I spent a week in Brooklyn recently for my daughter’s wedding, and I came back thinking I had seen the future.
Brooklyn is not an easy place to live. My wife and I found a loft that was a bit gritty, but we wanted to share the life of my daughter and her new husband who live in a loft. It turned out to be quite interesting. One may have to face concrete floors, but oriental rugs give them a comfortable look. Exposed plumbing and heating, and walls of uncertain shape and color can be off-putting — until one realizes it’s a metaphor for the messy nature of modern life. One is forced to learn how to float serenely above the rubble.
The most striking aspect of my visit was to see how millennials like my daughter have formed a life of diversity. The wedding was a rich mélange of wildly different lifestyles, clothing, races, genders, occupations, and anything else one might imagine. There was a lovely young woman in a flowing gown, a black man with dreadlocks in a white suit and red tie, unshaven men wearing cargo shorts, people in business clothes, all manner of hair and sexual orientations. This community of the young got along so well that it seemed perfectly normal. No conflict, no cliques, no stress. This looked like the future, and it gave me hope.
One reason for this blissful coexistence is widespread information. They live in a rarified world where smart phones connect everyone together constantly. Travel by Uber-like car services is called up on demand. Places to stay are arranged on the spot using AirBnB. Any question answered with Google. Destination mapped with GPS systems. Food and groceries are just an email away. Texting is like breathing. They sleep with their phones, take them into the bath, and even to bed. One wonders what to expect when the next generation of IT beyond smart phones comes along?
There are many different Brooklyns, with wildly varying cultures, so it is hard to generalize. The Brooklyn of my daughter’s millennial crowd is just one element in this rich mix, but I think it’s the Brooklyn of the future, the America of the future, and even the world of the future. It’s a world of constant contact with everyone and everything, celebrated by a wild mixture of cultures, and held together by strong pockets of community, hopefully merging into a global whole.
Not an easy task, and there will always be conflict and brutality. But I think the world is coming together, and I was fortunate to get a glimpse of the future in Brooklyn.
