I've gotten a few nasty letters regarding the Business Week list naming Portland the most unhappy city in the country. I didn't make the goddamn list! I guess it's a sin to report it. What is interesting, of course, is when the writers sing the praises of Portland, they reveal that they are among the nouveau riche in our fair city, or suggest as much, and they apparently didn't go to the source article to see that the list was calculated from crisis line calls, suicides, divorces and such, all of which put Portland on top. So we have a hell of a lot of unhappy folks here, and a hell of a lot of folks enjoying the good life in the Pearl District, and this sounds like the usual rich/poor stuff to me, which will probably get worse in this bad economy. (You see a similar but more complicated dichotomy in the issue of the mayor). The sense of "two cities" is strong, which is a major difference from 25 years ago, or so it seems to me.
But listen, gang, I don't work for Business Week! I didn't make the list. And yes, I do live here, I've lived here for 30 years.
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