Went to the Downtowner presentation this morning.

It was every bit as unpleasant an experience as I feared. I pretty much turned people against me. The crowd was overwhelmingly in favor of the proposal, which was presented in Utopian, happy-talk terms.

Apparently, the early meeting had gone the other way. Tom and Jeff took me aside as I arrived and told me what had happened. It felt good to have them on my side.

But inside the room during my hour, it turned out much differently. Linda and Trish tried to assure me that it hadn't gone wrong, but no one was meeting my eyes, which is a really bad sign. No one came up to say they agreed with me. 

Yeah, I probably didn't help my case.

But I kind of know this about myself. I come on too strong, don't know when to shut it. 

Anyway, I think I'm done. I'll talk to Mayor Russell on Sunday, tell her to be aware that despite what the Downtowners may tell her that there is significant opposition to the idea.

And leave it at that.

As Trish said, "You've only been in business in downtown Bend for 37 years. Why would they listen to you?"

37 years of listening to business owners come in without a lick of common sense who then go out of business. 37 years of newcomers telling me how it should be. Why do you insist in coming and changing what already works? Why come from somewhere else only to change it to the same thing you left?

37 years of working around the problems created by the Downtowners. 37 years of going my own way, of opening on Sundays when no one opened on Sundays, of being opposed the ever-expanding special events that hurt business, 37 years of fighting them, trying to keep them from permanently closing the streets. 37 years of realizing I have no influence and I'd better protect my business from their stupidity. 37 years of telling the downtowners they need to find ways for minimum wage, half time employees to afford parking. 37 years of always paying significantly above minimum wage to keep good employees.

37 years of looking at what actually happens, not what some book says. 37 years of people telling me that somewhere else does it better only to learn that the person who does it better is no longer in business. 37 years of building my business steadily until my 37th years was my best ever (even with being closed two months for Covid) and of having my 38 year turning out even better. 

And despite that, despite the huge numbers of customers and tourists downtown, the business who aren't apparently doing well (many of them who are still not open on Sundays and Mondays) are going to do a Hail Mary pass despite ample evidence it's a risk. 37 years of having the restaurants dictate what happens downtown despite having almost no similarities to my business.

So I will being doing my 38th, and 39th years, and so on, on my own, working around their decisions, ignoring their pie-in-the-sky plans and just doing my thing. Again.