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Category: walking

The Places In Between

The Places In Between

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In the winter of 2002, Rory Stewart walked across Afghanistan. He arrived six weeks after the Taliban fell, and he dodged landmines, snow storms and rogue tribal chiefs along the way.

Stewart’s walk through Afghanistan was part of a larger trek that included 16 months of walking 20 to 25 miles a day across Iran, Pakistan, India and Nepal.

All of which makes him an expert on walking. But don’t take my word for it. Here’s a passage from The Places In Between:

I thought about evolutionary historians who argued that walking was a central part of what it meant to be human. Our two-legged motion was what first differentiated us from the apes. It freed our hands for tools and carried us on the long marches out of Africa. As a species, we colonized the world on foot. Most of human history was created through contacts conducted a walking pace….

And Stewart thought these thoughts — of course — while walking!

Tweaking the Commute

Tweaking the Commute

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The general idea is to shorten the commute, find the cut-through, the shortcut, the (quicker) road not taken.

Lately, I’ve done the opposite, adding a longer walk in the afternoon and sometimes (today, for instance) in the morning, too; strolling to a Metro stop farther from my office, savoring the time I spend in the places in between.

En route I think of my great commutes in New York City, walking to and from midtown Manhattan from the Upper West Side and, later on, the Village.

The goal is to exercise, decompress, let the day begin (or end) on a vigorous, active, mind-toggling note. The reality is even better.

Quite a Track

Quite a Track

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When I don’t have time for a long walk at lunch I “just” walk around the Capitol. This can be an exercise in frustration, as I thread my way past bomb-sniffing dogs, bicycle-riding police officers, sign-toting protesters and press-conference-giving legislators.

Most of all, of course, there are tourists. They stroll, they dawdle, they pose for photographs. As well they should. That’s what they’re here for, and our city is enriched by them, really it is.

But when the Capitol loop is your lunchtime walking track, and you want to round it twice before going back to your desk, well, it’s easy to stew and fume at the congestion.

Whenever that happens, I try to step back and remind myself where I am. And if I have a phone in hand (as I did one day last week), I become one of the picture-taking multitudes, too.

Boogie Wonderland

Boogie Wonderland

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Never underestimate the power of soundtrack. The tunes in the ear set the pace, set the mood and sometimes make the day.

Take today, for instance, a gray Tuesday. Ho-hum. But over the weekend I watched a French movie, “The Intouchables,” which featured some of my favorite old Earth Wind and Fire songs. I already had most of them, but after Saturday night I also have “Boogie Wonderland” on my iPod. So that’s what I listened to on the short walk from Judiciary Square to New Jersey Avenue.

Impossible to walk to this song. You bop. You bounce. And you try, very hard, not to dance.

But don’t take my word for it. Listen (and watch) for yourself.

(See what I mean. Even the trees are dancing.)

Power Walk

Power Walk

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The more walks I take downtown, the more I compare them with my walks in the suburbs — the pace, the people, the places.

Yesterday’s was an outlier but also an example: A helicopter buzzed the Mall, breaking through the music in my ears, annoying me. I vaguely wondered if I should be concerned. A truck bomb? A heightened security alert? (Do we do the colors of danger anymore? I forget.)

As I made my way back to the office, I found Constitution Avenue blocked. That phalanx of bicycle police I’d seen earlier, they were just the front guard. There were uniforms everywhere. No one would be crossing the street anytime soon.

You’d think I’d be motorcade weary by now, but I’ve seen very few and none for this president. So for five minutes I was a tourist like the others standing at my corner — only without a camera or smart phone in hand. And when the black cars passed, motorcycles in the lead, ambulances bringing up the rear, sirens blaring, all the trappings and pageantry — I wasn’t listening to the music in my ears anymore. I was completely caught in the moment at hand.

I wasn’t intending to take a power walk yesterday. But that’s what I did.

In and Out

In and Out

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To exercise at lunchtime I don’t even have to leave my building. The health club upstairs is well stocked, well staffed and state-of-the-art. But two days out of three I put on my coat, slip in my ear buds and walk outside instead.

There are no weight machines, ellipticals or tread mills; no pool or spin class. Just pavement and people. But that’s the combination that works for me.

Turns out, it works for many. Exercising outdoors is often better than exercising indoors, studies show. It burns more calories and tweaks more muscles.

It has psychological benefits as well — and that’s what keeps me going. I come back inside after a lunchtime stroll tired and happy. The pavement is my treadmill, perspective my salvation.

Something Up My Sleeve

Something Up My Sleeve

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Spring is trying, but it’s still winter here. Bare trees, brisk winds. I probably should wear gloves. But somehow I never remember, or I think I don’t need them. So on most of my walks now my hands are balled into fists and pulled up into the sleeves of my old jacket.

This is probably against most exercise maxims: relax, keep your arms loose, shake out. But for better or worse it seems to be my style these days. And I like the idea of gloves at the ready, long sleeves (and this jacket has them) with a soft lining. Some sweat shirts these days are made with thumb holes so my hands are always warm — though wearing them makes me feel like a poorly paid Dickensian clerk.

Still, there is something to be said for being as portable as possible. Do I have something up my sleeve? Absolutely!

Unforgettable

Unforgettable

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Some walks stay in mind only as long as my feet pound the
pavement; they vanish as soon as I walk in the door. Others are unforgettable.
It was winter and the moon was rising.  The city was spread out as it always is,
midtown to the left, lower Manhattan to the right, New York Harbor at our feet,
the ferries and tugs like insects skimming water. The day was ending and the
great city was dressing for dinner.
In those days the Brooklyn Bridge talked back to walkers, as
cars drove across the metal grid of the roadway below, and being out there in the middle was truly to be suspended — not on earth at
all but flying above it with towers of stone and cables of steel and something
else that can’t be named or explained.
Later that year I stood with thousands as music blared and fireworks
exploded to celebrate the span’s 100th birthday. And in the years
since I’ve often strolled from Manhattan to Brooklyn. But when I think
of the bridge, it’s that walk I remember most — the gathering darkness, the sighing
of tires on steel, the real world falling away.
Maps of Clouds

Maps of Clouds

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Yesterday’s walk began in drizzle, which I cursed silently. Not that I mind it, but my hair does. But I walked anyway, and as I did, the sky began to clear and the clouds piled up in the west and made maps of themselves, great illuminated maps. There was Cuba, or maybe some Micronesian island, and beyond it, some southern coast. And the yellow-pink light kept growing, even though the light rain kept falling. By then I had given up on my hair and just marveled that the sky could be so bright and still have rain in it.

It wasn’t until I reached the far end of our neighborhood that the rain finally stopped, and by then the clouds were on fire, so I extended my stroll along the busy road, which offers prime sunset viewing — all the while keeping those clouds, those pink and yellow clouds, in my sight.

As the cars drove past I thought how few of those drivers (often I’m one of them) could look — or see — the beauty raging around them. The poverties we are given, how they enrich us; and the riches, how they impoverish. This is certainly not a new thought, but an intensely felt one there in the just-past-rainy gloaming of an otherwise dreary day.

Stitchery

Stitchery

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The lunchtime walk is timed, by necessity. No more than an hour, often less. Bracketed by desk work, it is more of a bolt than a saunter.

Down First to New Jersey, over and around the Capitol.

Or maybe down the Mall, to the Washington Monument and back.

Errands might take me up Massachusetts or along E Street to Penn Quarter, the bustle of Chinatown.

Sometimes just to the Botanical Gardens to smell the roses.

In the end, it doesn’t matter. Each route stitches me more securely to this place.