Back to School Sale

Not attended school in a long time, yet each summer's Back to School sales promotions with in-store displays captures my attention.  It usually gets a small portion of my money.  Lest I emerge as a senior relic, past my IRA's Required Minimum Distribution age, the AARP itself acknowledges this special retail season.  My children have careers.  Their children are infants.  No schools to attend, not for me, not for my descendants.  Yet, stationery and office supplies have always not only captivated me, but gave excuses to find homes for things I didn't need, and won't need.

Right now, my desk displays stick pens in multiplle colors, some click pens.  Pencils both mechanical and wood.  Two cartridge pens.  Three zipper loose-leaf binders.  I use some of these, not others, yet I've always had a fascination with pens.  Pharmaceutical representatives once distributed them to me in quantity, always with the logo of something they wanted me to prescribe stamped to the barrel.  Some were even mid-end in quality.  I use three bound notebooks regularly.  One tracks my Daily Annoyance, one three Daily Achievements, the third my exercise progress.  My desk has things I do not use.  Rulers.  A slide rule of another era.  Two three-hole punch devices to adapt plain paper for a three-ring binder.  I have typing paper.  Art supplies.  Pocket folders, some with clips, others just the pockets, some from stores, others harvested from meetings I previously attended, serve some useful purpose.  Clips and rubber bands get used, though more in the kitchen than in My Space.  I keep three razor edged letter openers, but do not open envelopes at my desk.  Instead, I use them to take copier paper and slice each sheet in half to create each day's Task List.

So while not in school, and not under pressure to appear stylish, each summer I check out the displays.  The process of resupply has changed considerably.  Sunday newspaper ads no longer arrive.  My favorite stores for stocking up have liquidated.  I could always enter a Christmas Tree Shoppe in August and find a few things to take to their register.  Target remains active.  While the store's chain has swooned with little that I want to purchase, each summer they stock their seasonal section in the way back of their stores with yellow bins.  I can expect teaser prices on pens of some type, yellow pencils, marble books, spiral books.  I anticipate needing a new spiral book next month.  Walmart also promotes heavily.  It can be a treasure hunt.  Among my favorite pens were there mulit-color package of Magnatank liquid gel pens.  Only the purple remains, the other lost to use or leakage.  Apparently sales or user feedback did not justify Walmart maintaining them.  Perhaps they still exist on eBay.  I could always use more dry-erase  markers, as my two whiteboards have become productivity and scheduling hubs. There only the Expo brand will suffice, preferably with the thin barrel.  And I can never have too many Bic hi-liter pens in multiple colors.

What advertising still exists also promotes Back to College.  When I designed My Space, I sought to create the dorm room that I could never afford to have.  Color TV, stereo, comfortable reading chair, swivel desk chair, optimal desk lighting.  I spent a little extra on this, though my stereo is a low-end retro without turntable, and my recliner a major disappointment, offset by being better off not occupying it too much at the expense of desk work.  Target and Boscov's supply the college crowd.  Mini-fridges, storage items, irons, coffee makers, small microwaves, stylish backpacks.  I have my optimally stocked house with all the things I need to function.  Big refrigerator, Keurig machine, high-end iron, built-in closets.  My Space has elements of a dorm, but the rest of my house does not.

Fortunately, most of what I now purchase over the summer classifies as consumable, even if I do not wear much of it out.  It takes a long time to deplete the ink of a Bic Cristal, though I succeed with the black one about once a year.  Highlighters last until they dry out.  Pencil cases sort my writing implements by type.  Paper seems inexhaustible, other than notebooks which get filled up.

While I have enough supplies, I anticipate buying some more, looking for discounts.  I don't really need or crave any.  Instead, the Back to School season announces a reset, even though my renewal time has been the medical world's July 1 rather than Labor Day.  The close of summer still has its reset.  The Holy Days.  Resumption of OLLI.  Football.  Target and Walmart and The Christmas Tree Shoppe z"l have all convinced me to stay ready.  

