White Stripes

Crosswalks in my neighborhood are getting a facelift. A set of them on a road I drive every weekend have new paint, flashing lights and big signs in neon yellow to remind motorists to stop.

In my work neighborhood I've started taking a new route to the office, one that involves a crosswalk and the forbearance of drivers.

It's interesting to be on either end of crosswalk etiquette — as a pedestrian on weekdays and a driver on weekends. It helps me see how important it is to share the road, to look out for the errant ambler or the distracted driver.

More than anything else, a crosswalk encourages engagement. Those white stripes on the road can be a walker's — and a driver's — best friend.

Hair of the Dog

A grocery store is a funny place to find one's self on the day after Thanksgiving. There was a hair-of-the-dog quality to it.

On the other hand, it was a very good time to be food shopping. I had the place almost to myself.

I bought more eggs and bread and dinner fixings for tomorrow night (tonight will be leftovers) and some for the week to come. I avoided the Thanksgiving-themed napkins that were 75 percent off. Yes, they're a good deal, but I won't be able to find them next year.

In that way, emboldened, I enter the holiday shopping season.

(Alas, I did not shop at a picturesque farmer's market this morning.)

Giving Thanks

This morning I woke to find two of our three daughters sleeping in the house. They'd returned from the grand adventure of seeing "Hamilton" in Richmond and had driven back here in the wee hours. I wasn't expecting them till later, so seeing the car in the driveway and finding the two of them asleep in separate corners of the house was the perfect start to a day of giving thanks.

I've read that if we forget all other prayers but remember this simple one — "Thank you, Lord" — ours will be a rich prayer life.

It's so easy (for me, at least) to get caught up in the web of daily cares and to-dos that gratitude, which should be the ballast upon which the rest of life rests, is overlooked. But how hard can it be to say or think "Thank you, Lord" or  "Thank you, ____ [insert Divine Being of your choice]"?

Not hard at all, it would seem. In fact, imminently do-able. So on this bright, windy morning, I remind myself not only to give thanks today, but to give thanks always and everyday for all I have been given.

Miles and Miles and Miles ...

On the second day of my getaway I wrote in the morning and explored in the afternoon. About 20 minutes from where I was bunking, there was an entrance to Shenandoah National Park's Skyline Drive. I'd been there before — it's less than 90 minutes from my house — but I hadn't been there in years, so I was looking with fresh eyes ... with, dare I say it, eyes of love?

Virginia is for lovers, you know, though it's taken some of us a while to love the state in which we live. But this reluctant Virginian was swept off her feet yesterday. First of all, the weather was perfect. It was almost 60 degrees, clear and bright. There weren't many people around, and those who were there drove slowly, seemingly as much in awe as I was.

I did a couple of quick hikes, but what grabbed me most were the views. Skyline Drive runs along the crest of the Blue Ridge Mountains, so you don't just have one vista, you have dozens. At some point I realized that if I didn't stop pulling over at every overlook I would never get home.

I looked at the ridges, one behind another, as close to infinity as we are likely to have this side of heaven. In my head was that song from The Who: "I can see for miles and miles. I can see for miles and miles. I can see for miles and miles and miles and miles and miles."

It reminded me of flying; there was the same above-it-all-ness, the sense of seeing more clearly because we can see farther. Real world problems didn't go away, but for a few hours they seemed smaller and more manageable. They seemed miles away too.

Hot Spot

I've gotten away so far and so thoroughly that I almost thought I wouldn't be able to get online long enough to write this post. As it is, I will make this one quick because I'm using my phone's "hot spot," and I'm not sure how long it will last.

The little cabin where I've escaped prides itself on lack of connectivity. There's even a cellphone lockbox where you put away the pesky item while you roast marshmallows over the fire and look at the stars.

Alas, though I am not addicted to the internet in general, I have become pretty attached to writing this blog, so I have circumvented the cabin's best intentions and have gone online anyway — but gone online only to extol the pleasures of being away from things, out of the loop, disconnected.

It's ironic ... but true!

The Gift of Time

This morning I embark on a two-day writer's getaway, courtesy of my daughter Claire, who decided last Christmas that what I needed most of all was the gift of time. She was amazingly kind and wise beyond her years when she made this decision, because I need it so much that I'm only now using it 11 months later.

