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Protecting Place

Protecting Place

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As I’m drawn further into the life of a town where I don’t officially live, I think about what I owe Reston. Though I can’t swim in its pools or kayak on its lakes, I do walk its trails and enjoy its ambiance without paying its fees.

There’s nothing illegal or immoral about this, but the film I just watched discusses those who enjoy Reston’s amenities without buying into its program. We live less than a mile from Reston but aren’t within its strict property boundaries. Still, I worship at a Reston church, donate staples to a Reston food pantry, and pay the higher, nonresident fee for a Reston yoga class. I’d like to do more. 

As I figure out how to do this, I think about what people owe place, the responsibilities that come with residency. It’s a topic I ponder often, this idea of stewardship, of protecting what is priceless. What can be more precious than hearth, home and habitat? And what can be more natural than wanting to protect them?

Another Way of Living

Another Way of Living

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Because of its strict property boundaries, I don’t live in Reston, but I walk on its trails, buy strawberries at its farmers market, and take yoga at its community center.  

For many years, I haven’t known where I live: My mailing address says Herndon, my kids attended high school in Oakton, and I commuted from Vienna.  You could say I live in the suburbs of northern Virginia, but for a person who cares about place, that’s always rankled.

Since the pandemic, though, I’ve been gravitating to the place that suits me best, and that is Reston, a community founded and developed by Robert E. Simon (hence Reston) 60 years ago. Last night I watched a film made to celebrate the town’s 50th anniversary: “Another Way of Living: The Story of Reston, VA.” 

To say it makes me proud is an understatement. It roots me, inspires me, makes me want to move a mile away just to live in Reston officially. I probably won’t do that. But I’ll walk its trails with more awe than usual. 

(The Van Gogh Bridge in Reston’s Lake Anne. More on the film in future posts.)

Blooming Where Planted

Blooming Where Planted

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For so long this has been a loaded phrase for me — “blooming where planted.” It carries with it more than a hint of compromise. Or maybe it’s wistfulness, that I didn’t stay where I was planted but moved several times as a young adult before settling where I did. 

And then there’s the fact that I’ve ended up in the suburbs. Heaven knows I carp enough about that.

But today, the angle of the light striking the grass on the lawns I passed, the scent of the air, rich with loam and honeysuckle, made me think that there could not be a much better place to be planted. And that whatever the mixed emotions with which I’ve traditionally viewed the saying, there is a nobility in trying to flourish wherever you are, in contenting yourself with the situation at hand. 

(Pebble people frolic along one of my favorite routes.)

Connectivity

Connectivity

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On a walk I took Monday and may take again today, I noticed how rich life feels when the path you are walking is not just an afterthought to a road but is a network complete unto itself. 

It leads from place to place, revealing parks and benches and fountains not easily seen otherwise. It has numerous intersections and junctions. You must know which way to turn or you will be lost, though not for long.

Such a trail has segments you recognize and enjoy: a few hundred feet winding among townhouses in the beginning, a wooded stretch, a ball field and little free library. Crossing one street, passing under another, and finally winding up in an urban village, complete with café, bookstore and community center. 

A walk from place to place is about more than exercise. It’s about connectivity. 

Listening Local

Listening Local

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We live close to one of the nation’s great symphony orchestras, but sometimes I like to keep my listening local — hyper-local, in fact. On Saturday there were two concerts within a 10-minute drive from the house: a community orchestra’s year-end performance and an organ and trumpet recital at church. The timing would be close: one began at 4, the other at 6. Could we take in both?

It was not only possible, but it seemed the best possible use of a rainy Saturday afternoon. The Reston Community Orchestra was trying out the last of its four conductor finalists, and sparks (and at one point even the baton) were flying as the orchestra galloped through two Mozart overtures, the Haydn Cello Concerto and Beethoven’s Second Symphony. 

Later, in the (post-vigil-Mass) sanctuary, the church’s new music director turned the organ around so the audience could see all its keyboards and stops. He and the trumpeter began with Handel’s “The Trumpet Shall Sound” from “The Messiah” and ended with Mussorgsky’s “The Great Gate of Kiev” from “Pictures at an Exhibition.” Can any two instruments sound fuller and more orchestra-like? I don’t think so. 

At least on Saturday, listening local was the way to go. 

(Members of the Reston Community Orchestra take a bow)

Photo Finish!

Photo Finish!

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A photo finish was just what we needed yesterday, or at least just what I needed. A chance to lose the self in the moment, the moment being the “most exciting two minutes in sports,” the Kentucky Derby. 

In this case, those two minutes were followed by several more minutes of uncertainty as judges studied a photograph of the race’s conclusion, the first time since 1996 that such a move has been necessary. When the ruling came down — Mystik Dan by a nose — the crowd erupted. The 18-1 shot had bested Sierra Leone (9-2) and Forever Young (7-1). 

To see those three thoroughbreds thundering to the finish line, looking for all the world like a single unit, was to see grace in motion.

(A 1953 photo finish of the first triple dead heat in harness racing. Photo: Wikipedia)

Treasures from the Vault

Treasures from the Vault

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I returned from Lexington with something I absolutely need no more of, and that would be books. 

But who could resist the Annie Dillard compilation (even though I have these books in other forms), the Bread Loaf anthology or This Trembling Land, by a Kentucky author whose father owned the farm where I rode horses as a young girl?

There’s also a workbook (covered in a brown paper from a grocery bag) that dates back to my first-grade class. These are the kind of goodies that can still be found in what was once my parents’ and is now my brother’s home. I think of them as treasures from the vault.

Grounding

Grounding

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When I try to name it I come up short. Is it depth that I feel here in my hometown? Is it community? 

In so many ways, I don’t know this place. Like any healthy city, it keeps growing and changing. And for most of my life, I’ve done my growing and changing somewhere else. 

But when I visit Lexington, when I stroll down Central Avenue or Ashland or South Hanover, I’m walking through layers of personal and family history.

If I lived here, these layers might weigh me down. But since I don’t, they ground me. 

Sold Out at Singletary

Sold Out at Singletary

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In Kentucky for the weekend, I take in a sold-out concert at the Singletary Center for the Arts, including a spirited performance of the Mozart Requiem. The stage was packed with the orchestra and combined choirs of the University of Kentucky. 

The last time I was at this venue I was on the stage. Last night I was (gratefully) in the audience. And what an audience it was: attentive, respectful, spirited, just what the excellent music deserved. When the final notes sounded, the audience leapt to its feet for a standing ovation.

Though I love attending musical events in the D.C. area, I especially enjoyed last night’s performance. There was a communal feeling to it, a sense of togetherness among musicians and listeners, as we all fell under the spell of the Lacrimosa, said to contain the last eight bars of music Mozart wrote. 

Witnessing

Witnessing

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Walking is witnessing, a way to be present in movement and in time. 

Yesterday’s stroll took me from the oldest part of Reston to the newest, from a community center to a commercial plaza, from a small cafe to a bustling bakery.

And all along I’m thinking spring. The dogwood, the azalea, the first green of the oaks and poplars. How lovely it is to see it unfold along familiar paths, how grateful I was to witness its unfolding.