Today is Enclave's 5th Anniversary

Five years ago today I launched Enclave with a quote from and reflection on Peter Taylor:

As one walks or rides down any street in Nashville one can feel now and again that he has just glimpsed some pedestrian on the sidewalk who was not quite real somehow, who with a glance over his shoulder or with a look of a disenchanted eye has warned one not to believe too much in the plastic present and has given a warning that the past is still real and present somehow and is demanding something of all men like me who happen to pass that way.

....
I am pleased to launch this weblog with an eye on the past. Elsewhere in A Summons to Memphis, The Narrator’s mother explains that the demands of the past were the legacy of an old Native American curse put on the first settlers who slaughtered the local tribes around the Cumberland River. She may be right. The past may hang in urban Nashville like a curse; but many times I only see a world of curses because curses challenge me to get beyond the veneer of the plastic present, which has made me complacent and foolish.

When I strip the window-dressing, the façade of the present, I can often see that the curses were not so accursed after all. To live in an urban enclave is to welcome the challenge of the past as a blessing. With an eye on the past, I see life in north-by-northwest Nashville as a blessing, even if a blessing at times in the disguise of a curse.

While considering the blessings and curses of living in Salemtown over the past half decade, writing, shooting, cropping, and chopping Enclave hyper-locally was a productive endeavor:

• Over 6,000 posts
• 3+ posts a day on average
• Currently averaging about 400 visitors/100+ returners a day (550+ page loads a day)
• Almost 100% of my Google ad cut given away to local non-profits:
• Nashville Jazz Workshop ($200)
• Fisk University ($190)
• Neighborhood Resource Center ($100)
• WFSK 88.1 FM -- Fisk University jazz radio station ($100)
• Second Harvest Food Bank, St. Paul's Lutheran Food Partner ($100)
• Friends of The Nashville Farmers' Market ($100)

Thanks to all of the readers who stopped by over the years and thanks to the cadre of bloggers who linked, aggregated, tweeted, quoted, and otherwise blogrolled Enclave.

Look forward to seeing you somewhere down the road.