The Bass Geek

Making my way down the alley that leads to my garage is an adventure - you never know what you’re going to find on your journey. Located on that scrambled mess of concrete slabs, gravel mess coming out of parking spaces, and some weedy overgrowth are some surprises and some inevitabilities. People lounging outside the rapidly degrading house behind us? Always. The next-door neighbors managing to park on our sidewalk, just ’cause they want to? Indeed. Assorted trash? Yep.

Occasionally there are deposits of kitty litter (because putting in the trash is just too much work) and broken televisions full of beer bottles and pork chops (I thought it was an ongoing art project before it became rancid, and I set aside my appreciation of the work to trash it). Currently, there’s a microwave resting next to a tree, for no apparent reason.

Today, however, I saw a nice landscape painting on a wooden fence. It’s certainly not visible from the sidewalk or the street, so I’m guessing it’s just a present to the neighbors. Or a more reasonable and less maggot-infested art project. In any case, it’s a welcome diversion. There’s quite a bit of art present in the neighborhood, stored mostly in galleries or artist lofts in a couple of studio/housing buildings. And now it’s leaking out.

Fountain Sqaure is one of the cultural districts of Indianapolis, as declared by whatever governmental organization has been charged with such responsibility. A green stripe of paint running down Virginia Street (one of the roads leading to the heart of this district) and a couple of pedestrian pedestals (which look like upended music stands painted orange) indicate that we’ve received this honor from the city - plans are to build a cultural trail along that length of green paint, terminating in a new pedestrian park. Construction has already begun downtown, near the interim library location and the tapas restaraunt my wife and I occasionally drop by. We’re looking at a couple of years on the trail back home, more than likely. The paint will have to serve until then.

There’s a fair share of business and community in the Fountain Square area, radiating out from the central location at the intersections of Virginia, Shelby, and Prospect. So it’s not so much a square, I guess. The name stuck, though. In any case, that’s where most of the life of the area starts. There are galleries, restaurants, the local coffeehouse, a music venue (and what a pleasure it is to have a place to play within walking distance), an old theater (a remnant of the district’s former life as the city’s theater district), and other assorted businesses. It’s coming along - there’s still a lot of work to be done on the neighborhoods, but the intentions (and finally the work to back it up) are coming along.

This site gives a good summary to the outside viewer, but it’s a little bit different living here. Not bad at all, just a little different.