I'm in Baltimore for a week or so, visiting with family.  I was born here, and we moved away when I was 8 -- first to Europe, then to Northern California -- but Baltimore is the kind of place you're always connected to.  You're either from here -- no matter where you live or how long it's been -- or you're not.

I'm from here. 

Baltimore people feel strongly about their city.  They make movies about it, and TV shows, write novels about it -- mysteries and elegant, gorgeous stories about family and loss -- and when they hate it, they hate it the way you hate something you love.

So, New Year's Eve I walked up the street where I was born -- never mind how many years ago -- along the narrow, broken sidewalk up the small slope (it looked much steeper years ago) and at the top of the street, at the circle where I used to ride my Big Wheel and, later, my bright yellow Schwinn, I watched a weird, funny neighborhood tradition unfold.

For the past few years, the residents of this street have developed their own classically odd-ball Baltimore New Year's Eve celebration.  Around 11:30PM, the neighborhood gathers at the top of the street.  As midnight nears, a large electric crab, festooned in blue lights, descends on a string, counting down (sort of; it's a pretty casual countdown) the last 10 seconds of the old year.  At the bottom, the electric blue crab hits a large bucket, turns red, and the neighbors cheer and toast and laugh and stamp their feet and rub their hands against the cold. 

The white, solidly preppy neighbors of my era have evolved into an eclectic bunch.  The Junior League moms have been replaced by artists and engineers and an older gay couple or two.  The front yard of my old house wasn't as well-kept as it was when my family lived there.   The street is now a lot more "funky" than I'm sure Frederick Law Olmstead originally intended. 

Still: everyone out there on New Year's Eve -- the older residents and the rowdy teens -- watching a big plastic crab on a string, laughing and wishing each other a Happy New Year and passing around cheap champagne.  And that's all you need to know about Baltimore.