 

To the Beach

Summertime.  Some of the living seems easy, some not.  Been an active month with synagogue obligations, medical care, and rendezvous with our infant grandchildren. As restful as 20 minutes of propofol must have been and admiring how well my descendants have turned out, I could use a short couples interlude, followed in a few weeks by a longer couples destination.  We have the good fortune to live within two hours of the shoreline, some bay, some Atlantic.

While resort towns now line the waterfront, attracting increasing numbers of prosperous retirees from DC to settle there and younger families to allot some of their annual vacation time to that sand and surf, my wife and I really do not want parking challenges, expensive hotel stays, or boardwalk amusements.  Our state makes these outings very easy for us.  As a senior, I purchased a lifetime state park pass.  My state operates three more than adequate beachfront locations with changing areas and usually ample parking spaces.  I only need bring beachwear and a sand chair for my wife and me.  One downstate excursion usually coincides with Wawa's annual Hoagiefest, so a quick stop for a low-cost portable lunch enables nutrition.  Access to all but the final few miles now comes as high speeed highway.  Main preparatory questions:  which day and which beach?

The experiences of the three parks overlap, though they are not identical.  I prefer the most distant of them for its isolation.  Its changing facilities appear more basic, and one time I almost got closed out of parking.  The middle location is the largest, near the popular stretch of beaches that people staying at hotels seek.  This location had an upgrade a few years ago.  The changing facilities were modernized.  A small play area for tots now offers young families a respite from the hot sun.  The food options expanded as did the concessions to buy t-shirts and sunscreen.  It seems the most attended of the state's beaches, with patrons seeking places for their chairs as close to the cabana as their luck will allow.  Yet the parking area during the weekdays always has ample space.  And the park has other amenities from history to inlet fishing.  The northernmost park sits where the bay meets the ocean.  A very pretty stretch of sand.  Parking never a problem.  Crowds never a problem.  This park attracts some campers.  It also offers an active wooden fishing pier where I seem to be the angler who has yet to hook anything.  They have a small nature center and a niche historical legacy as a military outpost protecting the mid-Atlantic coast in World War 2.

I don't know which one I will drive to during the upcoming week.  I've not even retrieved the two sand chairs from garage storage.  Seeking just a few restful hours, not enough to get sunburned, maybe a couple of short entries into the surf.  Apply lessons of previous misadventures.  Use spare glasses, having lost one pair of expensive bifocals to King Neptune.  Put cell phone in plastic protector, having ruined one when a wave from the rising tide soaked it.  Ample sunscreen.  Eye on the clock.

GI Prep

My gastroenterology team really thinks I need a colonoscopy now that three years has elapsed since they removed three benign polyps.  Now in my mid-70s, I've accumulated multiple conditions, none an immediate threat, all competing with each other to see which escapes indolent first.  My medical team now expands well beyond GI, which began innocently with normal surveillance colonoscopies at age 50 and 60, an inadequate cleansing at age 70 requiring a do-over, and now concern that something invasive may arise before either my actuarial table catches up with me or some other lingering process needs more than semi-annual lab assessment.  The NP answered all my questions.  The procedure got scheduled far more promptly than the last two times.  And I've been treated better by the office, which I suspect is a regional private equity enterprise that pays the lawyers who compose all their forms to sign more than they pay their endoscopists.  Or they have taken patient feedback more seriously than I remember.

With a failed procedure in the past, I extended my clear liquid restriction, as I did three years ago.  My tolerance has been good.  A little thirst, no hunger.  And no change in my weekly weight measurement from the previous week on an unrestricted diet.  

The cleansing procedure has changed.  Now I mix my own polyethylene glycol in two batches, one of two quarts, the other a half amount of powder and liquid.  I've taken the first capsule laxatives with no notable effect over the first hour.  The laxative powder mixes poorly in the lemonade, but a two hour head start should allow it to dissolve.  The second dose of laxative times to the procedure, so I will need to set an alarm for pre-dawn, but mix the powder after I have a lull from the first ingestion and its effect.  Or my wife can mix it.

