Vocal Point : Is Spokane Valley doomed to blandness?

Have you ever had a “Twilight Zone” moment?

I refer to Rod Serling’s spooky little 1960’s television series, where a man could walk down the hallway of the present and suddenly be in the bedroom of his past, or where his neighbors are not just illegal aliens, but out-of-this-world ones.

I had one of these moments recently while trying not to get lost in Salem, Ore. I rounded a corner and realized I could be anywhere. Was I in Portland, Denver, or – gulp! – the Spokane Valley?

Other than street signs, how do you tell one town from another? Suburban neighborhoods look the same everywhere.

We Americans like our differences to be the same, don’t you think? Nothing in the good old USA is quite as commercial as collective individuality.

Yet, ask any businessman and he’ll tell you, if your product is a commodity, you need to “differentiate,” “innovate” and “add value” to your brand if you want to stand a chance in a cutthroat economy.

Chrysler did it by removing the right-front door locks from all their Chrysler and Jeep vehicles. Look what that did for their sales!

What’s our fair city going to do? Build a new sewage plant? Install a light-rail system? Transform the U-City shopping center into an example of “new urbanism?”

All too conventional, my friends, and it’s all been done before.

People won’t come knocking down our doors for such mundane modernity. We’d just be keeping up. Where’s the truly original thinking?

If we can’t build anything unique – like a 300-foot-tall statue of Homer Simpson with a doughnut atop an upraised arm at the top of Veracrest – then we need to brand ourselves by what we do to tell the world how unique we are.

To escape the purgatory of suburban blandness we need something so awesomely weird the eyes of the nation would stare in disbelief and the words “Spokane Valley” would become as well-known as the title of a famous televised singing competition.

And we need it now.

I have some ideas, of course.

Fellow citizens, our salvation is neither the River District of Liberty Lake nor the mansions of Legacy Ridge, but – stay with me here – the Annual Spokane Valley Baby Toss.

Of course I’m not talking real rugrats, folks!

People would compete to see who can toss their old Beanie Babies the farthest, from the highest spot in the Valley Mall.

Can’t you just see those little purple Princess Dianas arcing gracefully toward the skylights and sailing past the palm trees before crashing onto the tile and splitting their seams with a satisfying little ‘pop?’

We’d do it all for charity, of course.

If that sounds just too icky, here’s another approach to civic notoriety.

How about paying celebrities such as Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton or Britney Spears to visit, get drunk, provide photo ops (wink, wink!) and spend time in our lovely jail?

“Hilton Hotel” sounds a lot more glamorous than “Detention Services” for the local lockup, doesn’t it? We could name the cells after the celebrity inmate of the month and let tourists get “booked” in the celebrity cell of their choice. Sell tsotchkes and T-shirts saying “I spent the night with ….”

Why would anyone want to stay in the Lincoln Bedroom at the White House, when they could spend a night where a living, breathing celebrity has slept?

If we don’t jump on these once-in-a-lifetime opportunities, we’re doomed to blandness like every other city in the West.

Aren’t we different?

Aren’t we special?

It’s time to write a City Council person and tell them we need to give visitors and natives alike a reason to yell “Yeah, baby, this is the place!” every time they pull off the Interstate and head somewhere down Sprague.

Tell them it’s not too late.

All we need is an imagination like Rod Serling’s, a few bimbos and a Beanie Baby or two.