Time is what writers need and what this writer lacks. I'm not complaining. I would much rather have more ideas than time than be twiddling my thumbs with vacant afternoons and nothing to say. And yet, it often frustrates me that my own writing time (writing what I want to write, not what I'm paid to write), is crammed into the bits and pieces of a day: scribbling on Metro, rising early, retiring late.

Today and tomorrow is a break in that routine. Two days to unwind and charge the creative engine. I always remember what happens to those who don't, beautifully articulated by the poet Mary Oliver: "The most regretful people on earth," she wrote, "are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time."

Thank you, Mary Oliver. And most of all, thank you, Claire!

Eat Dessert First

Long ago, when I was a musical purist, I would have thought it gauche to listen to only one movement of a recorded symphony. In most cases, I enjoyed the entire piece anyway, but even if I didn't, diligence kept me on task. If I was going to thrill with the allegro, then I would muse with the adagio.

For several years now, though, my approach to music has been the aural equivalent of "eat dessert first."  If I feel like listening only to the last movement of Mozart's Jupiter Symphony, then that's what I do.

Maybe it's a matter of time, or lack thereof. Maybe I'm just giving in to a need for immediate gratification. I could also blame it on Washington's classical radio station, which routinely cherrypicks the most notable movements of a concerto or symphony and seldom plays a piece in its entirety.

No doubt about it, listening to an entire work is a different experience, more ennobling, a journey rather than a destination. But these days I'm discovering the particular pleasures of listening to what I love best. In other words, to co-opt the catchphrase ... Life is uncertain. Last movements first.

Counting the Carbs

Planning the Thanksgiving menu is not rocket science. You basically make every carb under the sun to go along with the turkey. Every year I have fantasies of roasted root vegetables or braised leeks — and every year I fall back to what I know.

Which is not to say I haven't tinkered a bit with my mother's menu. My brother upped the ante years ago when he took over the Thanksgiving meal. His turkey was brined, his broccoli was capered, and his homemade cream of mushroom soup was to die for.  And I have my own spins on the seasonal classics: a cranberry salad with cream cheese dollops, and herbed stuffing with walnuts and (this year) dried cherries.

But somehow, no matter what I prepare, the meal always ends up being one big mess of carbs. Tis the season, I guess!

Muted Palette

An early walk today amidst a muted palette of autumn color. The pink of the sunrise sky set off the glow of those leaves that still cling to their branches. The air was mild with a feeling of warmth and moisture. A flock of birds passed overhead.

We are heading for a monochromatic world, I know that. Already more limbs are bare than leafed. But it was hard not to revel in the beauty of the moment, not to get from it an optimism about things in general.

The kwanzan cherry tree, which was slower to change and has held its color longer than most, is finally shedding leaves at a frantic pace. But it's all to prepare for next spring when it will send forth its big-fisted blossoms in a riot of pink.

Yes, there is winter to get through in the meantime. But today, or at least this morning, it was easy to forget about that.

Because Internet

While at times I wanted to shake my fist at Gretchen McCulloch's Because Internet, I lapped it up and took scads of notes on it. There will be others like it, maybe there already are, but to me it seems utterly original. To survey how the internet and social media affect the way we communicate is not only useful but necessary.

McCulloch approaches her vast subject with a linguist's eye, and notices things I've noticed but didn't know others paid attention to (I'm leaving that preposition hanging out there because I know McCulloch would approve). Things like how spellcheck and autocomplete cause writer's block because they draw our attention to small details when we're just trying to get the danged words out any way we can. And her observations on typographical tone of voice, which I'll cover in a separate post.

Where I take exception is McCulloch's quickness to condemn "book English" (my quotations, not hers) and the stodgy, class-laden thinking she believes goes with it. This makes me defensive, of course, not only because it threatens my profession (do we really need professional writers and editors if "idk, maybeeee we should taaaalk about it ... lol" is perfectly acceptable?) but also because she seems to assume that writing well, with grace, is somehow false.

