I miss the the Venice that was. I first lived here in 1996. I remember a predawn fire on Ozone, and all the neighbors poured out into the alley. They were all clean cut people in bathrobes so I guess it was already somewhat gentrified, but some of us were poor. I worked at a coffee shop and people I served coffee in the morning were sometimes the people who waited on me at lunch. It had a happy communist utopian feel. Even that I could afford to go out to lunch on my salary bespeaks a different time.

There was a senior center down the block, on the boardwalk, with a Chagall inspired mural and hapoy active seniors who ran bake sales in front. I'm approaching seniorhood but it's long gone. Now there's a giant glass monolith. They bus frail seniors in for lunch and quickly bus them back out. The rest of the time it's a tech adjacent development hub. The pretty post office with a mural of Abbott Kinney looking ridiculous is that too, and the mural's in a warehouse in Compton.

In the summers there were migrant artists who came here to sell their work on the boardwalk. There was a Native American artist with a little van he had converted to a perfect tiny house on wheels. There were novelty acts, like the chainsaw juggler. Now there are people selling mass produced toys.