As I get older, nearly all personal goals other than my 50th anniversary achieved, feeling pretty decent despite the vagaries and warning flags of the lab, a question of when to stop cannot be avoided.  When indolent moves to aggressive, biopsies, catheterizations, endoscopies, chemotherapy, and surgery remain consent procedures.  Some alleviate suffering, others delay the inevitable.  

Today, I just want to complete the intended colonic inspection and any new biopsies that the doctor does.  A few minutes with propofol will probably offset sleep deprivation of the dawn purging.  Then a summer's respite from medical care.  A chance to travel a little with my wife, share our next anniversary, maybe visit the grandchildren, express myself in cyberspace, entertain a guest perhaps, do something of use at synagogue once or twice.  The purpose of the GI ordeal and other lab surveillance should be to enable those things.  I can cooperate with a few days of deprivation to achieve all those things.

Pocket Notebook

My alumni rep assigned to my region contacted me about a year ago. Though my donations over the years would barely qualify for having my name engraved on a flush handle, I had referred the previous representative to a more accomplished classmate in the same city who chaired a medical school department.  He made a huge gift.  The referral got me an online invitation to a small-group meeting with the University President.  More  recently, the new alumni rep arranged for us to chat over a beer.

As a promotional gift, he left me with a chocolate colored genuine Moleskine notebook embossed with the University seal.  It remains in mint condition, unopened, on an honored surface of my desk, its matching elastic cord still keeping the pages shut.  I had never used one of these.  For much of my career, I depended on a seven-ring Franklin Planner, investing time to create core values, then intermediate and long term objectives,  Each day I listed tasks with priorities, just as the Franklin Planner tapes instructed.  Retirement largely retired my daily organizer, though I still revise what initiatives I plan to pursue twice a year.  Each Sunday morning, I list the items whose progress would comprise a Good Week, then every evening I create a list of activities for the following day.  All on loose sheets of paper using color coded pens.  I have desk journals, marble or spiral books obtained at back to school sales.  Each week I monitor my exercise progress.  Each day I select three personal achievements worth recording.  And at the suggestion of a Harvard professor, I mark something each day that annoyed me, then revisit this observation one month and six months later.  So I am very used to maintaining personal notebooks for different purposes.  Yet it would never occur to me to keep one on my person to pull out randomly, let alone pay a premium to acquire and maintain one like that moleskine.

Periodically, I receive gift cards, sometimes to Amazon, which I assign to frivolity.  Maybe I could use a pocket notebook.  Since these sell for many times what my marble or spiral notebooks cost, they must have a justification for that premium.  Indeed, as I searched YouTube trying to decide which to get, I encountered a notebook or high-end stationery subculture.  Ratings of different brands.  Quality of paper.  Lined, grid, dotted, or plain paper.  Some did not handle fountain pens or even gel pens very well, with smudging and commonly bleeding through to the reverse side.  Bindings that allow some to lay flat better than others.  Little frills, like a small envelope near the back cover to insert loose paper fragments, paper clips, and thin magnets.  Some come with an elastic pen loop, others offer a sticky pad with elastic to create one.  My local Target, Staples, and Barnes & Noble all carry displays of Moleskines in a variety of sizes, also standardized by the industry as A or B series followed by a code number indicating size.  Target had only Moleskine, which had gotten many critical YouTube reviews, often at a cost above $12.  Staples had a house brand.  Amazon had several brands. though only moleskine in pocket size.  Amazon had all the brands assessed by the YouTube content creators.  I selected on Amazon a two pack made by a Japanese company.  Lined paper, two flimsy ribbons as bookmarks, tiny envelope at the back.  I added an adhesive address label to which I added my cell phone number should I lose it.  One notebook went atop my University's Moleskine gift, the other into my cross-chest pouch.