Writing well is not just a matter of following rules but also of breaking them — and breaking them to more brilliant effect when they're not broken as often. Writing well is putting words together in a way that is fresh, original and utterly you (whoever you are). If striving for subject-verb agreement makes one stodgy ... then I'm guilty as charged. In the meantime, though, I'll be thinking about McCulloch's points, and maybe loosening up just a tad because of them.

A Windfall

The Fairfax County Library system has many benefits, chief among them the fact that I can order books online and pick them up at my branch — not a high-tech offering, I'll admit, but a generous and handy one.

Of course, this means I usually have more books on my nightstand than I can possibly read and must stay on top of a wide array of due dates. It's a task I'm more than happy to undertake given the pleasures it provides.

Usually I have a little slip plus an email reminder that tells me when the books are due. But this time the email failed to arrive, so I went online to check the due dates. And lo and behold, I found a brand-new catalog and extended deadlines — two weeks longer! — for the three volumes I have.

Though I know the extension is due to the new catalog, it feels more like an early holiday gift for those of us whose reading eyes are bigger than our stomachs. It's positively a windfall — and I'll enjoy every (extra) minute of it!

Foggy Memories

A foggy dawn has given way to a partly cloudy — wait a minute, make that sunny — morning.  But my head is still in the clouds as I remember great fogs I have known.

There was a stretch of misty weather in Chicago long ago, unseasonable November warmth that steamed up the city's windows for days. I walked from my house to the corner where I met my ride as if in a dream, passing stately homes and the distinctive domed church on Deming, pretending I was in Europe instead of the Midwest.

And then there were the pea soup fogs in Arkansas, so thick they made it impossible to drive the 25 minutes from Petit Jean Mountain to Morrilton. Since there were very few services on the mountain, a few days of fog created a desert-island feeling.

Finally, there were the fogs of my youth, which swirled around the big oaks in the Ware Farm behind our house, making those open fields look haunted and lonesome. The farm is filled with houses now, of course. But through the miracle of memory, the fogs and the fields are there for me whenever I want to see them.

Train Spotting

The windows of my new office overlook the main north-south railroad line in the eastern United States. So as I conduct interviews and write articles, I keep one eye peeled for the sights and sounds of a passing freight or passenger train.

Whether it's the Virginia Railway Express commuter line (one just zoomed by!), the quicksilver flash of an Amtrak engine heading up the Northeast Corridor, or one of the lumbering freights that seem to go on forever, I find this new pastime more than a little distracting.

Usually, the work of the day creates a vortex on the other side of the glass, and there could be a circus train chugging by and I wouldn't have time to ogle it. But early or late, when my eyes are prone to wander ... do I ever have a lot to see!

On Looking

In her book On Looking: Eleven Walks with Expert Eyes, Alexandra Horowitz asks us to look at the world with the wonder of a child and the expertise of geologist, entomologist, illustrator or other professional observer.

Horowitz's simple and elegant argument: that we cease to really see the world we inhabit because we become so accustomed to it. Through a series of strolls with those trained to see what we do not, Horowitz urges us to "look, look!"

In one of my favorites so far, she ambles with the typographer Paul Shaw. He points out the text on a manhole cover, ghost writing on the sides of buildings, and always and everywhere, the type itself: the thickness of a serif, the placement of a crossbar, and the humanistic qualities of the letters, a "long-legged" R and a"high-waisted" S. After a few hours of this, Horowitz realizes she "had been blithely walking by undiagnosed lettering disasters my whole life."

But after her stroll with Shaw, she sees not just the words but the letters that compose them. "Walking back to the subway, I glanced down at my feet as I crossed the street. Look was painted on the sidewalk where I stood. I will — but I feel sure that now, my vision changed, the letters will find me."

Standing their Ground

At first I worried that something was wrong with the crepe myrtle trees. Their leaves shriveled quickly, as if caught so suddenly by the cold that they didn't have time to turn, loosen and gently fall to earth.

Then I noticed other trees, other species, with the same condition. This isn't a disease. This is the crazy Arctic air that's come south to taunt us.

These trees were minding their own business, heading gently through the season. They were captured still green and growing, led into winter with handcuffs on. At least they put up a fight.

