A grey but beautiful day in the neighbourhood

Ways Lane, Kennett Square

Oil on panel. 14 by 11 inches.

Ways Lane, Kennett Square

Oil on panel, 14 by 11 inches.

Detail of Ways Lane

Oil on panel. 14 by 11 inches.

A grey day, and it will be like this for the next few more days, but it's still a beautiful day in the neighbourhood.

This is Ways Lane off of Walnut Street. The railroad tracks run parallel to Ways Lane on my right. The tracks are still in use but not often, and when the trains operate on them, they travel between 10-15 miles per hour. Über fast.

Not in view, but to my left is worKS Kennett Square and on the other side of the tracks on my right and behind me is The Creamery. Both businesses are two great new additions to our neighbourhood which one of the local newspaper mistakenly used blighted to describe our neighbourhood.

Back in the 80s and 90s I lived in Bushwick, Brooklyn as a volunteer drug rehab live-in assistant, and my daily stroll around the neighbourhood was often greeted by blocks of abandoned brick houses. Sometimes I would come across a lonely but occupied brick townhouse in the middle of a block of demolished buildings. Now that was blighted, and yet it was still home to many hardworking people. Bushwick was a sad example of redlining, and this practice is still happening today.

In my part of town in Kennett Square, we have occupied homes. It's certainly not blighted. They may not make it into the House & Garden magazine, but they're cared-for homes of hardworking people. They're my neighbours. It's a beautiful day in the neighbourhood. Could you be my neighbour?