I've lived in Vancouver, BC, since October of 1982. I came here by way of Powell River after leaving my home town of Thunder Bay, ON, in August of 1982. I remember coming into the downtown on a gray, rainy day, but for me, the city shone like the Emerald City in The Wizard of Oz. I was 19 years old, I'd just left home and this place seemed like it might have some possibilities for a young man just starting out on his own. It's been my home ever since then and it has generally felt like home for most of that time, but the last few years have made it feel more like a place being built for someone else and not me.
I've noticed it primarily in the boom of construction which has erupted in the West End and across the city in the last few years. So many towering luxury high rise apartment buildings are leaping up into the sky, it staggers the mind to think of all that real-estate propagating so quickly. But I don't know who is going to live in all of these places. I don't have any relationship with the people who are building these structures nor the people who will live in them. I only know that I won't be one of them. I'll never set foot in any of these places and I'll never know anybody who lives in them. Somehow, I got left out of this new city. It's not being built for me and it has no interest in me or my welfare, regardless of what I might have to offer.
You might ask what makes me think this way and, to be honest, I'm not sure how I know this, but I am as sure of it as I am that the world is round (though even that has become debatable again, somehow). What is certain is that I've been disconnected from the economy which is driving this construction and growth and there does not appear to be any means of interacting with it in such a way which would make it possible for me to even conceive of living a lifestyle which would include inhabiting one of these steel and glass stacks. Whatever it takes to earn the kind of money that one needs to rent or own one of these homes is completely beyond the scope of my abilities.
I'm not at all certain of how I got to this position. In fact, I was gainfully and relatively affluently employed for many years, but even then I was somehow not able to work myself into a position where accessing this level was possible. Even when I was pulling a high five digits for my annual gross income, I was only ever able to indulge little beyond splashing out for a bit of takeout food and a few tech toys here and there. I never owned a home or a vehicle and never had a family to support. Yet I didn't even have enough to get my damn teeth fixed, something which now poses a serious health risk to me and also, aesthetically, means I can't present myself in public with any confidence, given that a gap-toothed, dingy yellow smile is nothing less than a stamp of impoverishment. 16 years working "professionally" still left me with no foothold by which I could maintain even a modest lifestyle.
While I may not be in possession of formal accreditation in any field, I worked professionally in technology, including documentation, testing, design and implementation, long enough to merit those qualifications based on experience alone. I am in possession of ample natural talents and acquired skills to enable me to perform exceptionally in many different fields and applications. Yet, none of that bares any weight anymore and, going into application or interview processes, I can sense, intuitively, that I am automatically excluded from consideration the moment I present myself. There is some factor involved which shuts the door to all avenues of potential for me. The days when friends and family networked together to help each other secure employment seem to have vanished. Even with social media, it seems that the process of using personal relationships to remain connected to society have broken down and ceased to function.
In some regard, I suspect my age, being over 50, has played a significant role in this. My ongoing health issues may factor in as well, though they are neither obvious nor chronic enough to be apparent without actual knowledge of my medical history. Whatever the case is, I'm certainly the "potato" that's fallen off the truck and there doesn't seem to be any way to get back on. The city that is re-inventing itself before my eyes most definitely has no role for me to play in it. This place is now a playground for the wealthy and nothing being built here is manifesting with any intent to create communities or social infrastructure.
What we have is purely driven by economics. It's about money and nothing more. These places are investments, not homes. They're tools for laundering illicit cash flows. It's just a means to an end - busy work for the sake of "growth", but without any conscious goal where the lives and well-being of people are in mind. When I walk around certain areas in the West End, particularly along Coal Harbor, there's a faint sense of emptiness as so many of these properties sit vacant, purchased by people who aren't there and may only show up once in a while, if at all. These properties are no more than line items in a portfolio of assets. No dramas will play out within their walls. No events of lives lived will haunt their interiors. Only the movements of soulless automatons calculating interest rates will disturb the dust as it settles in these lifeless abodes.
This flurry of activity flies in the face of the looming ecological and climate crises which lurk at the threshold of the "day after tomorrow". It's so close to landing on our heads, but the busy bees keep working, oblivious to the futility of their efforts. I think of the "ghost" cities of China, built for no one. They were driven by the myopic obsessions of hyper-capitalistic investments with no human condition perceived within their planning. Money disconnected from benefits other than increase.
I've lived in my building since 1986, nearly 33 years. I've somehow managed to maintain my existence here by the skin of my teeth and through sheer force of will. I dangle on a precipice, only needing the occurrence of a property sale to trigger the "renoviction" process which has consumed so many low income residents in the past few years. I'm in a prime location for something like that to happen. I've seen building after building torn down across this city only to be replaced by greater, grander structures with price tags exponentially higher than what was there before. None of this is meant for so-called "regular" people. Only those of extreme affluence are welcome here and I don't know them at all. I don't know who who they are, I don't know what they want, I don't know where they think they're going with all of this.
It's like aliens have landed and taken over. They have no interest in our existence. We are a mere inconvenience to them. We will be eliminated in time. So I hang on to what little I have left until I can do no more.
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