Because yes, it's reasonable to accept the seasons in one's climate, place and lifetime. But sometimes it's necessary to say no, this won't stand. To cling to what is ours.

Salvation in Place

In his essay "Seven Days in a Sea Creature Town" in the November issue of The Sun, Poe Ballantine names periods of his writing life. There was the Diligent Typing Period, the Terrible Imitation of Southern Gothic Period and the Drunken Daydreaming Period.

By the time he was writing this essay, he was in his Geographical Salvation Period, which he defines as a belief, common among Americans, that "finding the right place to live  — someplace with a beautiful view, or nearby beaches, or casinos, or wonderful weather, or, in my case, an idyll straight out of a Normal Rockwell painting or pastoral boyhood story by Mark Twain — will solve the majority of your problems."

Ah, I can relate. I had a "place thing" for a long time, probably still do, if you want to know the truth. One of the reasons I started this blog was to explore the concept of place in the suburbs, which can be covered fairly quickly if you listen to some folks.

One of the lessons I've learned here is that place is as place does. In walking we belong. And in belonging ... we have place.

A Night at the Office

It was a late day at the office. Which didn't mean I was there until the wee hours, only an hour and a half later than usual, just long enough to label, transfer and prune some MP3 files that had been filling up my voice recorder.

My attention had been riveted by the screen for a couple hours, that and my inner ear, where voices from interviews I conducted months ago replayed through an earphone. It's a strange thing, listening to voices heard only once and trying to figure out who they are. It was an interior exercise, a journey into memory, aided by last year's day planner and typed notes.

But back to the matter at hand, which was the long day, the tedious task, and then, finally, completion. I clicked off my computer, packed up my things — and only when I stood up to grab my coat did I look out the window.

And there, spread out before me, was a magical sight. Offices that are drab brown and inscrutable in daylight were all lit up at night. What was normally invisible was suddenly seen. I marveled at the lights and the reflections. I marveled also at the comfort they brought. And that's when it occurred to me, something I know but too often forget — that we're never alone in our toil. Even when we think we are, there are countless others who are close by, working along beside us.

Snowflake Spotting

Snowflakes were spotted yesterday, and the temperature never rose about the "high" of 37 that greeted me when I woke up. It's Arctic air, the weather people said, and I wonder: Does Arctic air feel colder than plain old winter air?

Today I'd have to say yes. That may be because it was 15 degrees when I woke up and there's a stiff breeze out there, too. Emerging from the Crystal City Underground felt like a slap in the face. Even just a few hundred feet of exposure was enough to send me shivering inside.

But the sun is bright and a big old moon was still up this morning when I walked Copper across the frost-stiffened grass. We're moving closer to solstice, so 'tis the season for shivering. Which is just what I'm doing now.

(Caution: Snowflakes in the window may be smaller — and less real — than they appear.)

Smell of Burning Leaves

Yesterday's walk through the fading light of a late fall afternoon reminded me of what has been missing from the season. I caught a whiff of it when I rounded the corner. It was that autumn elixir — the smell of burning leaves.

Its source was unknown — and even if it wasn't, I would protect its identity, since the practice must surely be illegal. In fact, I hesitate to mention it at all with California burning.

But neither illegality nor political incorrectness can erase the fact that I love this scent, that it fills me with both poignance and peace, an unlikely pairing that takes me right back to childhood.

I would have been playing all day in that scent, would have been jumping in those leaves, in big crisp piles of them before they were set to smolder. And soon I would be walking back into my mother's kitchen, not my own. And it was the promise of that warmth and closeness that contrasted so perfectly with the lonely fragrance of ash and oak.

This, along with the scent of tobacco wafting from the big auction houses on the west end of town,  were the "smell-scapes" of my Kentucky childhood.  I don't smell either of them anymore.  But they're there. All it takes is the whiff of burning leaves to bring them back.

On Veteran's Day

It's impossible not to think of my favorite veteran on Veteran's Day, so Dad will be much on my mind today. And, because it is a federal holiday, I'll be able to drive into the office and back, creating a more "flow" commute than usual. Beyond these realities, what's on my mind this Veteran's Day is that this dear country, which so many have fought and died for, needs us in ways it never has before.

