In Defense of the Suburbs

When asked where ­I’m from, I often hesitate to respond. I pause and vacillate between versions of the truth before finally settling upon “San Diego.” But often this answer is too vague and requires further specification. A more precise, slightly more glamorous response would be “Del Mar”; however, this is borderline dishonest — as in across the borderline of Interstate 5. The un-vague, less-glamorous, honest truth is this: ­I’m from Carmel ­Valley.

I was in third grade when we moved here. To my unseasoned eye, Carmel Valley ­wasn’t like other places. Life here was still developing, and we were on the forefront of it — pioneers ushering in the progress. The settlement was characterized by newness. New housing developments, new schools, new strip malls. My family moved into a model two-home in Cantamar, custom tailored to my ­mother’s tastes, right down to the periwinkle tile in the kitchen. I chose the room with the window seat, and my brother settled for the walk-in closet. Heaven was having your own ­room.

The sparse geography was a blank canvas for our minds. My brother and I needed only hop over our back wall to explore the infinite possibilities of a dirt lot or walk our dusty street to scour the skeletons of houses undergoing construction. We rode our bikes to investigate this new territory. Spurred by the limitless landscape, our imaginations took ­shape.

Carmel Valley would soon gain a reputation as a ­family’s paradise. It was the promised land of good schools and safe cul-de-sacs. The community grew exponentially, dividing and multiplying like out-of-control cells. Housing developments, roads, grocery stores, gas stations, schools: it was the stuff of the Sim City computer games we played in school, and it was happening all around ­us.

In time, my inner snob would emerge. I started to notice the stuff other families were made of: the interior decor of their homes, the cars in their driveways, their yards landscaped with fresh sod, their sparkling, azure swimming pools. The subtle differences between us and them set my family apart in an otherwise homogeneous neighborhood. Ours was the only house on the block still without landscaping, and unlike anyone else, my mother drove a 1984 Honda Accord with screeching brakes and a ceiling that billowed like a Bedouin ­tent.

After assessing our net worth, it was clear that my family ­didn’t measure up. I managed this indignity by learning to tactfully evade embarrassing situations. Concealing the humiliating truth about my ill-equipped family became an art. I discouraged my friends from coming over: ­“Let’s hang out at your house instead. My parents are vegans,” ­I’d say, as though it were some disease. Driving past highly visible areas where I might be recognized by someone I knew was always a convenient time to tie my ­shoe.

High school only inflated my insecurities. There I was surrounded by kids from some of the wealthiest communities in the nation. I was a measly goldfish in a very expensive fish tank. The parking lot told the story: teachers drove the Hondas and rusted-out Oldsmobiles while students flaunted BMWs and Mercedes the second they turned 16. Preoccupied with pretense and perfection, I did everything I could to keep up ­appearances.

In the years to come, I would move to Seattle to attend college. I would mature and grow a social conscience and come to see the great blunders of our culture — the wasteful, consumerist, narcissistic, money-driven culture — all of which I associated with suburbia. Upon each return home, I was stabbed by a pang of disgust for this vast urban sprawl. The completion of Highway 56 only affirmed my distaste — Carmel Valley now joined together a slew of neighboring suburbs, making it one colossal indefinite ­conglomeration.

The suburban paradise lacked the flavor of some of its more noble counterparts. It lacked the history of a Del Mar, the iconic stage for the glory days of surfing and horseracing. It ­didn’t have the eccentricity of a community like Encinitas, which resonates a kind of offbeat eclecticism and nonconformist attitude. The conventionality and practicality of suburban living came at the expense of personality and ­individuality.

It has been 17 years since my parents moved into the model home in Cantamar. A few cosmetic improvements have been made, but the house has largely remained the same (including the periwinkle kitchen tile). It is now landscaped, with a flourishing garden and a koi ­pond.

Everything around the house has changed. An athletic club the size of a small planet, inhabited by svelte blonde women in pink velour sweat suits, has taken over the dirt lot. Only two of our original neighbors remain; everyone else has moved into newer developments. We no longer keep track of who lives in which house but refer to our neighbors by their ­home’s original owners, like, “the people that live in the ­Millers’ old ­house.”

Growing up in Carmel Valley meant watching my neighborhood transform before my eyes — from nothing to housing development after housing development of stucco and concrete. But in an ever-changing world, our house seems like a monument of stability — the one thing that my family can count on. I now understand why my parents scrimped and saved for this house. This house — mortgaged three times — has put both my brother and me through college, ­it’s seasoned wildfires, and it’s seen us through economic and personal crises. As we weather all kinds of storms — Hurricane Ikes and stock-market crashes — those of us with a place to call home count it as a rare blessing. These walls hold our lives ­together.

Carmel Valley may not be a true-blue, picturesque American neighborhood with mom-and-pop grocery stores and milk deliveries to your front door. It may have a few glaring eyesores of a suburb, but nevertheless it is where I am from. And at the end of the day, ­I’m cool with ­that.