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A Walker in the Suburbs can now be found here.

Farewell to Blogspot

On February 7, 2010, when I wrote the first Walker in the Suburbs post, I knew only that I wanted to share a few thoughts with the world. I had no idea if I could keep blogging until the end of the month. 

Now, almost 15 years later, it's time to move A Walker in the Suburbs to a new home. Truth to tell, it outgrew Blogspot long ago, but until now I've lacked the time and will to switch sites. 

Starting tomorrow, October 1, 2024, you can find A Walker in the Suburbs here. The content won't change, but the design is updated, and you'll be able to subscribe and comment.

Meanwhile, as I say goodbye to this platform, I think of all that's happened since it began, the writing I've done; the people who are gone and the ones who've just arrived; how our world has changed. 

How grateful I am to have this opportunity to connect with all of you, to share my love of walking and place. Thank you, as always, for reading. I hope you enjoy the new Walker in the Suburbs. 

A Day Without Rain

Yesterday, for the first time in days, we woke up to clear skies. I took a long walk then squeegeed off the glass-topped table on the deck, making a dry spot for alfresco research and writing. By late afternoon I was restless again, ready for another stroll. 

Such are the choices that await us on a day without rain, choices we haven't had for the last week or so. Not that I'm complaining, given what residents of Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas have been enduring. But a day without rain made me appreciate the sunny weather that is so often our lot. Plus, I can tolerate today's dampness all the more after yesterday's solar recharging. 

Today's drippy cloudiness puts me in a reflective mood. This is the penultimate post I'll write on this platform. On Tuesday, October 1, A Walker in the Suburbs moves to its new home. Stay tuned for more on this, including a link.

(Rainclouds in Canyonlands National Park)

A Sense of Ease

The student discussion leaders of my Emotions and Senses class on Wednesday began by asking us to assess our emotional states. Were we happy, sad, surprised, angry, disgusted or fearful/anxious? Four of us volunteered, and every one said fearful/anxious. 

Although two people blamed the weather (after a long dry summer we've had rain every day for a week) and others cited work or traffic as primary stressors, these answers made me think (not for the first time) that we live in an age of anxiety. 

This is nothing new. W. H. Auden published a poem by that name in 1947. But we still have the hallmarks: a sense of unease, a low-level discomfort, a feeling that another shoe may drop at any time. 

I'd like to say these anxious feelings will go away after the election, but I suppose they will only go away for half of us. So how do we keep the anxiety at bay? One idea is to devote ourselves to the people, places and activities we love, that we find meaningful. That's how I try to restore a sense of ease. 

Not Yet

A blog errand has me searching through old photographs, looking through the years, with one type of image in mind. 

Of course, I can't find it. What I discover instead are travel snaps, family group shots, photos of Copper, our sweet doggie, gone these many months. Memories, in other words. 

Though I look through many of these photographs easily, I can barely glance at others. Some day soon. But not yet. 

Another Meta Post

Yesterday's post was meta, as I think about the blog itself in preparation for launching it on a new platform soon. This has been long in the works, and on my mind for years. 

When it comes right down to it, though, I'm finding it difficult to make the leap. Which reminds me of a central truth: change is difficult. This is as true for small decisions — turning right rather than left at the corner when I stroll the neighborhood — as it is for larger ones, like moving a blog of 14 years. 

But change is also essential. More and more so as the years move on, I've noticed. 

And so, this Blogspot home will soon be history. I'll keep you posted as I make the move — and I hope you'll make it with me. Don't worry. It will take a few days. These things always do. 

Monetization?

For class I'm re-reading the excellent novel Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. I'm highlighting many passages, in part for a presentation I'll give in a few weeks, but also because I enjoy the observations and the prose.

Yesterday I was highlighting for an entirely different reason, and I was laughing as I did. The main character of the novel, Ifemelu, a young Nigerian-American, starts a blog where she muses on racial topics. In short order the blog becomes so popular and so profitable that she's able to buy a home in Baltimore's Roland Park. 

