Friday, May 27, 2016

A Plea

Dear Grumpy Rochesterian,

At one point, many years ago, I am sure that you worked hard to make our community a better place.  Despite your best efforts, you had the misfortune of watching an urban center decline and several iconic companies shrink.  Along the way, you shoveled a lot of snow and probably paid an impressive amount of taxes.  Over time, you became disgruntled and began to occupy your time with:

  • complaining about the weather, a lot
  • complaining about the taxes, a lot
  • bashing downtown despite never actually going there
  • repeating invalid negative statistics over and over
  • predicting that every potentially positive development would fail
  • secretly enjoying the aforementioned failure
  • writing negative comments on the Democrat & Chronicle website...after every article, even the uplifting ones

While you started out as a pivotal member of the team, you're currently crushing our chemistry.  The team is full of a youthful energy that is tired of your story - it's time they tell their own story.  As such, I kindly ask that you hang up your jersey.


Sincerely,

A less grumpy Rochesterian

5 comments:

  1. Thank you for this post Amol.

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  2. Amol, thank you for these blog posts! There aren't enough people in this town calling out the negativity for exactly what it really is. Just annoying negativity. This may seem like hyperbole, but you may just be one of the most important people for the future success of Rochester. We need more people just like you here. That aren't afraid to stand up against the whine brigade.

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  3. Really?? Where do you people live? Pittsford? Greece? Brighton? How much time do you actually spend in the city? I live in the downtown area. I have been to multiple cities throughout the U.S.; San Francisco, Portland, OR, Washington D.C, Chicago, Philadelphia, and NYC. All of these cities have a prevalent homeless situation, but none of them are nearly as bad as Rochester.

    To emphasize this point, I went to NYC two weeks ago there were several homeless people sitting quietly on the sidewalks. Sleeping on benches, ect. The number of times I was aggressively approached for change 0. When I returned to Rochester I was asked for food/change when I returned to Rochester.

    Last night, I was in the Rite-Aide on the corners of Monroe and Goodman. Shortly after I entered a woman came inside and yelled, " a white man is beating a black man with a cane." I was one of two men who went outside to intervene. The cane was actually a crutch and the white man was accusing another street person of stealing his shopping cart and seizure meds. Four Rochester Police cruisers replied to the incident.

    C' mon guys stop trying to "fluff" Rochester's image and be honest about it.

    Represent the bad with the good, don't just mention how you had a good time at a nice restaurant.

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  4. No, I'm not a grumpy Rochestarian. Just a realistic Rochestarian

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    Replies
    1. Thanks for the comments, Dave. I spend quite a bit of time working near the corner of Genesee Street and West Main Street. Having lived in Saint Louis and the Bronx, I find Rochester to be quite mundane from a crime standpoint.

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