The Ideal Nashvillian

Good afternoon, everyone.

The best way to approach a city is as a flâneur: enjoying long, languorous, directionless walks through the metropolis. Nassim Taleb, author of the Incerto series and well-respected flâneur, describes flaneuring like this:

Cities are living organisms. Like all organisms they are indivisible and mutate over time. Some cities are more alive than others. You can only "feel" a city by flaneuring, walking slowly (very slowly) without any predetermined goal.

He goes on to explain which qualities make a flaneuring city: large, dense, and full of mystery. This might work in places like New York City or San Francisco, but flaneuring doesn't really seem like a Nashville activity. It's not large or dense enough. Far too many parking lots.

In rural areas, you might adopt the attitude of an ambler. Someone in the mold of Henry David Thoreau, who would set aside four hours each day to wander aimlessly through the woods. Like the flâneur, the ambler values the acts of walking and wandering, but instead of admiring the fruits of civilization, he's more concerned with communing with nature and freeing himself from the humdrum of daily life. "Everything good is wild and free," Thoreau famously noted.

For Thoreau, walks in the woods were a way to escape the persistence of politics. Just as flaneuring doesn't really work as a Nashville approach to living, neither does ambling. The burdens of civilization are irrevocably present and to escape, one must drive. Neither an ambler nor a flâneur will find much to desire in Nashville.

So, you're asking, what kind of attitude should one cultivate in Nashville, a suburban city, without the density required for flaneuring or the space required for ambling? Fortunately, I have an answer for you: the lebenskünstler.

I learned about lebenskünstlers from a German while on a trip to Australia a few years back. He described them as "life artists". The word has something of a dilettantish, slacker undertone to it, emphasizing a person's lack of concern for his work and emphasis on mastering the art of living in its stead—life itself as their medium. You might know some people who fit this description.

Oscar Wilde once said: "I put my talent into my work, but my genius into my life." Here is the kernel of the life artist's preoccupation. Until recently, this would accurately describe why the average person found Nashville attractive. It wasn't for the job opportunities or the party, but the ability to live an unconcerned, reasonably paced life. You could find a quiet corner of the city, engage leisurely with your work, and build a fruitful, expansive life all the while.

We are well past the point of return to this version of Nashville, but one thing that will not change anytime soon is that Nashville is attractive precisely because it is a suburban—and not an urban—city. By and large, people come here to get a house, a car, and avoid the demands of more urban environments.

City leadership, the Metro Council in particular, seems determined to transform the city into an urban facsimile with bike lanes, high-density housing, and public transport. Despite their efforts, we are a city of lebenskünstlers and always have been.

Onward.

🖋️ Edited by Megan Podsiedlik.

💥 Break-Ins Highlight A Break Down In The System The police department held a community meeting at the East Precinct on Trinity Lane last night, where dozens of people gathered to voice their frustrations and concerns after roughly one hundred cars were broken into over the holiday. 

So far, the messaging has been a mixed bag. ”If you’re not seeing our police car, that’s really good for your area…”  East Nashville’s community affairs and liaison coordinator, Sergeant Keiara Ward-Whitely, started to explain during last night’s meeting before getting cut off by a concerned citizen: “No it’s not, because we got hit!” While the department has suggested “parking smart” by locking vehicles and removing valuables, many of the break-ins seem to be delinquent behavior resulting in smashed windows without missing valuables. Some victims have even decided to leave their doors unlocked, allowing the violation of their personal property to avoid a costly window replacement.

Even the police’s protocol seems to have a catch-22: “At the end of the day, these are status offenses,” East Precinct Commander Harold Burke told Fox17. “The juveniles are not going to be held in jail on a status offense.” While Burke focused on changes that can be made in the judicial system by lawmakers, the string of break-ins has become ammunition for advocates of both license plate readers and integrated camera surveillance technology. 

👨‍⚖️ Referendum Lawsuit’s Day In Court Today is the first day of the trial over the lawsuit questioning the efficacy of Mayor O’Connell’s transit referendum. Chancellor Anne Martin, who is presiding over the case, only expects the proceeding to last one day and has already stated that the complaint has “a very limited scope.” There’s also a time crunch given that Mayor O’Connell’s dedicated sales tax goes into effect in February.

According to the Banner, Chancellor Martin has already questioned an argument made by the plaintiff’s attorney, Kirk Clements, during December’s initial hearing. Regarding Clement’s complaint about the transparency of the plan’s financial feasibility, Martin asked whether she could assume that the Tennessee Comptroller’s approval of the plan was independent of Metro’s Financial Department. Despite a lack of clarity on the subject during the hearing, the Comptroller’s office told us during an interview back in August that they never technically approved of the plan’s feasibility. 

“There was a lot of reporting that we had to approve the feasibility study and we had to sign off on the Kraft CPAs’ work, which we didn't,” the Comptroller’s Director of Communication, John Dunn, explained. “We're not charged with doing that. All we had to do was approve them as a CPA firm and approve the procedures that they used.” Dunn then clarified that the Comptroller’s office will only become involved again if O’Connell’s plan is approved by the voters: “Then we would work with Metro to basically ensure they were following generally accepted accounting principles for this new revenue from this asset sales tax increase.”

🎓 Whispers About ESA Special Session “Two-thirds of Tennesseans support Education Freedom Scholarships to extend school choice to all families across the Volunteer State,” Governor Lee posted on X this morning about the recent polling data published by the Beacon Center. School choice advocates and adversaries alike are waiting to see whether the Governor will prove the rumors true and call for a special session to pass his Education Savings Account legislation.

According to NewsChannel 5’s long-time political analyst Pat Nolan, it might happen if Lee gets assurance that he has the same level of support from state legislators as it seems he has from Tennesseans. "Well I’m assuming, if there’s a special session, it’s a strong indication that the Governor and his supporters for the voucher program believe they have the votes to do it," said Nolan, before explaining that calling a session without the support could spell disaster for the initiative.  The 2025 General Assembly convenes next Tuesday for regular session.

DEVELOPMENT

• Nashville home sales are up 15% in December (NBJ)
• Dallas company pays $111.38M for two local apartment complexes (Post)
• Robert's Western World building planned for additional floor (Post)
• Status unclear for project eyed for The Nations (Post)

THINGS TO DO

View our calendar for the week here and our weekly film rundown here.

📅 Visit our On The Radar list to find upcoming events around Nashville.

🎧 On Spotify: Pamphleteer's Picks, a playlist of our favorite bands in town this week.

👨🏻‍🌾 Check out our Nashville farmer's market guide.

TONIGHT

🪕 Vickie Vaughn Band @ Station Inn, 8p, $20, Info

🎸 Ray Benson and Mindy Smith @ Riverside Revival, 7p, $20, Info

🪕 Bluegrass Night @ The American Legion Post 82, 7p, Free, Info

📰 Check out the full newsletter archive here.