Field trip

The next few installments of Everything Falls Apart have already been written and I am still working on the framing of multiple other episodes.

I say this only because some of it will seem to be mirroring the field trip I am taking tomorrow and it would be easy to say, “Oh well, Michael is just writing about his field trip on Saturday in this episode.”

Actually, it is the other way around, as I am doing the field trip to get boots on the ground research done for my story instead of relying on my shaky memory of what the modern-day scene is like in downtown Minneapolis.

Street View can only go so far in giving you a sense of how things have changed in forty years. Sure, I’ve been downtown multiple times over the years — but generally with a purpose other than trying to edge up memories against modernity. And definitely not with this story in mind.

So, I’ll be matching Alice’s steps, not hers to mine. And making a few other excursions in the area for future episodes. While the story is entirely fictional, I am trying to ground it in reality.

No, I’m not going on a modern-day urbex adventure. Don’t have the gear or the fitness to do such things safely. And I like staying out of jail.

But I do want to get a sense of the current backdrop so I can be accurate in my writing about it (and satisfy my curiosity on multiple other elements). I plan to take some photos and videos of the real world backdrop to the tale, perhaps audio recordings if they make sense.

We’ll call it research.

I’ve attempted to keep the story free from info drops and exposition. It’s a constraint I’ve put on myself as my own editor when I put that hat on. But that doesn’t mean that I am not spending as much time or more doing research in the name of accuracy. Hopefully enough of it comes through without me relying on infodumps.

You’d be surprised what old fire insurance maps will tell you about an older part of town. That preppy bar? Used to be a slaughter yard before they put a flophouse on it built of wood without insulation or fireproofing before it was converted to a “hotel” of dubious reputation next to the vaudeville theatre and adjacent to a six-room elementary school. They tore the hotel down during the prohibition years because—

You get the idea. I get to play at historian as well as fictioneer.

All because I wanted to know if something (several somethings, actually) in particular feasibly existed on the spot before it was modernized. Yes, it once did and might still be there if I physically confirm with my own two eyes instead of relying on blurry Street View photos to tell me if that feature is still there.

Who knows? I might even share what I find (hint).