Were I possessed of a bigger brain...

...then this post would be a scholarly, erudite riff on Edgar Allan Poe's 'The Raven'. It would be chock-full of allusions, of clever associations and witty juxtapositions of Poe's world and ours, and the resultant editorial would bring on a quiet smugness, maybe add a little peacock's strut to my gait, infuse my personality with, I don't know, the air of 'coming across as so all-knowing and condescending,' (Thanks, 'Petra'.) It might have begun something like this:

Once upon an evening muggy, while I pondered bored and fuggy,

Over lackings and misgivings of my hometown's downtown,

While I wandered, depression descending, sensing torpor never-ending,

I regarded the mix, the assortment of businesses, imagining excursions, how synergy-

See?

My brain being only its meagre size and me being not nearly as clever as what's required to go down that path, what you have instead is the usual pedantic stuff, no bells and whistles, just me yammering-on. Sorry.

Saturday evening, I had the chance to go on a reconnoitre of two area 'downtowns'. Westdale and Dundas.

It was fascinating...enlivening...and depressing. It was great to see these two areas again, to stroll the sidewalks, to reacquaint myself with the shops. Hardly a 'Vacant' sign to be seen, great storefronts, evidence of real activity. (Even though this was past business hours.) But ultimately, depressing. Because when you really take a good look at another 'downtown's profile, deconstruct its viability, examine the surrounding neighbourhoods, assess the contributing factors, especially when things are working well (I'm not talking about utopia here, I'm no dumb-bunny when it comes to the realities of retail/service industry business), then understanding washes over you.

Then, when you compare in your head your own town's core, place everything side-by-side and objectively- Well, that's when the depression sets in.

As I walked, I imagined a picture puzzle, and inserted this Dundas feature into Stoney Creek's 'downtown'. I took this store from Westdale, that restaurant, and slotted it in on King Street. I played with the possibilities, pretended an entirely different landscape.

Mostly though, while I was doing this I was asking myself 'If you transplanted what you'd take from these two areas into Stoney Creek, if you did it overnight, would it 'take'? And how long would it take to 'take'? What kind of resistance would there be? How long would it be before 'locals', those guesstimated five thousand residents/potential shoppers/no-brainer patrons living within the 'authentic Stoney Creek' (Centennial-to-Gray-to-Queenston-to-the Escarpment) shifted their shopping habits to make Downtown Stoney Creek more a part of their default routine, even taking into account the undeniability of The Draw of the Mall?'

Adding to all these ruminations were undeniable features:

-A cinema

-The upcoming Cactus Festival

-Farmers' Markets actively promoted in both communities

-People on the sidewalks

As a coda, the next day I had the rare opportunity to drive through Downtown Stoney Creek. To experience it as most do, in a car, and not on foot.

Oi-friggin'-vey.

OK; that's enough for this self-therapy session. But rest assured, we're not done here. (And maybe by next time, my brain might have been enlargened, even if just enough to effect a Poe-esque riff. Or maybe I should be concentrating on a more contemporary source. Eminem, perhaps...?)