Friends don't let friends move to Portland.

When I left town, I just got on the freeway.

No lingering, nostalgic drive through town.- And risk hitting one of the do-nothing layabouts badgering me for money?
It was an amazingly easy city to leave.

The pothead work ethic was one thing. But the thing I moved to PDX for: the hoped-for middle-class comfort zone- seems to have entirely disappeared from the US.

There were plenty of people driving the usual snooty nameplate cars. Does your self-image really need that car so much that you can't pay your employees a decent wage? You sad person.

There were plenty of people pushing their belongings in shopping carts, or riding Tri-Met without tickets. There were plenty of plump, tattooed white men in their 20's, butts pasted onto the sidewalks around Pioneer Square, insulting me as I walked by on my 15 minute break. Jobless, on the dole and proud of it, asking me for money.

A beautiful city, with so much precious, clean water it runs freely from drinking fountains throughout downtown. Made unlivable by stoner career bums.

Where was the *working* middle- class? Nowhere that I could find them. Maybe if I hadn't of been constantly, frantically trying to find a full-time job that paid more than 10 dollars an hour, I would have had more time to seek things out.

Shame on both of these groups. You've ruined my America- the one where all one has to do to get a job at a good wage with health insurance, is go in and work hard for the company. With that, one could live in a neighborhood with other hard-working people, who enjoy their lives and the city they create, free of harassment. To have a sidewalk cafe dinner without being bothered for money, by someone perfectly capable of getting their own.

I wish I'd gotten a picture of the well-fed under-25 white guy who sneeringly pushed up his sleeve and held his hand out to me as I exited a store. The inside of his arm. from elbow to wrist, was tattooed with "Beer Money," the arrow below it pointing to his palm. I felt afraid of the rage I felt, the strong urge to lash out at him physically. A vision danced through my mind: my bent head spitting into his palm.

What a waste of my time that 11 months in Portland was. Must be a good climate for growing pot.