I came across this article by Mitch Albom called “The Courage of Detroit,” published in Sports Illustrated this month. As a girl born and raised in Michigan, working with a company started in Michigan 23 years ago by a Michigan native, I can say confidently, no one’s captured this place better than Mitch Albom in this article.
SIDEBAR: I’m a writer. So I can tell you that when I interned at WJR-AM 760 Radio in Detroit back in college I remember exactly the day I first saw Mitch Albom breeze into the office. This amazing, highly regarded writer-guy just stewing in all his writer-brilliance, sputtering things like, “I could write that in my sleep” (a phrase that, if said by anyone else, would be flip and overconfident, but said by Mitch… well, probably just true). I wished if I could soak up just a morsel of the talent infused in his rhythmic prose, my Xerox-girl internship wouldn’t be a total wash. Articles like this are the reason why.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/the_bonus/01/07/detroit/index.html
If you’re from Michigan–no, even if you’ve never been to Michigan–I can bet you’ll find something in it you can relate to. And of course, enjoy the great writing.
Here’s an excerpt: And maybe you ask why? Maybe you ask, as I get asked all the time, “Why do you stay there? Why don’t you leave?”
Maybe because we like it here. Maybe because this is what we know: snow and concrete underfoot, hardhats, soul music, lakes, hockey sticks. Maybe because we don’t see just the burned-out houses; we also see the Fox Theater, the Detroit Institute of Arts, the Whitney restaurant, the riverfront that looks out to Canada. Maybe because we still have seniors who call the auto giant “Ford’s”, like a shop that’s owned by a real human being. Maybe because some of us subscribe to Pastor Covington’s words, We are somebody because God loves us, no matter how cold the night or hard the mattress.
Maybe because when our kids finish college and take that first job in some sexy faraway city and a year later we see them back home and we ask what happened, they say, “I missed my friends and family.” And we nod and say we understand.
Or maybe because we’re smarter than you think… (Read the article.)
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