These notebooks typically become EDC or Every Day Carry items.  I have mine.  My smartphone, two kippot, a microfiber lens cloth, and a cloth face mask not used since the COVID years in my left pocket.  Keys, coin pouch, and handkerchief to the right.  A Flash drive in the coin pouch.  And an overstuffed wallet in the left back pocket.  A wristwatch. My bifocals.  I also purchased a nylon cross chest carrier for an overseas trip.  When I go to OLLI or short errands, I sling this over my neck.  It has paper, a multicolored pen, foldable rain poncho, microrecorder, sunglass clip-ons, earphne.  My new Aisbugur pocket notebook wedges perfectly over the poncho.  After pasting a sticky with my name and address at the inside cover and adding my cell phone number, I took it to a coffee shop.  It took less than half a porcelain mug to date and fill out the first page.

Key decision point.  How to use this.  The library lent me an ebook on the history of notebooks which have acquired a myriad of purposes since first appearing in Italy when commercial paper became economical.  Notebooks of various sizes became the prototype for business accounting ledgers, personal diaries, collections of thoughts, preliminary sketches for artists, venting of various types, planning ones day, lists for shopping or errands.  I decided to dedicate mine to recording what I think at the time I write in it.

These undertakings go better with rules.  It had been my initial intent to rent some space at a coffee shop for a half-hour in the form of a purchse, while I sit undistracted.  Each page would have a date, prompted by a printed Date at the top of each page.  The lined paper would be filled to the bottom with sentences, then closed, with the elastic strap moved to mark where I left off.  Not continued on the next page.  I made a quick modification.  I did not need the isolation of a coffee shop, just the coffee and a few moments of focus on a small page that reflected my observations, aspirations, and irritations.  That has worked well.  No competition with phone, laptop, or even Daily Task List as I fill each page with cursive in ball-point that does not seep into the reverse page.  I did not reserve two pages for an index, though as I reach the end, I could jot down what appears on each page.  They do not come pre-numbered, though.  Indeed, some notebooks have perforated margins that enable users to detach pages.  For me, I have designated it not as a diary that records things I have done, nor a surrogate psychiatrist where I can express what I feel.  It is a place to write text, to connect mind to paper.  A useful tool, dedicated to a purpose, much like my marble and spiral books.  

YouTube videos greatly expand the culture of these books and the different instruments that people use to enter content.  I found people like me, fascinated by pens.  Previous Amazon gift card frivolities got me two low-end fountain pens. My Flair pens come as a full multi-colored set, stored in a separate pouch of Burberry Plaid.  Apparently, Japan hosts stationery expos where people can sample pens with different inks and price points, stationery products though screens have replaced premium Crane's paper and most professional letterhead for correspondence.  The pocket notebook, with its assigned purpose, becomes one element of linking brain to paper, whether the record be disposable or permanent.  

Thus far, I have found my new pocket notebook a worthy destination, a valued partner with a mug of brewed coffee, and a setting apart from competing distractions.

Commenting

In another era, though well within my lifetime, celebrities used to get cards and letters.  President Kennedy asked his staff to pull every 50th for his personal reading.  Betty Smith, author of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, noted that about a quarter of her fan mail was addressed to Francie Nolan, her book's main character, instead of to her.  People took the time to form opinions and express them.  Unlike Letters to the Editor that got selected for print, correspondence to public officials and celebrities remained private communications.  Responses were few, but people still selected stationery from doodle pads to Crane's, pens from Bic to Mt. Blanc or typewriter, reserved time to express on paper, and applied postage.

Our electronics have transformed how we express our opinions to people of fame and influence.  Pen and paper have given way to screen and keyboard.  Though not exactly.  Thoughts often organize better for later expression when outlined in a person's recognizable handwriting before composing sentences and paragraphs.  Admirers and critics alike still target public figures, but what we tell them no longer gets shared exclusively with them or staff hired to deal with correspondence.  A comment on Twitter intended as feedback for a VIP gets read by anyone.  Responses are more likely to come from random strangers than from the influencer to whom the writer directed the feedback.

Because of the ease of submission, volume has increased.  A censorship of cultural norms has yielded to bluntness, though that may have also been true when cards and letters came through verbal provocation of an Influencer on TV.  

