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by G. Sax

It's my weekly post-midnight posting. The @gsax witching hour in the wee few days before Halloween—still far enough away from the candied hellfire to be reduced to heckfire. Heck. Not as in Denny Hecker, a local name certain to find a way into costume parties this year, but just "For the Heck of It."

I noticed tonight that I'm the primary user of the "For the Heck of It" category to the right of these words on the St. Paul Real Estate Blog. The category serves well as an open window to my off-kilter oxbowing about things Saint Paul and otherwise.

I'm not much of a journalist or a columnist or even a blogger (…or even a writer?). It's why Twitter serves me well. It took some time for me to get used to saying less because I'm so in love with how I say things, but inevitably it's perfect for me. I write about what I want to write about in short sharp shocks.

Blogging is still worthwhile, and I've been doing it since our calendar years started with a 1, but I have a wandering eye and it's entirely possible that I'll be off this blog before the year is out, probably because I've overstayed my welcome. But possibly because I'm troubled by squatting in the same place for too long, even on a wonderfully cohesive site such as this one.

Adult ADD? Probably. Self-defeating? Meh. Restless? Definitely.

I'm attracted to abstract art, the unbeaten path, and the exterior wack of the Weisman Art Museum. Curiously, I'm also attracted to patterns of repetition in music. Hmm.

You probably came here today to see one of Teresa's otherworldly photographs or to read about the Como Park Zoo Boo or to see what the St. Paul Real Estate Blog has to say about the latest Case-Shiller Index. Try back tomorrow. My muse leads me to the restlessness of sameness.

Sameness fills me with dread. I work in the suburbs and I drive (always driving!) to other suburbs when work requires it.

Oh, ye, suburbanites: Your lawns are lovely, your homes are huge, your public schools are palatial, your tax bases are terrific. But I don't get you and your sameness. I don't understand you Woodbury and Eden Prairie and Maple Grove. I don't know what makes you tick Apple Valley and Lakeville and Blaine.

Your landscapes are undeniably groomed. Your pavements are relatively uncracked. Your Super Targets are super convenient. Your fiefdoms are complete with a certain sameness of houses and cars and restaurants and insurance agencies and parking lots and faces.

I don't get it. But maybe it's because I can't help myself but to cut against the productive grain. Saint Paul, with your meandering parkways and unkempt layout and evolving neighborhoods, you and I shall dine in the morrow. We shall revel in the heck of it.