Capitol Hill Walk

A lunchtime stroll up New Jersey Avenue to the Capitol, the grounds and plantings and pleasant vistas of which (I now realize) are thanks to Frederick Law Olmsted. Now that I've read his biography and learned this fact, I think of him often when I walk by. No wonder my eyes rest so easily on the west front, are led so capably to the dome. He planned it that way.

But the Capitol was not my destination. I walked around it to East Capitol Street, past the Folger and down the shady brick sidewalk to Lincoln Park.

If Mall walks are about the grandiose and the touristic (the grand edifices of the National Gallery, Natural History and American History Museums), Capitol Hill walks are about the domestic and the personal. Artful arrangements of zinnias and marigolds; the fluttering miracle of an overgrown butterfly bush; a fountain accessorized with a kitschy artificial deer (out here in the suburbs we have enough of the real thing, thank  you very much); and dry cleaners, markets and drug stores tucked away on inconspicuous corners (no tacky neon signs here).

My mind wanders: If we lived here, I could walk to work. We would mow our grass with a push mower, grow roses and herbs in large clay pots. And that balconied turret, that's where I'd write.

The Capitol Hill walk is also about fantasy.

A photo of the Capitol that is old and out of season and that convinces me to bring my camera along the next time I take a lunchtime stroll in the city.