Mechanisms of contact have changed.  Pre-computer, we did not know where celebrities lived.  Actors got mail addressed to their studios, authors to the publishers.  Our Congressional Delegation had published office addresses and an allocation to hire somebody to respond to constituent needs, if not opinions.  In the early email era, people had accessible email addresses.  their name or variant @ company or university . com org or edu.  Major publications solicited feedback at the end of news stories.  These could go into the thousands, created an expense to hire screeners to determine if standards of reader comments were violated, and largely disappeared.  Individual journalists and authors now often have their own websites which invariably include a contact option.

Who is worthy of a response has also shifted.  We never expect a movie star to write back, beyond maybe having a studio agent send a stock autographed photo.  Academics and think tank representatives used to respond to me much more than they do now.  Maybe volume, maybe pressure on time, maybe delegation of the response task.  Perhaps my most interesting sorting comes from my own Jewish biome.  As online educational sites became available, a lecture could be accessed, a question sent to the speaker, and a brief response suggesting that the query was read and understood would appear in a few days.  The Orthodox and Reform officials invariably acknowledged my approaching them.  The Conservatives screened me out or deflected me to my own Rabbi.  They seemed to have some fear of undermining the hierarchy and authority of intermediaries.

Much of these dialogues of cyberspace have transformed again.  We now have Substack.  Subscribers can pay a monthly fee, which includes both wisdom of the writer and access.  The Atlantic, one of my paid subscriptions, now has a comment section at the end of each article. Responses number in the hundreds.  While a substantial fraction conveys impressions of the article, far more of these create a conversation with what the original poster began.  Nearly all with a nom de plume of some type to preserve anonymity.

The role of correspondence seems in transition.  In the written era, the cards and letters served as a vote up or down.  The early days of email created more of a private conversation.  Modern forums using platforms or feedback boxes at the end of journal articles seem to bifurcate.  Some, like FB and Twitter, have become arenas for verbal combat requiring no expertise.  Others like Reddit and Substack function more like communities.  People of common interest exposed to identical material express to each other their views of what they read or what they had been asked.  Those are invariably more civil than the arenas.  Responders do their best to use their knowledge to guide a person with less familiarity or a valid but opposing view.  Private communication has expanded to public engagement among strangers.  Expectations have changed.  In the paper era, I expected no response, in the early electronic era targeted responses, now more of a melee or gathering of minds, depending on the platform.  Of the models, I have found the community of shared interest most appealing and most engaging.  It has its limitations, but for me, when I have something to enhance another person's perspective or their expertise advances mine, we each do better.  

Best Deal

My wife and I have a disparity of vacation preferences.  She seems perfectly content at home, willing to go to our kids' homes hours away when somebody else gets her there, and mostly stays inside their places when there.  I have more of a preference to escape to the new, willing to burden myself a bit to do this.  When at the kids, I zip around SF's Muni System, walk the neighborhoods, occasionally book a tour that I go on myself.  At my son's, I walk the blocks near his inner city house and drive around to different places. Hop-on Hop-off buses get a ticket, even though few stops see me exit to explore up close.  I seek the window seat on planes and buses.  New places interest me, even if they are daily stops to those who live there.

Day Trips, typically three, usually occupy my semi-annual agenda, mostly fulfilled by driving somewhere alone or using my free SEPTA Senior Pass to get me to a place I've not visited before.  It's time to get away again, though with a hotel.  Couples time.  The Good Old Summertime.  

My wife and I had our discussion, mostly her setting boundaries.  Our last two multiday road trips did not go well.  Cruises to the Maritimes would fill her need to minimize effort and my need to explore new places.  All filled up by the time we explored cruise options online.  As much as I like National Parks, flights of significant distance followed by a rental car for the multi-hour connection of hub to park fell outside the parameters, before we even get into the park and its requirements for driving and light hiking.

