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Author: Anne Cassidy

Out is Up

Out is Up

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A climb to the top of the Vienna Metro parking garage yesterday gave me pause. And not only because I was winded from the steps. It was because of what I saw from that perch. The long-planned retail and housing development beside the Vienna station is finally underway. Urban density is coming.

I have mixed feelings about urban density. I appreciate the efforts of Robert E. Simon (founder of the planned community, Reston) and other urban pioneers who have envisioned new ways of living in the suburbs. (In Simon’s case, it was to create European-style “new towns” in the middle of Virginia hunt country; his experiment has been only marginally successful.) And yes, it is true that our long driveways and wide lawns, our streets without sidewalks, do not foster walking or biking. They keep the automobile king.

But from my vantage point yesterday all I could see were bulldozers and barren soil stripped of grass and trees. The price of urban density is suburban leafiness, the openness and beauty that drew us here in the first place. But up there on the fifth level of the Metro Parking Garage, the future was clear: The way out is to build up.

The Bloom of the Present

The Bloom of the Present

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A nod to the “Writer’s Almanac,” which informed me that today is the anniversary of Walden‘s publication. When it was published on August 9, 1854, Thoreau wrote in his journal: “To Boston. Walden published. Elder-berries. Waxwork yellowing.” After the book sold out its initial 2,000 print run in 1859, it went out of print (encouraging news for us mid-list authors).

Here are the lines that caught my attention this morning when I heard them on the radio: “There were times when I could not afford to sacrifice the bloom of the present moment to any work, whether of the head or hands. I love a broad margin to my life.”

I have felt that way often this summer — that it is enough simply to be. To walk or run, to swim or bicycle. To stand still and listen to a mockingbird.

Walking Hot

Walking Hot

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Yesterday we went to Arlington Cemetery, arguably the hottest place on the eastern seaboard. We crunched across the grass, skirting gravestones, asking directions, finding what we thought was the quickest way to President Kennedy’s grave site but learning that we had taken the long road.

Once we found the site, I found my eyes darting away from the eternal flame; surely it was redundant on a day with a heat index of 100. The warmth was everywhere, shimmering off the pavement, slipping a veil between us and the landscape. A guard stopped people from bringing snacks up to the site. The guard had several bottles of ice water in a cooler bag and she chewed on ice in between barking orders to the crowd. We asked her directions, we shared her pain, we told her to stay cool.

But no one stayed cool yesterday, at least no one outside. The fitful showers that showed up about 4 only served to re-humidify the atmosphere so that by the time we got home the windows were fogged and the air conditioner chugging. We were walking, but walking slow. Walking hot.

Conversation

Conversation

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Quick on the heels of my New York trip comes a visit from my dear friend Kay and her son, Emile. Kay lives in Paris so visits from her are rare and treasured. We have been chatting about one thing or the other almost nonstop since she arrived Thursday.

Instead of walking, then, I’ve been talking. And the talking has sparked ideas and freedoms that have been buried lately. Nothing liberates the soul like a good conversation. Afterward one feels supple and limber — ready to take on the world. Conversation is a bridge to a better place.

Comparisons

Comparisons

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I am searching for a wireless network in the suburbs. I wind up at Starbucks. It’s tough not to compare this one with the one I just frequented in Manhattan. This one is cool and calm and you can hear the music.

The one on 7th Avenue was loud and crazy and hopelessly behind. Lines formed at all times of the day. There were no seats. Outside, human beings of every size and description formed an endless parade on the thoroughfare.

I live in the suburbs now. I write about the suburbs. I wouldn’t want to live in a small apartment in a huge city anymore.

But I notice the differences, and I miss the place. And most of all, I miss the person I am when I’m there.

The Feet

The Feet

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I forgot the cardinal rule of walking in Manhattan — always wear tennis shoes, no matter how dorky you look. But I was lured by the heat and by my comfortable sandals to think I could walk 10 miles in them. And I couldn’t. Now I am a limper in the suburbs. Wounded but unbowed.

A Moving Post

A Moving Post

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Today I write from the New Jersey turnpike, a rider on the highway instead of a walker in the suburbs. That I can do such a thing amazes me. So I write with a grateful heart on a bouncy laptop.

Yesterday I visited Central Park, and when I started strolling uptown I felt both wired and slow; I wanted to move more quickly. I wanted to ride a bike. There’s quite a brisk bicycle-rental business now at the 59th Street entrance and soon I was pedaling around the big park loop: zooming past the boat basin and the Met on the east side, up a small hill to Harlem at the north end, then past a noisy blue swimming pool.

I dismounted at the reservoir, which was my running track when I lived on the Upper West Side many years ago. There were the familiar curves in the path, the lapping water, the St. Remo Towers looming above it all. Coming back on the bridle path under an ornate metal bridge, I thought about the many times I’d walked around that large pond, how much my life had changed since then, but how the pond was still there, more or less the same.

It was early afternoon on a fine hot summer day, and I was back in Manhattan. Right then, that was enough for me.

The High Line

The High Line

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On the High Line in Manhattan, I’m thinking of space. How this space was created literally out of thin air — well, that, and an old trunk line and the prodigious dreams of its founders. And how because of this space, a ribbon of elevated parkland in a city desperately in need of a air and greenery, so many other spaces have been created. Chic buildings in what used to be a western wasteland. A skate park at the northern terminus. Viewpoints and wading walks and art installations, soon a gallery at the southern end.

And it’s all built around walking. Moving through space. Creating, with our movement, a space both public and private.

City Steps

City Steps

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I became a runner when I lived in Chicago, but I became a walker when I lived in New York. I ran here, too, looped the reservoir a couple of times in the morning when I lived off Central Park and, when I lived downtown, made the World Trade Center my turnaround point.

But when I think of locomotion in New York City, I think of walking most of all. Because it is so crowded here, walking can feel like navigating, looking down at the feet coming toward you, figuring out how to sidestep them. It’s a choreography, a dance. But when you hit an open stretch of pavement you can rev into high gear.

Then the short blocks fly by and the bridges, too. And all the faces coming toward you seem full of good will, though you know it’s the endorphins making you feel that way. But you don’t care because you’re walking, no flying, down the streets of New York, and you feel like you’re home again.

Both Sides

Both Sides

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On a walk down the West Ox path today, one stretch was lined with wild chickory, the blue flowers nodding over the path, almost crowding me out. I felt like I was strolling along a flower-strewn walk in an English country garden. The wild plants will do that to you, will mimic, with their colors and arrangement, the artlessness of the planned landscape.

But then again, some designed landscapes, Central Park, for example, are a controlled version of nature with stream, foliage and vista. Makes me think we need a little of both — wild and free; prim and controlled — in our gardens and in our lives.