When my son-in-law took the oath of citizenship last August, he pledged to support and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Those of us lucky enough to be born here never take such an oath, unless we serve in the military or other public service. But I think many of us would go to great lengths to make this nation a less divisive place.

So what can we do? Maybe something that's not very complicated. Something that doesn't require signing up or shipping out. Something like this: that we try every day to understand those on the other side of the political divide.

Mirror Image

My neighborhood does not immediately scream "cookie cutter houses." Homes nestle among trees on lots of varying shapes and sizes. Exterior sidings and trims sport an array of colors and styles.

But, truth be told, there are only a few "models" here, and stepping into a neighbor's house often feels like being on the wrong side of the looking glass. I mean this quite literally since there's a 50-percent chance, at least on my street, that you'll be in house that's the mirror-image of your own.

This was the case yesterday, when we went to look at our neighbor's bathroom, searching for ideas of how to improve our own. And there, like a twin raised by another family,  was the same house with a very different treatment. The bathroom was about two feet larger, reconfigured and reshaped. And indeed it was instructive in its use of space.

But that's not what I'll remember most. Instead, it's the living room wall that wasn't removed and the paneled family room that exists because of it; it's the wallpaper in the hallway and the portrait above the couch. It's all the unique details that make their house their home.

Cold Air

It feels acrid in the nostrils and chilling to the bone. It's the frigid air that has moved in and seemingly settled here.

Shivering on a short walk with Copper yesterday, I pondered how long it is till next summer, telling myself I have to do better. And, very shortly afterward, I did. I went for my own walk and, because it was brisker, the ole bod heated up, the everyday miracle of pumping blood.

And it was while on that walk that I thought about how cold air differs from warm, the way it smells — or doesn't.  The way it tingles in the fingers and takes away the breath.

Soon I'll grow used to it, but these first few days it's an alien creature, something I welcome only cautiously back into my life.

Warming the Pot

It's something I do without thinking, idly swirling hot water around my ceramic pot before brewing  my morning tea. I learned it long ago, when I first visited England and took on some Anglophile habits, such as drinking tea with milk.

Warming the pot, I was told, produces a better cup of tea. It prepares the cold surface for the rush of boiling water. The tea will be more fragrant and potent for this effort.

So all these years I've boiled the water, swished it around, poured it out — not unlike rinse and spit — and only then have I made the pot of tea. All of this even though I only use teabags — and an Irish brand, to boot.

This morning, for some reason, I wondered what would happen if I took the same time warming myself as I do warming this Brown Betty? What if I woke up gradually, reading in bed, then did some gentle stretches, some devotionals, some writing in my journal ... and only then began the mad dash to wash up, make lunch, walk Copper and drive to Metro?

It's a lovely fantasy — but only a fantasy, one I can dream about ... while warming the pot.

"OK, Boomer "

Sometimes a phrase hits the zeitgeist so squarely that it becomes the mantra of a generation. For mine, it was "don't trust anyone over 30." For the Millennials, it seems to be "OK, Boomer."

Twice within the last two days I've heard or read about "OK, boomer," the dismissive reply young people make to "olds" who don't get (fill in the blank) climate change, student debt or how to rotate a PDF.  The phrase lit up the Twitterverse, the editorial pages and will be featured on a radio show I occasionally listen to. There are retorts and retorts of retorts.

Here's how millennial Morgan Sung ends a Mashable essay on the topic: "Saying 'OK, Boomer' now is even funnier because of how pressed the Boomers get. And you know what we say to that? OK, Boomer."

If I'm aware of something like this, I figure it's probably on the way out. But just in case it isn't, I will refrain from generational preaching. Because that would just be playing into their hands, you know.

Knowledge Workers

Like most "knowledge workers," I spend a lot of time sitting. This is made painfully clear at the end of work days when I move stiff muscles up and out of the building, onto the streets and sidewalks of Crystal City.

A standing desk and an office to stand in has improved this a little. But I still get into my rut, which is too much time on my behind and too little time on my feet.

