Mayor must act to defend an Alamedan's right not to have to choose

Dear Roger,

This town just isn’t what it used to be. When I was a girl, there were real sailors whistling at us on the streetcorners, not these well-behaved young Coast Guard fellas who sometimes find their way into Alameda. Why, some of them aren’t even men, now that women are taking over our nation’s armed forces at an alarming rate.

The point is, I don’t like it. This used to be a sleepy town with quiet business districts and not much going on. These days, I hardly know if I’m coming or going, there’s so much to keep track of. I remember when going out to dinner meant getting a hamburger and a root beer, or maybe a steak dinner for special occasions. You never had to decide where to go because there weren’t all that many restaurants, but yesterday I counted over five different restaurants on Park Street, many of them new, before I got dizzy and had to sit down. Imagine my surprise when I realized that the bench I was sitting on was in front of a brand-new coffee shop!

Things are moving too fast, and our mayor needs to do something about it. Bring back the empty storefronts with dirty windows covered with paper, and the dusty displays of familiar drugstore items, always with the same dead flies reassuringly scattered in between. If things don’t stop changing soon, Park Street will get so crowded that no-one will want to go there anymore! And I don’t even want to think about what could happen to Webster Street. If the mayor won’t do something, we’ll have to do it ourselves. I, for one, am ready to boycott local businesses until they start sliding safely downhill again. Who will join me?

Worriedly yours,
Marlene Verloren