Walking for Tomatoes

Walking for Tomatoes

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Some days, I walk to stretch my legs, to get my muscles moving. Other days, it’s mental exercise I crave. The ideas flow best when the body moves through space.

But yesterday, I walked for none of these reasons. Yesterday, I walked for tomatoes.

I took the long way around, ambled one half of a circular trail, crossed and recrossed the Glade, went up a hill and down some stairs. And, close to the end of my route, I stopped in at a farmer’s market. The tomatoes were ripe and I bought three.

What fun to stroll back to the car with my precious cargo. Not just my phone and keys (the essentials), but also with those three tomatoes.

A walk doesn’t need a reason — but if it does, tomatoes are a good one.

Darkness at Noon

Darkness at Noon

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The door was round and red, ornate and stylized, but it did not invite entry. In fact, it did just the opposite. I hesitated at first to step inside, because beyond the door all was darkness. Darkness on a warm, bright, late-summer noon.

Who knew bamboo trees could grow so close together? Who knew they could shut out the day? Had a path not been plotted between the plants, the forest would have been impenetrable.

But there was a trail, and as I made my way along it, I touched the smooth trunks, marveled at the tangle of leaves that hid the sky.

There was no way to get lost in the grove. I needed no trail of pebbles or breadcrumbs. Before long I was back in the brightness. Will all of us be so lucky? I hope so.

(This post titled with apologies to Arthur Koestler, whose novel Darkness at Noon depicts an even grimmer era.)

Community of the Air

Community of the Air

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I’m a longtime supporter of public radio. Whether I’m tuned to the Sunday jazz show or the classical station during the week, there’s radio music blaring here most of the time. The parakeets love it, and I do, too.

Of course, there are those inevitable periods throughout the year when a fund drive takes place. In the past, I’d turn it off. I’m a member, so why listen to hours of cajoling, of hearing how for less than the price of a cup of coffee a day you can support your favorite station.

This year, though, things are different. This year, I’m listening to as much of the fund drive as I can. I don’t mind the pleading, the shilling of a compilation CD, or the announcement of a new tee shirt lego. This year it’s “Defunded but not Bach’ing Down.”

All the talk makes me feel part of a community, a community of the air, to be sure, but a community just the same.

With the abolishment of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the removal of already earmarked federal funds, I feel more protective of public radio, and more grateful for it. I’ll listen to as much of the fund drive as I can stand, though I won’t be listening much longer. It ends in less than an hour. Will the station make its goal? I hope so. It matters more than ever that they do.

(Photo: Courtesy WETA Classical, which did, by the way, meet its goal.)

Lake Newport

Lake Newport

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I arrived as a light rain began to fall, jacket looped around my waist. It would be there to ward off the bigger drops, to keep serious downpours at bay.

I started on the straightaway, across the top of the dam, moved quickly past the playground and ball fields, crossed the street and strolled by the lakeside homes, then into the woods.

The path doesn’t go directly around the lake, but it’s variable and interesting with exposed and shady stretches, those now covered with crispy brown leaves.

The longer I walked, the dryer it became. I reached the end of the circular trail, which was also the beginning. It seemed dry enough to do it again. Which I did. Then one more time for good measure.

Three loops, three miles, and a jacket I never needed.

(Lake Newport on a sunny day)

Bridge to Somewhere

Bridge to Somewhere

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Yesterday I slipped out between the raindrops for a walk around Lake Anne. This is one of my favorite Reston walks, one I often take with a good friend, though sometimes I do it solo after my yoga class.

This bridge is on that route, a bridge to nowhere, you might think, though that wouldn’t be exactly right. It’s only a short pedestrian bridge, doesn’t span a great river or even a shallow canal, but it brings me full-circle from the community center, where my yoga class is held, back to my car. A bridge to somewhere, after all.

On the way I pass gardens, kayaks, rock sculptures, a cafe and a bookstore. The best walks are like this, I think. They combine natural features — woods, fields and streams — with signs of human habitation: houses, stores, cafes. And then there are bridges. A good walk might include one of those, too.

You Never Know

You Never Know

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Yesterday, sitting at the best desk ever, I looked up and saw a hummingbird. It was only there a minute, making several passes at the feeder, perching briefly on the thinnest of climbing rose twigs, before flying off to parts unknown.

