 
Tponetom
Member
Username: Tponetom
Post Number: 17
Registered: 06-2007
| | Posted on Thursday, June 28, 2007 - 8:11 pm: |    |
From the years 1974 through 1987, I used to commute to Detroit, to work. Not daily, mind you, but usually, bi-weekly. We were building our retirement home in the Upper Peninsula. We used Rapid River, MI. as our mailing address but we lived 14 miles northeast of that small town. It was 440 miles from Detroit. I was a union plumber (Local 98) working at various venues in and around Detroit. My schedule was something like this. I would leave home at midnight, Sunday, and get to the job site around 7:30 a.m. on Monday morning. I would work two weeks and then head for home on Friday afternoon and would arrive there around midnight. I would sleep a little bit and then work on the house all day Saturday and Sunday. I would grab a few hours sleep in the early evening, on Sunday, and then repeat that schedule. Of course there were many periods of no employment but our life style had evolved to an old philosophers pronouncement. "Show me what I am missing, and I will show you how to get along without it."
Digression: In 1973, the oil embargo caused the price of gasoline to soar to 80 cents a gallon, but we weathered that storm.
All of our dreams came to fruition.
I have only recently entered into this Forum. I have read at least five hundred postings on different issues. I do not read very much despair in those postings, but more often, I read indecision in a lot of them. People reaching out for advice, frustration, some times complacency and others who are perfectly satisfied, doing what they are doing, and that is great.
Will detroit ever return to its glory days of the Forties. Of course not. But it can evolve into something that we cannot conceive of at this time. Detroit is not unique. Check out St. Louis, cleveland, Pittsburg, and a dozen other medium cities.
We are Detroiters and we always will be. Sadly, my two knee prostheses and Peggy's craniotomy cannot survive in todays atmosphere of Detroit. But. at the age of 78, we will get back to Michigan, because there is no place in this country to compare it to.
P.S. What did Peggy do while I was gone? Woooow, that's another story |
Waz
Member
Username: Waz
Post Number: 98
Registered: 11-2006
| | Posted on Thursday, June 28, 2007 - 8:21 pm: | |
I met a guy when I used to work at Budd Plastics who lived in Sault Ste. Marie (Mi.) and did pretty much the same as you, tponetom. His wife was a school teacher up there and I wondered why she couldn't find a job down here. But I guess mine is not to question why.
I knew a guy who lived in Jackson and drove to Dearborn every day. Also, someone who lived in Howell and drove to Warren for a few years.
I don't know how they, or you, did/do it. My mantra is "make my commute as short as possible." I love to drive, just not in the BS traffic you see today. |
Mikeg
Member
Username: Mikeg
Post Number: 979
Registered: 12-2005
| | Posted on Thursday, June 28, 2007 - 9:00 pm: | |
My dad is a retired Local 98 plumber. During the early 1960's he was working on a job in Paw Paw for several month during the winter. He took an apartment in Kalamazoo and came home (Macomb County) on weekends. Some of his daily commutes over the years were to jobs in places like Avoca, Luna Pier and Belleville. |
Treelock
Member
Username: Treelock
Post Number: 208
Registered: 03-2005
| | Posted on Friday, June 29, 2007 - 5:27 pm: | |
I used to commute from my home in Grosse Pointe Park to Manchester, a small village about 12 miles west of Saline. It was 62 miles each way.
I only had to do it three times a week, but it was long enough that I usually stayed at friends' houses in Ann Arbor to lessen the ickiness. |
Esp
Member
Username: Esp
Post Number: 87
Registered: 09-2005
| | Posted on Friday, June 29, 2007 - 6:46 pm: | |
What happened to the retirement home in the Upper Peninsula? |
Mackinaw
Member
Username: Mackinaw
Post Number: 3121
Registered: 02-2005
| | Posted on Friday, June 29, 2007 - 7:10 pm: | |
I could not commute more than 20 minutes. I have a good attention span, just not when it comes to driving. |
Jerome81
Member
Username: Jerome81
Post Number: 1534
Registered: 11-2003
| | Posted on Friday, June 29, 2007 - 7:28 pm: | |
I love to drive, but driving when you HAVE to SUCKS. Especially in traffic.
