January always feels like a fresh start! Clean out the attic, sweep the cobwebs, empty the fridge, and just hit restart and take a fresh look. Sparkly, shiny, with new blue crystals and a zesty new smile. Speaking of shiny blue crystals, Rockin’ Holiday was amazing this year. I was so excited to take my grandson to experience the Rockin’ Winter Wonderland, the Snow, the music the Tree and the Rockin’ North Pole with Rockin’ Santa and the elves. We have created a good tradition here and so glad to the next generation experiencing it.
So first off this January. Thank you to all of you that get involved to make a difference.
Thanks to those that see our vision and see what Modesto can be. Thanks to those who are open minded enough to see how our cultural and historical stories overlap and work together for a brighter Modesto. Our history is key to our future. You don’t have to like classic cars to understand the cultural value. We can be a gourmet locavore food city with a dynamite smart ag industry and at the same time be the home of American Graffiti with a classic culture. These things are all possible and we have to see things in a bigger way.
I went to London the last week in December to experience Trader Vic’s one last time before the London Hilton closes it. They don’t see the value of the history, and they will be sorry when Trader Vic’s is gone and too late. I met people from all over and when I said I was from Modesto, one responded, “Oh, American Graffiti”. My bartender witnessed it. This is amazing. We have a brand, and it can mean a lot of different things to many people, but when your brand is that strong globally, you gotta run with it and that’s what powers me up more about building the Graffiti USA Museum. How many other smart gourmet cities can also claim American Graffiti. Zero, just us. Makes us special. More important, we need to see how we can include more of our different cultures.
Our amazing community of lowriders and customs have been a vital part of our car culture for years. In fact, the families, many of them two, three and even four generation car families represent a big part of our car culture. It is new and fresh, attracting more women and blends the art with our hot rods and give us the opportunity to find a way to bring back cruising to Modesto. It is a different world today than it was in 1962, 1979 or 1993. We have fresh new opportunities and mustn’t look through the lens of the past.
As we close out 2022, we look back on some of our own local traditions and long-time businesses that have moved on. We lost Concetta, Deva, Crow Trading, and Beijing. They were all favorites and had a lot of fans. But this creates opportunity for new traditions to begin and we all need to be open to what people are going to create and what new directions they will go. We are still on the great Potsticker hunt and still mourn Minnie’s, but the new pan-fried dumplings from Chinn International are right up there. There is always a fresh way to look at things.
In our BigView this month, we are featuring new young up and comers with a fresh new look on Modesto. They will have diverse opinions, but they are all starting some that will have a place in our community. Let’s embrace the new, shepherd the developing and treasure our favorites so they all work together to make a more interesting Modesto.
ModestoView needs to be fresh and new always. Please tell me what you like about ModestoView, what you don’t and how we can make this more valuable for you, your family and your business. Our goal is the same as it has always been to “Serve Civic Pride Daily”. And we hope this mission works for you and our community. We need good news, we need positive reinforcement and we need to know that we are all in this together. We are a collection of local business, local organizations and families and friends.
Thank you to the local business that advertise in ModestoView so we can create, print and deliver this to you to keep the positive messages flowing.
Thank you for reading and on behalf of my family and our amazing ViewCrew, we wish you a very Happy New Year, filled with peace, prosperity, friendship and love.
Chris Murphy
Founder & Publisher, ModestoView
chrism@modestoview.com<mailto:chrism@modestoview.com>
