It's weird living in a little city.
For one thing, you can't say you're from a small-town, and have people give you that "oh shucks, aren't you adorable" look.
On the other hand, you feel odd saying you're from a city, when the city you're talking about is less than half the size of most major U.S. cities.
I'm from Providence, Rhode Island, and whenever I'm in another state and tell people where I'm from they usually respond with "Long Island? You're from Long Island?"
"No," I say, "RHODE Island."
Instantly, they look disappointed.
I'm not going to have any fun farm anecdotes, but I'm still just as foreign to them as if I were from Uzbekistan.
At a play in New York, a woman mentioned to me that one of the actors in the play was recently on "Law and Order."
With complete sincerity she asked me--"Do you have Law and Order in Rhode Island?"
"Ma'am," I said, "I'm pretty sure they have Law and Order in the Himalayas."
It's hard to make being from Providence a point of pride sometimes, but creatively, it's a gold mine.
Aside from the fantastic art scene we have in Rhode Island, there's a benefit to living in such a small place.
Providence is one of the few places I know that actually shifts its identity every so often.
What am I talking about?
Think of it this way--Imagine a pot of soup. No, forget soup. Imagine broth. Just plain broth. Now, imagine throwing tons of pepper in the broth. You're going to get spicier soup, right? Now, let's say instead of pepper you throw something else in there, like tons of vegetables or more exotic herbs.
Depending on what you put in the pot, you can get all different kinds of soup.
That's sort of like how it is living in Providence.
Every once in awhile there will be a conference, or a tournament, or just an infusion of people coming into the city that drastically changes the tone of the city.
Whereas pouring thousands of people into a larger city like New York might not mean much to the city itself, adding half those people to Providence would mean a totally different kind of soup.
As someone involved with the arts, it's a blessing to be able to live in a place that always seems to be changing, adapting, upgrading, and evolving.
In the past, it's been difficult feeling proud of a place that can go from being a college town to a party town to a ghost town all in one month, but as I get older, it feels kind of exciting.
Now when people ask me what it's like to live in Rhode Island, I can say--
'It depends on when you're there."
And it sounds like a pretty good answer.
For one thing, you can't say you're from a small-town, and have people give you that "oh shucks, aren't you adorable" look.
On the other hand, you feel odd saying you're from a city, when the city you're talking about is less than half the size of most major U.S. cities.
I'm from Providence, Rhode Island, and whenever I'm in another state and tell people where I'm from they usually respond with "Long Island? You're from Long Island?"
"No," I say, "RHODE Island."
Instantly, they look disappointed.
I'm not going to have any fun farm anecdotes, but I'm still just as foreign to them as if I were from Uzbekistan.
At a play in New York, a woman mentioned to me that one of the actors in the play was recently on "Law and Order."
With complete sincerity she asked me--"Do you have Law and Order in Rhode Island?"
"Ma'am," I said, "I'm pretty sure they have Law and Order in the Himalayas."
It's hard to make being from Providence a point of pride sometimes, but creatively, it's a gold mine.
Aside from the fantastic art scene we have in Rhode Island, there's a benefit to living in such a small place.
Providence is one of the few places I know that actually shifts its identity every so often.
What am I talking about?
Think of it this way--Imagine a pot of soup. No, forget soup. Imagine broth. Just plain broth. Now, imagine throwing tons of pepper in the broth. You're going to get spicier soup, right? Now, let's say instead of pepper you throw something else in there, like tons of vegetables or more exotic herbs.
Depending on what you put in the pot, you can get all different kinds of soup.
That's sort of like how it is living in Providence.
Every once in awhile there will be a conference, or a tournament, or just an infusion of people coming into the city that drastically changes the tone of the city.
Whereas pouring thousands of people into a larger city like New York might not mean much to the city itself, adding half those people to Providence would mean a totally different kind of soup.
As someone involved with the arts, it's a blessing to be able to live in a place that always seems to be changing, adapting, upgrading, and evolving.
In the past, it's been difficult feeling proud of a place that can go from being a college town to a party town to a ghost town all in one month, but as I get older, it feels kind of exciting.
Now when people ask me what it's like to live in Rhode Island, I can say--
'It depends on when you're there."
And it sounds like a pretty good answer.
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