Depending on where I really wanted to live or how much I really liked my job, I'd probably be willing to go up to 30 minutes each way. More than that and I'd have to think about changing something.
I know people here in CA that work in Silicon Valley and live in the central valley. Their ocmmutes are sometimes an hour+ each way.
Mainly because the jobs are here but the affordable housing is out there. To them, to own a home or to own a big home is worth that. I think it is insane to spend 10 hours on the road each week. Thats an extra business day just driving to/from your work.
I drive about 15 minutes currently. 8 miles each way. Rarely does traffic suck. I don't mind it a bit.
I tried the hour from SF each way for awhile. It was TERRIBLE. Made worse because the freeway traffic was always so bad. I ended up taking the train a lot even though it added 15 minutes each way. At least I could read or listen to music or work on the way. hour and 15 in relaxation beats hour in traffic any day.
As much as I loved living in SF, I just couldn't do that any more. So I moved down the peninsula.
Decided about 30 minutes is as much as I will do from now on. Being forced to drive something just sucks if it is too long. |
Jimaz
Member
Username: Jimaz
Post Number: 2485
Registered: 12-2005
| | Posted on Friday, June 29, 2007 - 7:55 pm: | |
I knew a couple of engineers who would fly their own planes between Sedona and Phoenix every workday.
There was another who flew commercial between Phoenix and San Francisco every week! Ouch! |
Bulletmagnet
Member
Username: Bulletmagnet
Post Number: 724
Registered: 01-2007
| | Posted on Friday, June 29, 2007 - 9:00 pm: | |
We have friends who live in Easton Pennsylvania, and have taken the train into New York City for dinner. You can do that kind of thing when you have mass transit. I drive 20 miles to work, one way. |
Tponetom
Member
Username: Tponetom
Post Number: 19
Registered: 06-2007
| | Posted on Friday, June 29, 2007 - 11:08 pm: | |
ESP: Retirement home.
We moved from Detroit to the U.P in December of 1973. We stayed there for 21 years. I don’t
know that anyone would be interested in our adventures of living in the Hiawatha National forest,
west branch. All we did was make maple syrup, picked wild flowers, maintained 3 separate
vegetable and flower gardens, cut, split and stacked 10 full cords of beech and maple firewood,
reveled in the color season of Autumn, and in the winter we had too much to do to notice the
minus 20 degree temperatures. The best activity in the winter was to awake in morning when the
temperature in the house was 48 degrees. I would get out of bed first and stoke the banked fire in
the Franklin wood stove. I would heat the water to make coffee. I would pull the two La-Z-Boy
chairs close to the Franklin. I cover each chair with a blanket. When the coffee was ready I
would scream at my beloved, “For God’s sake, get up, the house is on fire.”
She would reply, “Well, that sounds like a good way to defrost.”
She would come down and I would wrap the blanket around her and then serve her
coffee. It would take 2 to 4 hours to get the house warm.
What kind of a woman is she? Some years later, when I was working in Detroit, she
decided to paint the house and the garage and the barn with a double coat of paint. 28 gallons of
paint, and two months later, she had finished it. When I came home on a week-end I would paint
the gables.
By the way, the Franklin wood stove is easily the worst stove for heating a house that you
can imagine. But oh, you cannot beat the charm of its open fire. If you are interested in more
details I have 67 MB on file.
It might have been dull for some people. We had no commercial electricity, no phone, no
TV, mail, water or sewer service. Our one dependency was propane gas for lighting and
refrigeration. When I write these things, I end it by saying, “If you can think of something we
were missing, I can tell you how to get along without it.’ |
Tponetom
Member
Username: Tponetom
Post Number: 20
Registered: 06-2007
| | Posted on Friday, June 29, 2007 - 11:21 pm: | |
ESP: retirement home?
ESP: Retirement home.