Of course, those of us who wax rhapsodic about standing desks might sing a new song if we were street cleaners, baristas, or letter-carriers. Too much sitting is a problem of affluence, and that's something we knowledge workers shouldn't forget.

Still, I regularly remind myself of the power of movement. Even a quick stroll down the hall for a glass of water can rejigger brain cells. This is also a good time to be thankful for ... a job that lets me sit down.

Our Only World

In his essay collection Our Only World, Wendell Berry writes of the "deserted country" that results from farmers displaced by progress, whether it be Big Coal or industrial machinery and chemicals.

The result is an emptiness most modern people think normal because they've never known it any other way. But Berry, who is 85, remembers a richer, fuller, more peopled countryside. A countryside that included farmers who "walk don't run," Berry writes.

"The gait most congenial to agrarian thought and sensibility is walking. It is the gait best suited to paying attention, most conservative of land and equipment, and most permissive of stopping to look or think. Machines, companies, and politicians 'run.' Farmers studying their fields travel at a walk."

It's one of the reasons I walk, too, because it is the gait "best suited to paying attention." And though the remnants of a once-rich countryside lie ruined all around me, suburban neighborhoods named for the farms they've displaced, there is a point to walking even here.

Because when we walk, we feel just a little more like we belong. And when we feel just a little more like we belong ... we care a lot more about the place we live.

A Poor Trade?

By about 4 p.m. yesterday that extra hour of sleep Saturday night was beginning to seem like a pretty poor trade for the early darkness. The angle of light and the gathering shadows were disorienting, coming as they were a full hour earlier than I was braced to expect them.

In short, it's "fall back" all over again, half of the crazy exercise in discombobulation we undergo twice a year. In this one we gain sleep and lose light — and in the springtime just the opposite, of course.

As an early riser, I technically shouldn't mind this shift, because the light we lose in the evening we gain in the morning. But arriving home in darkness truncates the part of the day that belongs to us.  I always feel a bit robbed these first dark evenings.

I'll get used to it eventually; I always do. And then it will become so much the norm that the bright evenings of early spring will seem an assault on the senses, leaving me blinking, as if someone flipped on the lights in the middle of the night.

Candy is Dandy

Some wild and wacky weather managed to put a dent in the crowd of tricker-or-treaters coming to the house, which meant — oh, too bad! — we are left with a goodly amount of candy.

This is not something that bothers me. In fact, it's a perfect excuse to eat something I know is unhealthy. How unhealthy? Probably not very, when taken in moderation. 

Here's the thing: I don't drink much anymore because wine and beer give me headaches. I don't even eat much red meat these days. It's mostly veggies and fruit and grains — positively Puritanical! 

Which means I try not to feel guilty when I settle into an old episode of "Call the Midwife" with a bag of peanut M&Ms.

(I've been waiting two months to use this photo. I snapped it in a restaurant restroom in White Stone, Virginia.) 

Charged by Change

Night before last, our temperature dropped 40 degrees in a few hours. This morning it was 25 degrees when I woke up. Winter blew in right on time for the first winter month and the big light change this weekend.

I went out for a walk with three layers on ... and it wasn't enough. Time to break out the down jacket and turn on the heat, which has been off since April.

Though in the depths of winter I might fantasize about living in a place where it's always warm, I never get too far. As much as I grumble about the cold, I like seasonal change, am charged up by it.

So today, on the coldest morning of the season, I will try to concentrate on the difference ... and not the deficit.

Dino Walked into a Bar

The Halloween'ness of yesterday was eclipsed by the World Series win of yesterday ... until later in the day, when my office held a party complete with fog machine. There were three folks from one team who collectively dressed as "working remotely" — wearing  robes, slippers and headphones and carrying big bags of chips to munch. They won first prize in the costume competition.

There was a dinosaur, a scarecrow, an Elvis impersonator, a Minnie Mouse and someone dressed as regenerative soil. (After all, I work for a nonprofit development organization with a robust agricultural unit.)

And then there was my fave, because we hatched the plot together, a woman who dressed as the Winrock "mouse" with gray ears and tail ... stuck in a sticky trap. The only hitch: this poor woman found just such a creature in her cubicle the very same day.

That's a little too Halloween for me!