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Moment in Time

Moment in Time

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A quick walk yesterday at lunch time. Just long enough to feel the pulse of the city and to muse about what often occurs to me on walks in crowded places: That we are all here together on this earth. Right now. That we are all sharing a moment in time: young and old, weak and strong, those who’ve just begun and those who are almost done.

Some of us are in love; some of us are in despair. And some of us (those would be the teenagers on family vacations) are bored out of our minds. But for this one moment, the distinctions are irrelevant. We all feel the warm sun on our faces. We are all equally alive.

I don’t want to get all mystical now, but lifetimes, after all, are composed of moments. Which is why dipping my toes into the waters of humanity almost never fails to comfort and inspire me. It certainly did yesterday.

Bartholdi Fountain

Bartholdi Fountain

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A noontime walk in the city yesterday took me to Bartholdi Fountain. It didn’t look like this, of course. It was daylight and water droplets sparkled in the sun. Peonies hung their heads in the park. Creamy roses and colorful columbines competed for attention.

The bounty of bloom was an artless companion to the fountain, which is elegant, classical. Created by Frederic Bartholdi before he made the Statue of Liberty, it was first displayed at the Philadelphia Exposition in 1876 and later sold to the U.S. Congress for $6,000, half the asking price.

I learned these facts today on Wikipedia. But yesterday, when I was walking, what struck me most was the energy of the scene. The water shooting, gushing, cascading. Nearby office workers strolling, checking their phones, rocking in the chairs that offer prime viewing spots (and maybe a little fountain spray). And taking in all of this at my own pace, which is a bit of a whirl, especially when I’m trying to walk halfway down the mall and back.

The Bartholdi Fountain made me want to sit down and rock for a while. Maybe I’ll do that next time.

(Photo: Wikipedia)

Dogs Wearing Clothes

Dogs Wearing Clothes

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Our little ragamuffin pooch Copper was glad to see me when I walked in the door Sunday night. I gave him a hug and a pat, and yesterday, when we had more time together, I told him what I really thought about the dogs of New York.

They’re cute, I said, and you would probably like to sniff them out. But then again, you might not take them seriously because … they wear clothes. I mean, not just the random pampered poodle, but the perky bichon and the elegant whippet.  I would say about a third of the canines I spotted in the Big Apple were wearing something other than their leashes.

Dachshunds were the best dressed. They wore knitted shirts and tuxedo vests. And one dog (not a dachshund) in Washington Square Park was decked out in a plaid shirt and tennis shoes. This dog also walked on his hind legs.

I’ve heard there’s a new movement afoot to accord animals the rights of people. If not the rights, then at least the wardrobes. At least in Manhattan. 

West Side Story

West Side Story

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I used to live in the West Village. Now I’m a visitor here. It’s taken a while to adjust to this fact. “A while” is an understatement. We’re talking more than two decades now!

It must be the timelessness of the place, the winding streets that began, they say, with cow paths. The bohemian flavor that lingers amidst the wealth and Starbucks.

But it’s not just the timelessness that draws me back. It’s the new features, like Hudson River Park, a ribbon of asphalt and greenery that runs from 59th Street to the Battery. To stroll or bike here is to be of the city but not in it. It’s to be moving as the river flows, as the city itself moves, poetry in motion.

Every time I visit, I add another chapter to my own West Side Story.

The Parade

The Parade

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The Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade just ended — with all its balloons, bands, commercialism and faux cheer. Still, I had it on in the background as I baked the pies, made the stuffing and popped the bird into the oven.

As I heard the familiar tunes, salutes to the latest toys and cartoons (all of which I’m blessedly oblivious to now!) and, of course the obligatory salute to the Big Apple (“It’s up to you, New York, New York”), I couldn’t help but think about the part the parade played in my childhood.

Was it the parade that made me fall in love with Manhattan long before I had a chance to live there? Was it the parade that filled me full of Big City dreams?

It certainly played a part.

