Must-visit awful U.S. cities

What is love? Baby, don't hurt me. Don't hurt me no more.

 

I attempted an explanation in mine, though must-visit is certainly a stretch. Lumberton has lots and lots of problems. Crime is terrible, schools are bad, there's poverty and lots of drugs. There's not much for entertainment and I don't find the swamp land particularly scenic.

But with the Lumbee Indians there, it is unique. Seeing it and meeting people offers insight to a part of American history that's obscure to a lot of people and it's a glimpse at the challenges a community can face.

 

Been to lumberton...not good...still blue velvet was set there so they have that going for them.

 

Unfortunately, I never ran into Isabella Rossellini there.

 

Paterson and Passaic, New Jersey. To imagine what once was.

Centralia, Pa., where the coal mine burns beneath the town but maybe a half-dozen homes remain of the hundreds that used to line the now-empty streets.

 

How about the chalk outline in Ferguson?

Too soon?

 

There was a was?

 

Paterson has the waterfalls. Years ago was known as Silk City. Also hometown of Larry Doby, Lou Costello and Ruben Hurricane Carter.

 

My mom used to live in Morrisville, on the first street across the Trenton Makes bridge. The Route 1 bridge was one duplex and one empty lot from her house. I think the Poor Righteous Teachers are dancing in what would later be her front yard.

 

I lived in Morrisville for 4 years, on Grand, down the street from Giant. Small world.

 

Indeed. My mom lived on Delmorr. She moved there after I left the house, and then moved again a couple of years ago.
I was born and raised in Trenton, so my Morrisville geography is sketchy. I learned how to get to her house after she moved, how to get through Morrisville and avoid the toll bridge, and how to get to the pitch and putt course. Never explored much beyond that.

 

The Jim Jarmusch movie, Paterson, which came out earlier this year, made Paterson look really nice.