New Skins, New Perspective
Last night I attended the Jefferson Street Art Crawl with the hubs. It was a dope event filled with different types of art, lots of cool folks and even one of my favorite artists - Alice Gatewood Waddell! But this piece isn't about the art, it's about the street itself. As I drove up & down Jefferson Street, a street that I've known intimately since 1993, I was filled with a sense of excitement for the future. Like many key streets in African American neighborhoods, Jefferson Street was once the thriving center of the Black community in Nashville. It not only had amazing businesses and nightclubs, this road also led to three of the area's HBCUs. But as the years have gone by, the street has undergone significant change. We can talk about the reasons behind the change - crack, poverty, systemic oppression, integration - but the bottom line is that the street needed a fresh wind.
Well, that fresh wind is blowing down Jefferson. What started as a wisp of air with Kijiji's Coffeehouse or the Garden Brunch Cafe, has turned into a tornado of wind blowing new life into Jefferson Street. The street is actively being developed and will once again be vibrant and full of life. And I am not naive enough to overlook the gentrification or the new interest in living closer to downtown which made Jefferson Street prime real estate. I understand that. But I enjoyed seeing the street reminiscent of its heyday.
This change didn't come about by people waxing poetically about what used to be on Jefferson. The developers and investors had to see the potential of the street, visualize what could be and then make it happen. And it's wonderful!
While wandering around looking at art, I saw this tree & realized that I too am ready for a season of bloom. A season of beauty. A season of possibilities. A new season. Maybe I'm just Spring rambling or maybe it's my normal wanderlust speaking. But like the Word says to not put new wine into old skins; I don't want to put new thoughts or new plans into this old mind/body. I'm ready for a revitalization of self ... of everything. So it's not enough to know who I have been, what I've written or even where I've been. Prepare yourself to meet the "fresh wind" me. I've waited on her a long time and I think we'll be best friends.