We settled on a three-night excursion within five hours of home.  Electric maps have made that easy.  In five hours, as our distance driving is never shared, I can cover about 250 miles.  Draw a radius from my home address.  I've already visited most of the places inside that circle during my working years.  Only Long Island as a tourist and the Capital Region of NY remain novel.  I looked at both.  Long Island is closer and has more to do.  Generous responders on FB's Visit All 50 States and r/long island of Reddit assured me that a senior couple would have things to do there beyond attending a Bar Mitzvah or funeral within my extended family.  Historical sites, wineries, landscapes, ferries, and gawking at old and new money.  Good for a few days.  For all the antagonisms of social media, sometimes the groups function as communities of helpful people instead of the more typical arena model.

When to go?  I picked dates.  My doctor picked the same dates for a periodic procedure that has gotten a little overdue.  I picked later dates, a time that significantly lowered the hotel prices for the places that seemed most suitable geographically.

Now dates in place, recovery from medical procedure anticipated, alternate dates adjustable by a day or two if hotel rates come down in a different three-night stay, it's time to find a place to stay.  Long Island is the largest island in the continental USA.  It takes hours to drive its length.  It might also take an hour to get past the two boroughs of NYC that comprise its western portion, which I would prefer to avoid this vacation.  I don't want to access beaches, at least not as a swimmer or basker.  Still, the tourism that I seek stretches hours, from the gilded, repurposed mansions at the western and northern extreme to Montauk at the southern and western extreme, would require some driving.  If I stayed in the middle, which seems to be near the island's airport, I would still have an hour to get to the end of the North and South Forks.  Where the forks separate, a town called Riverhead, might serve as a base.  Hotel prices for that convenience come at more of a premium than I am willing to spend.

By now, I've gotten experienced at selecting hotels and airline reservations through online travel sites, though I always check directly with the hotels and carriers to see if they pass some of what they save by avoiding the travel site fee  back to the vacationer.  It usually doesn't.  For accommodations, unless an overnight rest before the next day's flight when a simple bed will do, I have my preferred amenities.  I like the place I choose to have a pool if I am staying more than one day, preferably indoor.  Most hotel stays I enter it.  In warm places, outdoor usually suffices, but I've been to SC in their shoulder season where the outdoor option proved chilly.  Wi-Fi in room has become a must.  For all the legitimate critiques of global connections' downsides, I have learned to ration how I use this, yet still feel deprived without it.  Even on cruises, I purchase a minimal internet package.  For an American hotel, I ask the travel sites to eliminate places that have a surcharge.  I also need parking, whether driving with my own car or a rental.  It's one hassle that I find objectionable.  Within reason, I am willing to pay for assured garage space in a big city, but most of the places I select in recent years occupy enclaves of a few hotels in proximity of a shopping center.  This serves me well.  And exercise on schedule borders as a must.  Most places have small work-out areas with a treadmill whose settings options surpass what I use at home.  Breakfast buffet does not appear on my screens.  They are convenient, usually adequate.  I often prefer to drive to a local breakfast place with a menu, sit there with my wife as we choose eggs or pancakes.  I take the anticipated price of eating at a diner into account.

That still leaves a significant number of options.  Then sort by price.  Mostly, I cannot assess location.  For Long Island, I know that the airport and Brookhaven National Labs are in the middle, Stony Brook where I almost attended school sits in the north, the Hamptons, which I cannot afford lie to the south, and Riverhead where the forks branch is closest to the optimal location.  I'll drive a bit more with my own car for a lower prices.  

My wife deferred the selection to me, after we reviewed the various options together.  I chose one near Brookhaven with the amenities I need and the ability to drive to places tourists to Long Island might like to go.  Best Deal?  Probably not.  This is one of those projects where the perfect undermines the good.  To be sure, I agreed to a surcharge for at-will cancellation.

