The city

A couple weeks ago, my husband and I went on a date to My. Tabor park at twilight. We followed a trail that we have never explored before. The view of the city was amazing. I love Portland for many reasons; it's parks, its natural surrounding beauty, farms, sustainability ethic, people, but what is a city..physically?  There is a lot of pollution, generally, a lot of waste, materialism rampant co-existing with with poverty, factories, smoke, car exhaust, injustices.. In the  past, I have not liked cities..But, that was before I lived in Portland. This city is different (to me)..  All of what I do not like about cities is here, but it is much more than that, and has such natural beauty still here, that it is so much more liveable. 
Still, it is amazing to look at the city from above watching the lights below.  All the negative aspects of what it does to scar the earth are there, but it is amazing that it can still be beautiful..  Man-made,  and not so sustainable or natural, but  soo beautiful.  What an interesting juxtaposition! I  suppose it may also depend on how you view our humanity..as overpopulated locusts taking over the  earth and eating everything in its path, or as beautiful gems glittering in the  night like the city lights; we create beauty even in our messes; or something in between..imperfect, making mistakes, but beautiful just the same..  Somehow, our  beauty still shines through our mistakes..Somehow, the city is beautiful, despite, how it has severely altered the landscape with cars and buildings..  Perhaps there is hope for us.  I would really like to  believe that.  We have really messed up our planet and have created systems that are not just, especially to the  poor..And we  have been so selfish--look at what we do to other countries..using  them to produce our cheap stuff..People work severely long days in China to produce our ipads, etc..at the  expense of their own families, so that we can get them  cheaply..  What mistakes we are making right now..  But, look at  how beautiful we are in the shining lights of the  night..Somehow, we are so amazingly beautiful too, even in the messes we make...Look at how beautiful  Portland is at night..Look at the  wonders we have created in architecture, technology, art, music!!  Look at how the streets are so organized and thought out!  So much beauty!  We are such creative creatures!

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