My local non-place is the West Transfer Point.
Let me explain myself. I never ride the bus. I have a car here in Madison, so I just drive everywhere. Since I work at Weather Central, which is located on the east side of the WKOW building on the Southwest Side, I pass the West Transfer Point every time I work. So, last night, I decided to take time and head over there. Now, since I don't ride the bus, I have what you may call a bus stigma. In my opinion, I would always think that you'd find rather, how you say, "uncouth" people at the bus stop. But, I forage ahead nonetheless.
I flet weird sitting there. Who sits at a bus stop? People were just walking through, standing and waiting for their next bus, or running right up to the one that had already arrived. This is the difference between place and non-place. When you stay at a location and become connected with it, it becomes a place. The only people that stay at bus stations are vagrants. I am no vagrant, let me tell you.
So, I continued onward, watching people come and go. There really was no talking, just kinda like how you would stand in an elevator looking straight forward. This is the epitome of the non-place. There's just no connection to it!
After a while, I got bored and just had to leave. I get creeped out by people being in close proximity to me too, so I was a bit uncomfortable as it was pretty busy at that hour. So, there's my non-place. With no connection to the location, anything can be a non-place, perhaps. But, any location can be a place. It truly is a grey area.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
I totally agree that any space can be either a place or non-place depending how you look at it. It seems strange to talk about the appearance of these non-places, when I'm sure they have existed for quite some time. When one spends time in a space without giving a damn about the actual space, it is to him or her a non-place. Is this really a new idea?
So I have a thought. If I had been you, I wouldn't have been uncomfortable sitting there watching people and not really having a purpose of being there because I don't ride the bus; my discomfort would have come from the idea that people might have been secretly observing me and thinking that I was a sketchy individual. You know what I mean? Maybe it's fear of being seen in a negative light, but you make the point that your bus stigma leads you to think that only vagrants hang out at bus stops...were you nervous people began to think of you in this way?
Along with randi....another way to look at a non-place is that you feel uncomfortable if you have no reason to be there or aren't using it for its specified "non-place" purpose. Or maybe the people who work in the non-place won't allow you to use it. Like an airport..you can't go in without a ticket. Or starbucks....you're not really supposed to linger around if you aren't buying anything.
Post a Comment