Let me tell you I was enlightened when I went to DC this past January. This time I ventured to a rough neighborhood where my friend lives and learned that outside the pretty monuments and wealthy areas of DC, things are pretty bad there.

I took a trip to my friend’s neighborhood grocery – I mean – party store to pick up bacon and eggs for breakfast. This place resembled many party stores in Detroit – ones I would never consider entering to do my grocery shopping let alone pick up a gallon of milk…

Quickly I realized that while we can beat up Detroit for its poor choices in grocery stores, this is a problem that exists in many urban areas. For those of us fortunate enough to have cars, we can travel the city to find the best of the best when it comes to produce.

Unfortunately for my friend who relies on the DC metro for transportation, his choices remain limited unless he can hitch a ride with his roommate to the bigger grocery store (although, we did drive by that store on our way to the airport and it left much to be desired as well).

My point, sometimes I think we have a lower tolerance for what we expect out of Detroit than what many people in many other cities expect or get out of their cities. But – this is not to say that we should not expect more than we do. Its just to say that the urban experience is a different kind of challenge in every city.