Credit: Courtesy LadyBugTours
Sometimes it’s not winter but not yet spring and you’re sitting at your sad computer, in your sad apartment, staring out of the window onto a sad, cold, gray, barren Cleveland landscape. You don’t want to feel this way, so you check all of your social media sites in search of a much-needed hit of dopamine. When that doesn’t work, you check your email. You have a new email. It’s an email from Groupon, but an email that was sent specifically to you by their algorithm, so you open it. The email says that you can now purchase discount tickets for exciting events in your area. The email says that one of these events is a romantic carriage ride in quaint Chagrin Falls. The email says that the carriage rides will happen in April, which is in the spring, which is when the view outside of your window will be full of budding trees and flowers and squirrels who aren’t upsettingly thin. You buy the carriage ride because you want to believe in hope again and your girlfriends agreed to come with you.

And now it is April and you are in lovely, quaint Chagrin Falls on a Saturday evening, cursing everything that moves because you’ve been driving around these lovely, quaint streets for 20 minutes and still haven’t found parking. When you do finally find a spot, it’s in a the parking lot of a church that you hope loves Jesus enough to not have anyone towed. You rush to the carriage, apologizing profusely to all of your very patient friends, climb in, and then the horse refuses to move. You blame yourself, and the enchiladas you ate for lunch.

But then the horse does eke forward and slowly begins to clop-clop down the street. You finally have a venue suited to your English royalty wave – elbow, elbow, wrist, wrist. The throngs of people out in Chagrin Falls, enjoying the light spring evening in addition to all of the parking spots, smile and wave back. Due to the sound of the clopping it’s too loud to talk, so you focus on the lovely homes you’re being pulled past. They really are fantastic. These are homes that make you want to immediately get pregnant and put your kid on the waitlist for baby yoga.

The carriage stops for a photo op in front of a particularly gorgeous house that is also for sale. We’re all curious, we all have smart phones, so you look up the price of the home. It costs so much that the website immediately shuts off because it presumably knows your credit score and doesn’t want to waste its time.

As you are pulled down the quiet neighborhood streets of Chagrin Falls, you start to really think about your life. These are nice homes. You would like a nice home. Are there any open CEO positions you could apply for? The driver helpfully points out that one such home is owned by the person who invented the Yonanas banana ice cream maker. So you just need to invent something that will turn healthy fruit into disappointing ice cream. Simple enough.

You pass perfectly sculpted lawns, lush flowerbeds, and fences without a speck of grime. And you start to think about what it is you actually want. These houses are lovely to look at, but you have to be honest with yourself and admit that you would not, under any circumstances, actually weed your yard or power wash your fence. And you’d need to buy that special cleaner for granite counter tops, and dusting the wainscoting is really going to take a chunk out of your Saturday mornings. Plus, the constant gawking carriage riders looking up your home price on Redfin must be a real nuisance.

Pro-tip: When standing in the hour-long line for Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams afterwards, pretend that everyone around you is in line to audition for The Voice.

Rating: 5 out of 5 inklings that maybe you should try to make more money. 

This article appears in Apr 27 – May 3, 2016.

15 replies on “Someone Who Just Moved Here Reviews Cleveland Things: A Carriage Ride in Chagrin Falls”

  1. Well…There are gems in this crappy little hovel we call…CLEVELAND OHIO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    (Hugs Cle!)

  2. True, but one of them is NOT this sad attempt at humor. Who the hell “checks social media sites for dopamine? And it only gets worse.

    Squirrels is squirrels…and they are”upsettingly thin” in the spring because (if they are lucky enough and fat enough in the fall) they have just survived a long, cold, tough stretch. It is more commonly called winter.And horses do not “eke forward”…nothing really does.

    Chagrin Falls is about as much of a “Cleveland thing” as Starved Rock State Park (on the Illinois River) is a “Chicago thing.”. And if you really believe it is, I have a lifetime EZ Pass for sale, if you’re interested, for the bridge from Avon to Rondeau Provincial Park, Ontario. Just promise me you won’t drive drunk on it, with your kid.

    Chuckles the Clown

  3. Try riding that horse and carriage through the ‘hood and take a camera crew with you. I’ve never seen a horse raped before. Lord knows what they’d use the carriage for. Probably a fancy new crack house.

