The doors were locked. I got the eerie feeling that this exploding downtown, this urban pearl and pride of the upper Midwest, with all its upscale shops and classy hotels and stunning skyscrapers is built on sand. I mention this just to illustrate how even the big enterprises of our life and culture are very fragile. We plan and we save and we build, and things look good and successful, and then it starts to collapse. And we can't believe it.
Nobody comes to shop.
Nobody rents the office space. Retailers begin to leave. The streets are deserted. The hotels can't pull the conventions. The pushers move in.