Living Spaces

My children and their friends live differently from me.  As much as I enjoy going to a big city periodically, and have lived in a few, my upbringing took place in a free standing suburban house designed from an architectural template.  My adult life had its base in an even larger home, ample bedrooms, basement, garage, attic.  And it filled with stuff that will eventurally find its way to some blend of dumpster and estate sale.  A small city sits a few minutes drive, accessed primarily for synagogue and OLLI.  A major city, where I can travel for free with my Senior Transit Pass makes for a periodic but random visit, usually to visit a museum or historical site.  The city has things that my town does not, but not alluring enough to want to be in proximity.  Even in my time in three major cities, my focus always remained school or work, never trendy places to eat.  Even for shopping, when I had a car, I drove to a suburban mall.

My children attended school in NYC and StL.  They settled and now have families in central parts of SF and Pittsburgh.  Their pre-earnings and early career homes were compact apartments, as were mine.  Not a lot of stuff.  Higher incomes, and now children, did not change that much.  Each lives near a main thoroughfare with short walks to places to eat, most inexpensive.  Supermarkets lie a little farther away, but are not the regional megamarts that send me their sales fliers in the mail every Wednesday.  The streets appear neat, though hardly scrupulously clean.  Parking is scarce, driving requires less distance between cars for longer stretches of time than I am used to.

While my son has a town house with ample interior space, very drivable to suburbia, the SF and NY environments of my daughter and her friends require more adaptation.  I've stayed with her and house-sat for friends on both coasts.  Space utilization requires thought.  Two bedrooms, one bathroom.  A recent stay in Brooklyn had me walking up four flights, as it lacked an elevator.  The apartments, carved from houses, all had strategic designs with nooks dedicated to workspace, a wall transformed to an entertainment zone, kitchens dedicated to food preparation and storage, though not always eating.  That takes place in another nook.  A massive dining room table with two leaves and a breakfront in a separate formal room cannot happen.  I stayed at a duplex in NYC with two outdoor patios, each accessible through sliding glass doors and modified as expanded living or entertainment space.  No yards exist, but planters can be placed outside to nurture culinary herbs.

Despite the limited space, by my standards, the people can do most of the things that I do, though without dedicated rooms.  They all have large flat TVs, internet access, cooking, small modern appliances, washer/dryers standing atop each other in a converted closet instead of next to each other in a laundry room.  What they cannot do, that I can, is accumulate stuff and stick it somewhere.  As a result, the smaller living spaces that I visited seem more selective in what they display.  A few pictures.  Strategically placed flowers.  Shelves with books sharing space with knick-knacks.  Area rugs on wooden floors in lieu of wall-to-wall.

Perhaps the biggest difference is where you walk or cycle to.  From my house, a walk usually has an exercise purpose.  In SF or Brooklyn, or even Central West End St. Louis, a walk has a destination, even if not predetermined.  It may be specialty coffee, the library, the subway station, or a haircut.  Shops along the sidewalk, few with the recognizable from anywhere national chains.  Sometimes green grocers set up produce outside their entrances.  During the daylight, people walk from place to place, sometimes block to block.  Cars some by, speed depending on traffic and traffic signals.  Architecture usually has some variation, gingerbread pastels of SF, elegant townhouses and midrises of another era in the Central West End, reclaimed shells in Pittsburgh.  Parks and schools with playgrounds interrupt the commercial and residential sections.  Churches seem few, but imposing where they occur.  

Despite my multiple rooms, as an empty nester, I use very little.  Clutter has kept the cars out of the garage for decades, though I do appreciate my driveway.  A few blocks from my daughter's SF apartment, there are small single-family houses with downsloping driveways into single-car garages.  I have a place where I write, surf a laptop, watch YouTube on a big screen, and listen to a stereo.  Bedroom serves mostly sleeping and closet, not requiring much space.  Rarely entertain in the living room.  Family room is now for my treadmill, something that would fit into My Space if I could get help moving it upstairs.  Spacious kitchen and formal dining rooms remain used frequently.  And multiple bathrooms all get used.  So my kids and their city friends do not seem to be at much disadvantage for living in places that require judicious decisions on what to place where.  They still get to do the things I spread out to do.  And they have more purposeful destinations nearby.