Monday, June 18, 2012

Good Thing #9: Bangor, ME

We bought a house in Bangor, Maine because it was where we could afford to buy a house we loved, not because we were actually thrilled to be moving there. In fact, most people's reaction, if it wasn't, "Where?" was, "Why would you want to move there?" To be honest, we had our misgivings, but figured we'd be spending most of our time in the college town up the road, Orono.

To our surprise, Bangor has turned out to be a great place! We only go to Orono when we have to. We've never run out of things to do here, and there's always some event we're missing. There's a growing creative community, and young people who are trying to make the place better.

There's a real feeling of history here. Bangor was once one of the wealthiest cities on the planet, before the wooden ships fell out of fashion. It never fully recovered from that crash, but many of the buildings are still around, great lumber baron mansions that are now divided up into apartments.

The city has its problems, as any city of a certain size does. Homelessness and drug abuse and crime are things you hear about, but you'll find those in a lot of places. What Bangor also has, though, is potential. Lots of cheap but beautiful properties and places where things could happen. Creatives are moving to Detroit because they see the potential in the abandoned places. They should be coming here!

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