outside restaurants, bars. I’ve been a victim when my car was parked in a Trader Joe’s parking lot. My wife, twice, once outside our local library. We’re not the only ones: sadly, it’s a daily occurrence for many Oakland residents.
As writer, I’m painfully aware of how important words are. Maybe we could tackle this epidemic by calling it exactly what it is, criminal vandalism. ‘Bipping’ softens the blow, imbues it with some ‘cutesy’ affectations, makes it sound like some TikTok challenge (which, give it a few months and it probably will be). Let’s not do that. Let’s not turn crime into a catchphrase and trending hashtag.
That being said, I’m not here to bash Oakland (log onto your Next Door or Citizen App, if you’re into that kind of vitriol).
I’m here to say yes, Oakland is everything they say it is. And yet it isn’t.
Like most things in life, the truth lies somewhere between extremes, and living in Oakland is no exception. Crime is a very real issue here: years of rising murder rates, tent encampments sprouting up in public spaces, a Mayor who’s clearly out of her depth, and a DA who’s averse to prosecuting.
It’s no surprise they’re both facing the very real prospect of a recall ballot.
A perfect storm of city mismanagement, political naiveté, soaring houses prices, and rapid gentrification led us here, and thrust Oakland in the national headlines for all the wrong reasons.
Oakland is still reeling from the loss of three major sports teams; the Golden Gate Warriors moved to San Francisco, the Raider to Las Vegas. The fate of the A’s remains in limbo, with rumblings of an offer from Sacramento. Either way, that’s three major sports teams leaving Oakland in the span of five years.
Bad luck, or bad city management? My bet is on the latter
As this is my first missive on living in Oakland, I’m determined to stay positive, after all, I don’t see us leaving the city any time soon.
In future articles, I hope to touch on a bunch of different aspects of Oakland life, but for this first one, I wanted to present a snapshot, a wide angle view of a city that’s steeped in history but struggling to define itself in this new economic reality.
Yes, we have crime, homelessness, and inept city management. We also have the natural beauty of the Lake Merritt, a revitalized waterfront of Jack London Square, stunning hikes and bike trails in the Oakland Hills, a vibrant bar scene, shockingly good coffee shops, hopping micro breweries, and Michelin star restaurants surviving alongside innovative hole-in-the-walls.
All life is here, it just takes the motivation to immerse yourself in these experiences, because if we don’t, these places will close, replaced by another chain restaurant, Bobba bar, nail salon, or God forbid another Starbucks.
Am I aware of my surroundings every time I venture to my favorite local restaurant? Of course I am.
Do I often Uber instead of driving, not just to avoid a DUI? Yep.
Does any of this stop me from enjoying my city? It does not.
Do I wish the Mayor and her cohorts would finally get off their asses and figure out a solution? One hundred percent yes. But I’m not holding my breath.
If you’re hoping for a tidy resolution at the end of this, I’m sorry to disappoint you. I don’t have one.
But at the end of the day, isn’t that what it means to live in a city? To take the rough with the smooth, see its beauty along with its imperfections, and accept that just like the people who live there, a city never stands still, it continually evolves, and some days that’s all you can ask it to do.
Thank you for reading!
For more writing from Dylan, please check out- https://medium.com/@dylanjonesauthor
And if you’re a crime fiction fan, check out my website at- www.dylanjonesauthor.com
What a delight to read, Dylan. Funny enough, when I was growing up in the Central Valley in the 1970s and 1980s, Oakland was in the position it is now--again. I dare say you forgot--or I overlooked--the lush hills surrounding Oakland packed with beautiful and refined houses. When I was a child, I saw this over to my right as we would come through on the way to San Francisco, and I didn't know what the hills were--I thought they must be some other town, the other city in your tale, perhaps. Oakland DOES have it all and it is a worthy metropolis, a very special place, in fact. I figure, if it can contain the Hon. Jessica Mittford--where she lived a fabulous, contented life--it's good enough for ANYONE (aristocrats, Communists, artists, Bohemians--since she was all of those), though perhaps not for the squarely middle class, of whom you are certainly not one.