Was it a straggler? A johnny-come-lately? A bird passing through from more northern climes? I don’t know. But I did relish the chance to look again at this amazing creature, to marvel at its bravery and its derring-do.

I thought then, as I often do, that you never know. I thought hummingbirds were gone for the year, that I wouldn’t hear that distinctive whirring sound until next April. But I heard it days later.

You never know when you might look up and see a rainbow or a hawk in flight. You never know much of anything, really.

Daf Yomi

Daf Yomi

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These are the Jewish High Holy Days, and I’m writing about a tradition called daf yomi, the practice of reading one page (a daf) of the Talmud every day. There is something similar in the Christian faith, a year of studying the Bible, but such is the richness and heft of the Talmud that at a page a day it takes seven and a half years to read it all.

I mention this because a friend of mine paid the blog a compliment. What’s most important about the daf yomi, he’s been told, is not the daf, the page of sacred text, though it is holy beyond measure. The point is the yomi, the dailyness of the practice.

The point of my blog is the yomi, too, he said. I appreciated the fact that he understands A Walker in the Suburbs, though not surprised because he’s a former colleague who heard me talk about the blog in 2010, the year I started it.

My blog is daily by design. Some weeks I throw in a Saturday or Sunday, but I always post Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Some days I have much to say, others not much at all. But the discipline is what I’m after, bringing to each day the habit of noticing.

(On a woods walk last year, I noticed how a drop of water disturbed — and beautified — a puddle.)

Best Desk Ever

Best Desk Ever

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The season has turned, mornings are cooler, but I still haul my laptop out to the best desk ever. That would be the glass-topped table that’s tucked under the rose arbor on our deck.

It may not be the place to sit when deep concentration is required. There’s too much to look at and listen to: the poplar whose leaves are just starting to turn at its crown, the liquid sound of blue jays calling to each other, the hawk crying from the oak next door. During rose season an errant petal may float down and land on my lap. But I love sitting here. I feel inspired and enabled. I seem to draw strength from the green, growing things around me.

I’ve worked in cubicles and carrels, at wide tables, and once, for a few months, in a converted closet. My office desk, where I park myself when it’s too cold to sit outside, has a similar view — more expansive since its higher up but less immersive since it’s inside.

But today, and I hope for a few more weeks, I’ll be working at the best desk ever.

Summer Preserved

Summer Preserved

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I usually take months to fill a handwritten journal. The one I finished this morning took exactly six weeks. I began it in the dog days of summer, sitting in the hammock as twilight fell, two days before flying to France. I knew that when I returned, the season would almost be over.

And though we’ve had heat and humidity, dry parched earth and one torrential rain, the calendar tells me that autumn begins today. So I finished the journal, tying the summer in a bow.

I filled about half the 80 pages the last two weeks. In the rush of travel there may only be time to record names, dates, places, impressions. Digesting it all begins later. This time it began while I was waiting for the return flight. I wrote for hours, capturing moments I was afraid I’d forget: three Eurostar conductors on the platform frantically puffing their cigarettes after we reached Paris from Brussels. The flapping plaid flannel shirt of a cyclist who zoomed past me in Amsterdam. The translucent orange butterflies at the Botanical Gardens.

Words like ripe fruit that I process and freeze, preserved for the future. The words and the seasons were in sync for a while. Now summer is over, but the words remain.

Hummingbirds’ Farewell

Hummingbirds’ Farewell

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In 2024, September 19th was the last day we spotted hummingbirds at the feeder. But so far this morning I’ve seen no sign of the tiny birds. We had two days of rain, which may have chased them off, or maybe they were following that mysterious call that sends them from suburban backyards to tropical rainforests.

They fly hundreds of miles, winging their way south over the Gulf of Mexico to their winter home in Central America. The calories they consume will help them make that journey.

On Tuesday, before the rains came, a hummingbird left the feeder and hovered right in front of me. Birds have done this before, almost buzzed me. They seem to be checking me out — or maybe they’re thanking me and saying goodbye.

I answer them in a soft voice, as I do to the parakeets inside. “You’re welcome,” I say. “Please come again next year.”