We moved from Detroit to the U.P in December of 1973. We stayed there for 21 years. I don’t
know that anyone would be interested in our adventures of living in the Hiawatha National forest,
west branch. All we did was make maple syrup, picked wild flowers, maintained 3 separate
vegetable and flower gardens, cut, split and stack 10 full cords of beech and maple firewood,
reveled in the color season of Autumn, and in the winter we had too much to do to notice the
minus 20 degree temperatures. The best activity in the winter was to awake in morning when the
temperature in the house was 48 degrees. I would get out of bed first and stoke the banked fire in
the Franklin wood stove. I would heat the water to make coffee. I would pull the two La-Z-Boy
chairs close to the Franklin. I cover each chair with a blanket. When the coffee was ready I
would scream at my beloved, “For God’s sake, get up, the house is on fire.”
She would reply, “Well, that sounds like a good way to defrost.”
She would come down and I would wrap the blanket around her and then serve her
coffee. It would take 2 to 4 hours to get the house warm.
What kind of a woman is she? Some years later, when I was working in Detroit, she
decided to paint the house and the garage and the barn with a double coat of paint. 28 gallons of
paint, and two months later, she had finished it. When I came home on a week-end I would paint
the gables.
By the way, the Franklin wood stove is easily the worst stove for heating a house that you
can imagine. But oh, you cannot beat the charm of its open fire. If you are interested in more
details I have 67 MB on file.
It might have been dull for some people. We had no commercial electricity, no phone, no
TV, mail, water or sewer service. Our one dependency was propane gas for lighting and
refrigeration. When I write these things, I end it by saying, “If you can think of something we
were missing, I can tell you how to get along without it.’ |
Iheartthed
Member
Username: Iheartthed
Post Number: 1055
Registered: 04-2006
| | Posted on Saturday, June 30, 2007 - 10:33 am: | |
"We have friends who live in Easton Pennsylvania, and have taken the train into New York City for dinner. You can do that kind of thing when you have mass transit. I drive 20 miles to work, one way."
Some people commute from Philly to NYC for work daily (not hard by train). A couple people who work in my building live in Pa... |
Sturge
Member
Username: Sturge
Post Number: 34
Registered: 05-2007
| | Posted on Saturday, June 30, 2007 - 5:36 pm: | |
There's a guy where I work who commutes daily to downtown Detroit from Frankenmuth. |
Esp
Member
Username: Esp
Post Number: 88
Registered: 09-2005
| | Posted on Saturday, June 30, 2007 - 8:14 pm: | |
nice Tponetom ... very interesting |
Jeduncan
Member
Username: Jeduncan
Post Number: 109
Registered: 11-2006
| | Posted on Saturday, June 30, 2007 - 9:28 pm: | |
my buddy's dad lives in Howell, and works at the Rouge. Fuck that commute. |
Dustin89
Member
Username: Dustin89
Post Number: 33
Registered: 07-2006
| | Posted on Sunday, July 01, 2007 - 12:20 am: | |
I knew a guy who commuted to the Renaissance Center from Caro, Michigan. |
Gargoyle
Member
Username: Gargoyle
Post Number: 84
Registered: 04-2006
| | Posted on Sunday, July 01, 2007 - 2:43 pm: | |
I felt very lucky to get a job with Ford in their Romeo tractor plant in the fall of 1977. The down side? I lived in Wyandotte.
Economic reality being what it was then, I chose to commute to my job in Romeo until I got my ninety days in and had some union protection. I was afraid to sign a lease on a place in BFE and then not have a job to pay for it.
It was exactly 52 miles each way. I posted in the plant for ride sharing, but got no replies. When my ninety days were in, I rented an apartment in Richmond, and later, a house on North Avenue.
I can't imagine ever having that kind of commute again. There are too many angry people on the roads these days.... |
Daf
Member
Username: Daf
Post Number: 3
Registered: 02-2007
| | Posted on Monday, July 02, 2007 - 8:16 pm: | |
I do Emmett to downtown Detroit every day. About 60 miles each way. I USED to do Emmett to Lansing: 107 each way. For 6 1/2 years. New commute is a picnic, pretty much. |
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