I found myself wandering through the western JeffVanderLou neighborhood, which straddles Grand Boulevard. It is in rough shape, as this corner storefront demonstrates.

This beautiful row of flats has been ravaged by fire, as has this beautiful little house on a narrow street fronting a small park. The house next door is fine, but how would it be to live next to house like this?

I crossed over Grand, and realized I was near Dan’s house, a man we had met several years ago in 2013. Much to my chagrin, I discovered that Dan and whatever family lived with him had given up on his troubled corner of the neighborhood, moving somewhere outside of the abandonment of his block.

These two forlorn, and collapsing houses, sit to the east, drifting into oblivion. Can you blame Dan for moving?