IDC: I Don't Care

Senator John Kerry will be there. So will the mayor and lots of Kennedys. You can count on seeing the two Bills: former President Bill Clinton and Governor Bill Richardson of New Mexico. And Ben Affleck and Susan Sarandon are expected among the Hollywood glitterati.

But don't look for Christina Johnson of Hyde Park at the Democratic National Convention.

She is more concerned about the lack of summer programs for children in her neighborhood than a politicians' shindig.

"It's funny how they find money for this, but there isn't money for different summer programs for the youth," said the 23-year-old cosmetologist seconds before she boarded a Mattapan trolley at the Ashmont MBTA stop on a recent weekday rush hour. "It's horrible in that sense. I could say I don't care about it [the convention]."

As Kathy Curley of Codman Square waited to board her bus, she said the convention isn't on her radar either.

"I'm not really interested in it," said the 37-year-old legal secretary, taking puffs from a cigarette. "They are making such a big deal about it. It's no big deal."

While the July 26-29 DNC in the FleetCenter is the mother of all conventions in New England this or any other year, to some Boston-area residents -- the Hub's average Joes and Josephines -- it evokes another acronym: IDC (I Don't Care).

They don't see how the convention will affect them, and if they were interested, they wouldn't be able to get in the door -- even the card-carrying Democrats among them.

It's not their party, they say.

They see it as a private event that will have a public impact, with snarling traffic tie-ups, the shutdown of Interstate 93, congested MBTA stops, and armies of media crews descending on the city like birds of prey.

"It's not that it's a bad thing," said Johnson. "[But] I don't like how they have inconvenienced the city for it."

As a giant cloud of collective anxiety looms over workers who must commute in and out of downtown, many Bostonians would like to simply go about their everyday lives as artists, bartenders, students, and office workers -- but that will not always be easy.

Wanni Asavaroenchai, a lab researcher at Massachusetts General Hospital's Institute of Health Professionals in Charlestown, wishes she could overlook the convention, but she can't when it stands in the way of her commute from Somerville.

"I wouldn't be concerned about the convention, but it will be a hassle for us," she said, sitting on a bench by Flagship Wharf on a break from work. Part of her job involves visiting the hospital's West End center, so she also worried about going back and forth between there and Charlestown. "We can't ignore the convention even if we wanted to," she said.

Eric Starosielski of Jamaica Plain compared it to just another private trade show restricted to a certain segment of the population -- but a big one.

"I see it as a business trade show and it happens to be the whole city," said the performance/sculpture artist near his studio in Cambridge.

Ideally the convention would unite the community the way Red Sox and Patriots games draw Bostonians together, but that rallying spirit seems to be missing with this event. It's not exactly the caliber of, say, the Olympics, said Starosielski as he stood in Central Square digging into a plastic cup of dried fruit one recent sunny weekday afternoon.

"People come together for the Olympics to root for their team or their country. With the DNC, you can't really interact with these people," he said. "People in our community are disconnected with what's going on politically. The average person wouldn't care about this unless they are stuck in traffic."

Starosielski would like to see conventioneers leave the FleetCenter area and venture into the Hub's diverse communities such as the South End to see the works of local artists -- but he doesn't harbor much hope of that happening.

"I don't think these people who are coming into this town will check out the local Boston arts scene," he said as he headed back to his studio.

In the South End, two middle-aged women sat on a bench outside the Anna Bissonette House, a residential facility on Washington Street for former homeless people trying to get back on their feet.

When asked about the upcoming convention, each seemed indifferent.

"I don't think it will make much of a difference to the city," said one of the women, who like her friend asked that only her first name, Peggy, be published.

"I look to God for any real change to come about for peace, the economy and foodwise," she said. "I don't vote anyway."

Said her friend, Mary, "It just gets harder over the years, no matter who is in office. For the elderly and disabled, it gets worse for us every year with prices of prescriptions going up and housing."

Stewart Bishop, a bartender from Brighton, was interested in the convention when word broke that it was coming to Boston. He thought the attention would cast a positive light on the city.

But the protests by off-duty police officers, rising convention costs, and the amount of time Senator John F. Kerry spent mulling whether he was going to accept the nomination or not disillusioned Bishop.

"The convention really doesn't mean anything anymore. I'm not really thinking about it too much," said Bishop, 27, as he ate lunch at the Wendy's in Cambridge. "In the old days, party bosses would meet at the convention and announce who they want to be their candidate. Now it's all for show. We know Kerry will get the nomination. It seems kind of pointless now."

Adding to his disenchantment: He is one of the workers who has to commute into the city for his bartending job next to the FleetCenter. He plans to take the T.

"I don't see any good coming out of it. The delegates will be carted around the city to private parties. It's not like it's going to do a lot of good business for the city," he said.

"If I could get out of the town I would, but I have be in town and work."

Johnny Diaz can be reached at jodiaz@globe.com.