{"id":887,"date":"2015-09-13T22:50:28","date_gmt":"2015-09-13T22:50:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/?p=887"},"modified":"2015-09-13T22:50:28","modified_gmt":"2015-09-13T22:50:28","slug":"thoughts-on-our-vanishing-third-places-anupma","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/?p=887","title":{"rendered":"Thoughts on \u201cOur Vanishing Third Places\u201d – Anupma"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ray Oldenburg\u2019s article on \u201cOur Vanishing Third Places\u201d in some ways took me back in time. In the article, he says\u00a0home is our first place, work is our second place, and third places are an escape from both. \u00a0He describes them as \u201cinformal public gathering places\u201d where people can \u201cgather easily, inexpensively, regularly, and pleasurably\u201d close to home.<\/span><\/p>\n

It made me re-look at the places I\u2019ve spent most years of my life so far. First,my parent\u2019s home where I grew up, then the place I moved in with a friend after finishing college and then our home now in NY. Interestingly, when i think of these places now it\u2019s not the physical space that occurs to me first but, the time, the people, the memories and how well these places fit in with the stages of life. Oldenburg\u2019s concept of third places holds very different meanings for each of these places.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the years growing up, our patio, neighborhood streets, parks, and shops were the primary places of social interactions. It all centered around children(me, too back then) playing and their parents & grandparents conversing and sharing their lives at the same place. In my 20\u2019s when I started working and moved to a different city, these third place interactions shifted to coffee shops, restaurants, or a friend’s home. Neighborhood common space like parks or interacting with neighbors wasn\u2019t something that resonated with our lifestyles & schedules. There was a shift, it wasn\u2019t anymore about the neighborhood\/ community but friends and a convenient location that provided a comfortable space to talk to each other. I\u2019m not sure if these places even qualify the author\u2019s definition of \u2018third places\u2019 considering that these were often not close to home and didn\u2019t involve people from the neighborhood community.<\/span><\/p>\n

When I moved to NY last year the unfamiliarity of the place, it\u2019s people, my own life and lack of friends and family took a toll on my spirit. I found myself lost in the pace and loneliness of the city. The only thing that connected with me strongly was my home and it\u2019s neighborhood. That pace and life was something I could relate to. It gave me solace, just sitting in the park or the waterfront and seeing people take their dogs for a walk or seeing them walk with friends and family gave me a sense of comfort and belongingness for this place. These places, outside the comforts of my home, \u00a0filled in the void that I was experiencing with the shift. They gave me a chance to see, smile and sometimes interact and become friends with people I once didn\u2019t know, in a community that was once new and unfamiliar to me. In many ways these \u201cThird Places” made me feel \u2018home\u2019 yet again.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ray Oldenburg\u2019s article on \u201cOur Vanishing Third Places\u201d in some ways took me back in time. In the article, he says\u00a0home is our first place, work is our second place, and third places are an escape from both. \u00a0He describes … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-3rd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=887"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/887\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":888,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/887\/revisions\/888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.just4letters.com\/pi\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}