Creative Concerns -- Cultivate your inner oddball and then share with Pittsburgh
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I'm pawing through the "stuff-we-couldn't-sell-you-at-our-exorbitant-prices" clearance bin at a local retailer the other day when I unearthed something truly bizarre.
Buried beneath the sad "we missed summer" gingham shirts was an extraordinary mushroom colored floppy hat. It lacked any discernible shape and had a brim that would make a sombrero blush. As soon as I put it on, my colleague, without missing a beat, said "What's up, Gandalf?" When I strode proudly through the front door at home wearing my new find and saw the look of shear horror on my 16-year-old daughter's face I knew I was on to something.
It's odd looking. Strange. It doesn't have a Steeler logo on it. I get dubious looks from passers-by when I wear it out (more and more often it seems without my daughter). It makes me feel eccentric -- a characteristic I'd previously not courted. So why now -- after 46 reasonably sane sartorial years (if you don't count the '70s) -- do I feel the need to be freaky?
Out of economic necessity. Pittsburgh is currently 44th in CityVital's weirdness index of the top 50 metropolitan areas. The weirdness index is part of Portland-based economist Joseph Cortright's recent study -- in partnership with CEOs for Cities -- which posits that "to be successful today, cities have to develop their own unique formula that addresses the four dimensions of urban success: talent, innovation, connections and distinctiveness."
It's in the area of distinctiveness that I'd like to concentrate. Rightfully so, many people have focused on trying to push the diversity of our region in terms of race, culture, religion and so on. Let's throw another kind of "color" into the mix -- characters, oddballs, freaks and misfits. They have ideas, ideas that can be strange, uncomfortable, goofy, unreasonable, incoherent and often brilliant.
And they're attracted by their own kind. The publication Fast Company in July of this year reported that for the first time ever -- according to U.N. estimates -- there will be more of Earth's population (3.2 billion) living in urban than in rural areas. More people are choosing to live nearer to each other to share intellectual capital, creative thought and an eclectic mix of strange and wonderful expressions.
Austin, Texas, is on pretty much everyone's list of fastest, hippest, tech-savvy, you-name-it urban areas. Around 2003 the city trademarked the slogan "Keep Austin Weird." The phrase actually started out as a grass-roots movement years before (www.keepaustinweird.com) designed to highlight the idiosyncrasies of the local inhabitants and creative subculture that made Austin appealing to academics, musicians, artisans, politicians and entrepreneurs. It also was an attempt to stem the tide of "Big Box" retail and other commercial overdevelopment that transforms unique urban areas into so many "Miracle Miles."
As a result of this and other efforts, Austin has become a mecca to the quirky and the off-beat. There's a sense of acceptance that Austinites extend to their unpredictable and peculiar brethren that makes them feel welcome, involved and gives the region a pretty damn interesting vibe. All of which helps create a positive economic and cultural environment.
Back to the weirdness index. Pittsburgh's 44th? Behind the likes of Tampa, Fla.; Oklahoma City; and Buffalo, N.Y.? Say it ain't so! The index is compiled by assembling a composite based on consumer activities and spending behavior that measure the differences between the residents of a particular metropolitan area and those of the typical American consumer. It identified for each metropolitan area the 10 behaviors that differed most from the national average and summarized those differences by computing the variance -- a statistical measure of how much each metro area differs from all others. Pittsburgh's variance is closer to the rest of the country than it is different. Looking at the list of cities that are further away from the norm -- San Francisco, Seattle, New York, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Boston and Austin -- and you have a list that is attracting both business and talent.
I broached the subject of idiosyncrasy and weirdness with one of Pittsburgh's more original thinkers, Don Marinelli, co-founder of Carnegie Mellon's Entertainment Technology Center, promoter of the synergy between technology and the arts and a still-die-hard Pirates fan (talk about weird). To him, "Idiosyncrasy is seeing the world differently than the masses and then acting upon those intuitions, visions and connections. It is central to the creative process, especially when applied to historic and persistent dilemmas and obstacles."
When the idiosyncratic approach is different enough we call it revolutionary. There are nowhere near enough revolutionaries in the world, let alone Pittsburgh. Sadly, many of the Pittsburgh revolutionaries (Andy Warhol, August Wilson, Michael Chabon, etc.) are transient; feeling an emotional connection to the region, but not enough to actually reside here. That is why their revolutionary thinking remains confined to classrooms and usually becomes manifest when they depart and/or relocate to someplace where they feel a greater connection."
So, how to get that connection here? For starters, flip "normalcy" on its head. Marinelli and others have stayed because it's a bit weird to be able to afford the kind of quality of life unheard of in some of those cities mentioned earlier. And not that we don't need to keep working on it, but for the most part, we get along here, so I believe we have the acceptance gene in our collective DNA. Comfort and harmony are different -- extol them.
In addition, support the eclectic and the artistic; check out what is going on with the Multi-Cultural Arts Initiative. Silk-screen your own T-shirt at AIR (Artists Image Resource). Attend a Calliope concert. Make one less visit to a Wal-Mart or Home Depot and one more to an East End Food Co-op or an Oaks Theater. Find an alternate mode of commuting to work. Employ people who don't think and look like everyone else. Before knee-jerk negativity sets in, take a moment to actually listen to the absurd or embrace the discomfiture a beat longer when listening to an idea that is diametrically opposed to yours. This isn't a province of the young either; weirdness and acceptance should be ageless.
Justin Hopper, who has covered the local music scene and Pittsburgh in general, wrote in the online publication Pop City earlier this year "It's open season for freaks here. Try something. Try anything. If it fails, we'll help you move on; if it succeeds, we'll be the first to buy a round."
Weird, huh?
First Published October 14, 2007 12:00 am
