As Trump spectacle winds down, Cleveland breathes easier

CLEVELAND — Mike Kaplan pulled molten glass out of a 2,000-degree furnace made of construction debris and a recycled mattress frame, and put his mouth to the steel blow pipe.

For Kaplan and thousands of other Clevelanders, it's time to exhale.

After the balloons drop on Donald Trump's acceptance speech, 50,000 out-of-town guests — including 2,472 delegates and 15,000 credentialed members of the media — will head for the airports and highways.

The 2016 Republican National Convention, taking place just across the winding Cuyahoga River from Kaplan's glass-blowing studio, is "not as big a deal as we thought it would be," he said.

"It's kind of peaceful," he said of a sometimes unruly convention that's brought protests, boos, jeers and chants "Lock her up!"

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Cleveland may have been the center of the political universe this week. But it's not at the center of most Clevelanders' lives. In fact, many Clevelanders seem to have gone out of their way to avoid it.

On the home rental site Airbnb, more than 1,900 Cleveland households left their homes and decided to rent them out to convention-goers for the week, at an average of $300 a night. Except for the occasional motorcade — escorted by Secret Service, Capitol Police the Ohio Highway Patrol and local departments — traffic was tolerable outside of downtown.

Latroya Cole got pulled over by one of those motorcades as she took her nieces to Edgewater Park, a newly cleaned-up beach on Lake Erie. "I just want it to be over, she said. "I've been a little stressed. I just don't want to see anyone get hurt."

She hasn't been watching the convention. Too much negativity, she said. "My main priority is that these children can stay naive to everything that's going on, so they can have a carefree summer. Just for a few weeks."

Many Clevelanders adopted similar coping strategies, avoiding the city entirely — to the chagrin of many shop owners. At the landmark West Side Market, just outside downtown, customers were so few that many of the food vendors simply closed for the week.

"As much of a headache and a heartache that's going on around the world, I was worried that all the hatred would rear its head here. And it really hasn't," said Jeff Frank outside the nearly empty market. He came in from the suburbs to have lunch at Town Hall, an an organic Ohio City restaurant where the waitresses wore hats saying, "Make America Healthy Again."

Frank is a reluctant Trump supporter. "I feel like Trump is really our only option," he said. Democrat Hillary Clinton, he said, would put her personal interests ahead of the country's.

In this largely Democratic city — where 2012 Republican nominee Mitt Romney won just 11% of the vote four years ago — Clevelanders were nonetheless welcoming to the idea of a four-day GOP invasion when it was announced in 2014. After decades of being known as the "Mistake on the Lake," a national spotlight might illuminate the $6 billion investment in downtown Cleveland since 2010.

But there was also trepidation. The "comeback" narrative had failed Cleveland before, in politics, economics and — perhaps most famously — in athletics: Earnest Byner's fumble. Michael Jordan's shot. John Elway's drive. LeBron James' decision.

And now, Donald Trump's nomination.

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The prospect of an disorderly convention, with protests spilling over into the streets, had led to heightened anxiety in Cleveland as Trump and anti-Trump forces maneuvered in the final weeks of the presidential primaries.

Then, James led the Cleveland Cavaliers to an improbable, come-from-behind national championship — the city's first in any major sport since 1964. More than 1 million people flooded downtown for a victory parade. The city was euphoric.

"I think the tide turned when the Cavs brought home the ring a few weeks ago, as stupid as it sounds," said Kirk Johns, who lives in a newly revitalized historic neighborhood just south of downtown. "Because everyone is in love in Cleveland."

But anxiety returned as terror attacks and police shootings this month put the country on edge. And Cleveland has its own recent history of violent crime and police-community tension.

The weekend before the convention was the bloodiest in Cleveland so far this year, with five people killed and 20 shot in violence unrelated to the convention. And the 2014 police shooting of a 14-year-old African-American boy by Cleveland Police — and the subsequent decision by a grand jury not to indict the officer responsible — still stokes passions.

On one local Sunday morning news program on the eve of the convention, an anchor asked viewers to pray for their city. "The media has made this out to be a complete terror hotspot," Johns said.

Clevelanders were proud to show off their oft-maligned city. But they were also bothered and apprehensive.

"It's sort of a witch's brew," said Mike Mitchell, who owns eight ice cream shops in Cleveland with his brother Pete.

Then again, Clevelanders are used to dealing with complicated emotions about their hometown. After being the butt of decades of jokes about the Cuyahoga River catching on fire in 1969 — an event that inspired the Clean Water Act of 1972 — the Great Lakes Brewing Company now bottles Burning River Pale Ale. "'Burning river' — that has a feelgood connotation now," Mitchell said.

He's a bit disappointed that the convention didn't draw more national star power. While Democratic convention is drawing A-list movie stars and musical acts, in Cleveland "you see an underwear model and a soap opera actor."

Cleveland's Sam Phillips — not the pioneering rock 'n' roll producer  — once drew his own 15 minutes of fame as the self-proclaimed "King of the Hand-snappers" on the Arsenio Hall Show and the Howard Stern Show. He's retired from the hand-snapping circuit now, and mostly tends to his urban garden plots on the near west side of Cleveland.

"I don't like the toxic mentality coming to my hometown. But I'm glad everyone's being civil," he said, pausing for a brief demonstration of his ability to make percussive sounds by rapidly flailing his hands in the air in front of him.

"I even love Trump and that whole bunch downtown," he said, strolling through a six-acre urban farm and motioning over his shoulder to the downtown skyline. "We have to show our collective humanity. We're like a big dysfunctional family."

Back at the cinderblock building that houses Kaplan's Glass Bubble Project, a suburban dentist comes in on his day off to work on his own projects. A recently homeless woman works the register and makes wind chimes as Morty the Rooster patrols the floor.

Here, the Rust Belt meets modern art, with lamps and chandeliers made of scrap metal, bicycle parts and driftwood. Even Kaplan's furnace is recycled, made from of construction debris and a used mattress frame. "I grew up in a junkyard," Kaplan said, and he's not joking — his family owns an auto salvage yard in Cleveland.

Kaplan made a custom glass mug in the shape of an elephant, but it's not selling.

"The world is so full of duality that it's difficult for me to pinpoint who Trump is," Kaplan said earnestly. "He's got to be able to talk to other leaders, and he has to talk sensibly. That's important to me. I don't think a person who grabs his balls on TV is going to be able to do the job."

But then, sensing that his opinion may have been a bit too harsh, he continued. "I won't be afraid if Trump wins. I just don't think he's the man for the job," he said. "That's the nicest way I can put it."