Today I’m thankful for family and friends, for health and warmth and work. I’m also thankful for dreams. They may never quite measure up to reality. But that’s not what they’re for.

Walkable City

Walkable City

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“Walking is a simple and a useful thing, and such a pleasure,
too. It is what brings planeloads of Americans to Europe on holiday, including even some of the traffic engineers who make our own cities so inhospitable.”  — Jeff Speck, Walkable City
 It would take far more than a single post to describe all the ideas in this book, thoughts about walkability from one of the nation’s foremost experts on it, the city planner Jeff Speck. For now here are Speck’s “Ten Steps of Walkability”:
 Put cars in their place
Mix uses
Get parking right
Let transit work
Protect the pedestrian
Welcome bikes
Shape the spaces
Plant trees
Make friendly and unique spaces
Pick your winners
Speck mentions European cities throughout the book. Here are places where pedestrians rule, where public transit safely transports people to and from their destinations, where bikes are welcome and buildings create human-scaled places.
What all these features combine to create is a walkable environment, one people want to stroll through and be part of.  We need to value “moving under one’s own power at a relaxed pace through a public sphere that
continually rewards the senses,” Speck says. “We need a new normal in America, one that
rewards walking.”

Beating the Clock

Beating the Clock

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I don’t know when cross-walks that flash “Walk” or “Don’t Walk” turned into cross-walks that give pedestrians a countdown of the seconds they have left for crossing, but I was thinking yesterday how this development has changed my walking style.

Before, I would find my cadence and stride confidently from block to block. My feet were on auto-pilot while my mind was free to wander. I stopped and started when needed.

Now if I spot a flashing “20” halfway down the block, I play beat the clock. The natural gait is gone. Instead, I race to the corner and dash across the street.The flow of thoughts is replaced by strategy. If I keep up the pace another block I can beat that light, too.

Do I get where I’m going any faster?

I doubt it.

A Building is Born

A Building is Born

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This morning on my way to work I didn’t have to cross the street and cross it again a block later. I didn’t have to walk around a construction site. It seems that finally, finally, the new building is finished.

I’ve watched it fall and rise again, gutted, framed and windowed. The old building was indistinguishable from its brothers, another stone box. This new version is mostly glass, it seems. Shiny and bright, but I’m wondering how it will hold up.

No matter, though. I’m just relieved that my path here is not impeded, that cranes don’t swing across the sky, that First Street no longer narrows to one lane.

It happens all the time, I know, but usually not so close to home. And when it does, it’s worth mentioning: A building is born.

Sidewalks Gleaming

Sidewalks Gleaming

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Wet pavement, steam rising — an urban phenomenon I’d forgotten until I started disembarking two stops early and walking a mile through the city some mornings. It’s the ritual hosing of the sidewalk to start the day.

There is some pride of place here. The rest of the city can get by with grit and grime, but not our patch of pavement. It will be clean, rinsed by the waters of dawn, sun barely glinting above the horizon.

Some custodians, the polite ones, pause briefly to let pedestrians tiptoe through the puddles. Others dare you to cross.

Though a temporary annoyance, it’s all for the best. It’s a salutation, a baptism, a way to start the day.



(Pretend you can see the sidewalks in this picture.)

Beyond the Horizon

Beyond the Horizon

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Three walks yesterday: One in the morning, one at lunchtime, one in the evening.

In the first, the sun blared in from the east, blotting out all color on the Mall. The darkness in this photograph is deceptive. The place was flooded with light. But as I stepped in front of the Capitol, the rising sun seemed to disappear behind the building, and the birds, lively at that time of day, flew in and out of the rays.

It was only when I looked at the photo again today that I noticed the aura that emanates from the Capitol Dome. As if the sun was rising right behind it, as if the city ceased to exist beyond that horizon. Not just the city but all known inhabited places.

What lies beyond is terra incognita. A steep cliff and then nothing. Unknown lands. A blank slate. The future.