Life With the Little Caliph

DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES - Our family moved Downtown three years

ago, when our son, Nathan, was just a year old. We were refugees

from Silver Lake, escaping not only the crazy high rents but the

insularity as well.

My husband, James, and I were looking for a place that was big

enough to accommodate his computer business while also being a

short commute to my job in City West. As regulars at the Art Walk,

we could see the neighborhood was evolving into something exciting,

and as native New Yorkers who'd grown up playing street games like

hopscotch, stickball and Ringalevio, we liked the idea of raising

our kid in the city core.

There is now a whole litany of places that didn't exist when we

first moved here: the Nickel Diner, D-town Burger Bar, Bliss,

Spring for Coffee, Crack Gallery, Syrup Desserts, Flea, Bark

Avenue, Bolt Barbers, the Gorbals and all of the bars on Spring

Street.

There were also, when we arrived, almost no families. I

personally knew almost everyone with kids Downtown and could count

them all on my fingers (no toes needed). I'd push Nathan in his

stroller down deserted streets on Sunday afternoons wondering if

we'd made a terrible mistake by moving into the neighborhood.

Things have changed. A lot. There's a newborn in my building

whose daddy takes her out for walks in the Baby Bjorn, along with

the family dog. More than 150 people belong to the Downtown L.A.

Parents Facebook group. There's a play date in Grand Hope Park

every Saturday and I see people pushing baby strollers down Spring

Street every day. It blows my mind. It's so... normal.

Of course, raising kids Downtown has its own special flavor.

There's a man on Broadway and Sixth Street who gives out

handwritten sheets detailing the connection between Allah and

Frankenstein (seriously), and he always makes a point of handing

one to Nathan. My son loves it because, at age four, he thinks

getting stuff, any kind of stuff, is awesome. The man loves it

because there aren't too many people who grab his handouts with a

big grin on their faces. He calls Nathan the Little Caliph.

So yeah, raising your kid Downtown means putting up with a bit

of weirdness. But in a strange way, Caliph Man illustrates what I

love most about living Downtown: the sense of community. When we

eat at the Nickel, owner Monica May sits at our table and calls

Nathan her mascot because he's grown up along with her restaurant.

Shane, our favorite barber at Bolt, knows exactly how to cut

Nathan's hair and calls him the best kid he's ever worked on. At

Christmas last year, both the owner of an electronics store and our

parking garage attendant gave Nathan presents out of the blue.

Walking down Spring Street or Broadway with Nathan can sometimes

feel like the Copa sequence in Goodfellas, with people calling out

his name and waving or stopping to shake his hand.

The other amazing aspect of raising a kid in Downtown is the

culture. My husband and I grew up in New York visiting the

Metropolitan Museum of Art, taking in Broadway shows and hearing

free symphony concerts in Central Park. Living in Downtown Los

Angeles, our son is having similar experiences. Nathan gets to

gallery hop at Art Walk, and attend children's opera at the Dorothy

Chandler Pavilion and free concerts at Disney Hall. This summer

Nathan will be taking music lessons at the Colburn School on Bunker

Hill (and riding Angels Flight to get there).

I remember one amazing event in particular when Pershing Square

was taken over for a nighttime art show. Nathan wasn't the only kid

there that night, and he and the other children ran around and

gaped in wonder at the sculptures as bands played and parents

strolled hand-in-hand under the stars.

As Downtown continues to evolve, there will be more and more

kids like Nathan, moving into the neighborhood along with their

parents or born here (because, as my husband says, when young,

attractive people move into lofts together, reproduction happens).

They'll experience a childhood that's unique in Los Angeles, one

that isn't limited to seeing the world passing by through a car

window.

We love it and we wouldn't want anything else for our son.

page 12, 5/2/2011

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