Fire that's closest kept burns most of all

This made me very sad today.

I was eating dinner across the street from Eastern Market around 10pm last night. I didn't see anything unusual. I think it happened much later, or even the next morning.

Yes. I was eating dinner at Tunnicliff's. But it wasn't my fault. HPMelon wanted a chicken sandwich. So there it is.

Anyway, Eastern Market is the reason I moved to the hill five and a half years ago. I visited Skids in DC around 1998 when he was assisting on a show at Ford's and I was in school. He was staying on the hill, with a couple who later became dear friends of mine. I got horribly lost getting to their house (quadrants, duh) and pulled in to their drive less than an hour before the show I was heading to at Arena Stage was to start.

I don't remember the show and I don't remember how I got to the theater, but I do remember walking around Eastern Market the next day. And I loved it. It reminded me of a cross between the Public Market in Rochester, which I LOVED going to as a child (more for the booths selling cheap jelly bracelets and plastic charm necklaces than for the produce) and Chelsea Market in New York (which is a chi-chi, urban version of any of these markets).

So when 2001 rolled around and I needed a place to live in DC, any listing that referenced Eastern Market moved to the top of the list. I knew nothing about the actual neighborhood, I only knew that there was this cool place nearby where I could impulse shop for jewelry and used cds (remember when we bought cds?) on the weekends, and buy dates and tomatoes and apple butter during the week.

Since I moved here in 2001 I have never lived anywhere that was not within walking distance to Eastern Market.

Oddly though, I've only been to Market Lunch once. The crowds make me itchy.

It's very sad.

When I was writing for voice of the hill I wrote a piece about the history of the outdoor flea market part of Eastern Market. I need to track down the date--maybe when I find it I'll link to it here. And I imagine (I HOPE) that the outdoor market will still operate even with the damage done to the produce part of the market.

I guess we'll have to wait and see.