Thoughts.com Blogs - Your own great city

I love when a comment made on my blog gets me thinking of how to better explain myself and my feelings on things.
Yesterday I posted a few blogs about my day in the city. And one comment which I thought was great was that I need to let my son find his own great city. I agree with this in many ways. But in the case of both my wife and my son I am not saying that I need them to like my "great city" but that they need to have one.
Before I start down the analogy highway here let me stop and be concrete. New York is great. I love it. But I also see that Paris and Rome and London and Sydney and Melbourne and San Francisco and Chicago and Tokyo and Moscow and many other cities you can name are great also. Some of them I would love to see, one in particular but that is less for the city then a woman in it, but you all know that...But all but a few of them are plane rides away, and none are a day trip except for New York, from where I am. And to build a love of things you need to start somewhere.
There are things in many of those cities that New York has nothing to compare to. Rome has ancient ruins and an antire sperate city state inside it. Paris has great avenues and many old world building built well before we were even a country. London has old world charm and it's own living tourist attraction, the royal family.
But to see all that, to truly say that you like the old world experience of Paris or London, or the ancient granduer of Rome, you need to dip your feet in the water somewhere.
A few weeks ago I was talking to a young lady I know that is thinking of moving to New York, actually into the city itself. She made a comment that she would never raise kids there. This is a very smart woman that loves culture, loves the arts, and is really very well rounded in may ways. I pointed out that while I knew what she meant, that I know she wants to raise children that are as into the finer things as she is. She wants to see them as they see Picasso's and Van Gough's for the first time and while yes they are but a short drive and train ride away for me, I would maybe have seen much more of the city if it was all around me. If the museums were a short subway ride away, I would have gone at 14 not at 44.

I was watching this new minseries on HBO "John Adams"
The thing that applies to this discussion is that in there they show how miserable and out of place he was in Paris. He was a New England, work hard, love God, puritan and here he is in Paris of the 1700's and it is the opposite of all that he is. While Ben Franklin on the other hand was the toast of Paris, and he loved the place! And Abigail Adams loved Paris too when he had her come. It was just not his type of place.
Horses for courses, I get that

I stayed concrete longer than I planned but you get that point....

The wider issue is that whatever my son's "great city" is, he needs to have one.
I have a brother that loves golf. I really see no point in making myself that fustrated and paying for it. But that is his "great city" and I think that is fine. I have a sister that does body building, and while I think she does it due to some deeply sad psychological pain and I also see that as not something women should do...heck I am not reall into guys doing frankly but I see it as an extension of thebig strong man persona in most cultures...I guess that is her "great city".
All I ask is that he have one
PlayStation, watching TV, laying on your bed in your room, pro wrestling...they are not "great cities". I am sorry they are not.
And maybe that is my biggest fustation with my wife, she has reached well into he mid-40's and has no "great city".  She will tell me she reads, but has not in months. She did latch hook rungs for a bit, not anymore. And when I ask her for an activity we can do that is more her thing than mine, I am told she has no idea or she gives "regifts" an idea I had.
I long ago began to see that the clock has run out on my ability to make my wife find a great city but at 18 there is still hope for my son.  I think that what we are as adults is not all to the credit or blame of our parents. It is not always mom's fault. But I do see that much of the issues I have now with my wife came from her mother's words to her.  She did a very quiet number on thsi woman early on. All I am trying to do is make sure I do not leave a mess for some poor woman to solve.
All I am saying boils down to this:
Pick a city, any city. If you want to make Newark NJ your great city feel free. Just have a one