    Jeni’s Splendid Ice Cream, indeed.

  4. Chuckles, you strike me as a sad sad individual who has not lived up to their hopes and dreams and so now turn to what you think is telling the world the truth about itself and thus making yourself feel salient again. And so you turn to spending so much time on sites that you reportedly hate as to make yourself feel important and like you have a real ‘job’ to do. It’s a sad truth, but you live that truth. Live it all the way to trolling stardom.

    Now I’m going to put my name down here too, because, you might not see it next to “Posted by” and because, important.

    Feed the Trolls

  5. To author, Dana Norris: Hopefully, the horse and carriage ride gave you a new perspective on Life in general. Your thoughts are very depressed. You sound like a “spectator” in Life, instead of a participant. You took one giant leap to take the carriage ride, so keep on going! Get out of your apartment and get involved with other people and animals. The way the horse and carriage uplifted you, is the way you can uplift others (and consequently, yourself). Today, I am taking my registered therapy dog to a de-stressing session for people who need unconditional love and a soft fluffy dog to pet and release their tensions. I live with my dog, so she is a constant de-stressor for me. We are happy to share our happiness with others. Get out- get involved!

  6. Don’t cry for her, pasovasz. She’s crying all the way to the bank…that’s how sad she really is.

    It’s merely part of her “shtick”…her “routine”…she’s just another Millennial entremanure who moved here because she heard it was cheaper but still “cool”…and now, thanks to the largesse (and idiocy) of the folks at SCENE, she’s using this site to try to be funny (epic FAIL) and, more importantly, also trying to drum up business for her “thing”…whatever the hell THAT is.

    Don’t worry, pasovasz…she’s already plenty involved…SELF-involved. And it shows. You’re supposed to laugh at all this crap, not cry. It’s stand-up comedy for the eyes (yeah…right…)

    For the record…I don’t hate this site…just some of the people who “write”…er…type…for it. Do they actually get paid to produce this stuff?

    Go ahead, kids…keep hitting that dislike button. I can snark all day. Or until my fingers get tired.

    Chuckles the Clown

  7. Ahhh…struck a nerve, I see. That’s validation enough for me.

    I was in print media (you do know what that is, right?) in YOUR hometown and mine (born, raised, resident for 42 years) long before you were an afterthought…or a forethought. The “three dots” school of journalism goes back a long way, even longer than I do. Old habits die hard.

    When my most recent employer pulled the plug on his publication, I said the hell with it and that was the my last ballgame. I’m not a whore anymore. I no longer need to be. I just do it for the fun of it. Can you say the same?

    Doing what you love, for little or no remuneration, used to be called (back in the touchy-feely Seventies) “psychic income.” I’m having a ball right now. I hope you are. And for your sake (and your bottom line), I hope to hell they’re paying you by the word.

    Chuckles the Clown

  8. Dana Norris
    Member since Nov. 3, 2015

    Member?

    So…either you’re NOT getting paid…or…much more likely…you’re not even the author… just another shmuck commenter like me…and a troll impersonating someone else.

    Clicking on your name should say “author”…not “member”. You’re a troll. And I don’t think the powers-that-be are going to be very highly amused.

    Chuckles the Clown

  9. We? us? There’s only you and your hang-ups, kid. Come on out to Smedley’s or the VIP. But be warned, those are adult bars in an Irish hood. You might become shepherd’s pie.

    Chuckles the Clown

  10. My dear Chuck, You do certainly seem to obsess over all those tough boys you like to talk about. Especially having them beat people up for you. I think, perhaps, you are not only a weak and sad excuse for a man but that you are obsessing TOO much over them. Not that I’m judging mind you. You should just be more honest with yourself.

  11. How many sock puppet names are you using? Nice way to fuck up an adult board, kid.

    Chuckles the Clown

  12. Oh, “sock puppet”! That’s hilarious!! I commend you on such a fine comeback for an uninspired fossil. Bravo, Cluckles.

  13. Hey, doc…why don’t you threaten to kill him…and then you’ll get put away like you deserve, you POS troll. STFU already.

  14. Nice original syntax there… um, plain… So he’ll get put away just like you get put away for physically threatening people on this board? Got it.

    I see your troll and raise you three billy goats Gruff.

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