Granted, Americanah was published in 2013, much earlier in blogging's history. I suppose its current earning power might be equivalent to that made by YouTube influencers. But still, I had to smile. I've never expected my blog to earn a penny — and it hasn't! 

Holding On

Fall has arrived. It rode in on a heavy rain that pulled down twigs and leaves, littering the road with summer's excess. 

Truth to tell, the trees are tired. They have been hanging on to their foliage throughout this hot, dry summer. They're looking for an excuse to lay down their load. A heavy rain will do it, so will a brisk wind. 

They're preparing for the great un-leaving, still weeks away, but imminent. The equinox is here, and with it a lowering of the light. I want to hold onto as much of the light as I can. Don't we all?

Two-Walk Day

I didn't intend for it to be, but it was anyway. A two-walk day, that is. Two-walk days usually result in deep sleeps, and this one was no exception.

Of course, a two-walk day is not a two-day walk. I imagine I would sleep extremely well after that. But a two-walk day isn't nothing, either, especially if both are an hour or more, which these were. 

Yesterday's strolls were in north Reston, with its well-peopled trail, its purposeful pedestrians. They're not just sauntering; they're making their way from Point A to Point B. They carry backpacks and shopping bags. They're going places. To be in their company is to be caught up in meaningful movement. 

Hall's Hill Wall

It was a late-summer walk with my daughter and granddaughter, but it became a history lesson. Yesterday I learned about Hall's Hill wall, a stark reminder of segregation in Arlington, Virginia. Bazil Hall was a 19th-century plantation owner whose first wife was so abusive to their slaves that one of them killed her. 

Although he was a slaveowner, Hall was also a unionist. He voted against Virginia's succession, and in 1861, Confederate troops set fire to his home during an attack from an adjacent site. Union troops later occupied the area. 

After the war, Hall sold off his property, some of it to formerly enslaved people. According to the Arlington Historical Society, he didn't do this because he was nice, but because he wanted to irritate his white neighbors. The Black community that resulted was known as Hall's Hill.

In the 1930s a wall was erected along the perimeter of the neighborhood to block Black citizens from entering the new subdivision of Woodlawn. It remained mostly intact until 1966, when the county tore most of it down. The vestiges still standing are a sad reminder of life in earlier times. 

Making it Fun

For the last week or so I've been becoming more familiar with PowerPoint than I ever wanted to be. After much angst and effort, I managed to pull together a handful of slides and share them with class last night, no small feat for this technophobe.

I will have to do it again several times this semester, but not for as long and I hope with a slightly higher confidence level. And then there's something else I'd like to add: a sense of fun. 

The classes I'm taking this fall are not required. No one is forcing me back to school. I'm not working toward a career goal. This is to keep the old gray matter churning. Instead, it's the stomach that's been doing loop-the-loops. 

Maybe next time it will be easier. I'm counting on it.  

(Photo of an old bomb I used to illustrate one of my slides last night. ... It's a long story.)

Fluid Again

The long-sought precipitation arrived during the night, and I awoke to the pleasant sound of a steady rain. This morning, after an early appointment, I ventured out into the storm, which had dwindled to drips and mist by the time I started walking.

What struck me most was how the dust was tamped down. The woods were refreshed after weeks of parching, and I was energized by the damp greenery and water gurgling over rocks. 

Weeks of drought slowed movement. Now, with the moisture, the landscape was fluid again. 

Still Dry

Here, trails are caked dirt, easily scuffed, and streams are dry, rocky ditches. Leaves are dropping early, tired and brown.

The drought is even more pronounced in West Virginia, which we drove through a few weeks ago. It looked like autumn at the beginning of September.

In my part of Virginia, weather gurus call it "abnormally dry," but that's just one step away from full-fledged drought.

Help is on the way, they say, but not as much rain as was originally forecast. Looks the ferns will continue to wilt.

No Way to Say No

When I began walking this morning, pink clouds were piling up on the horizon. The day was just getting to know itself. I needed a quiet tune, so I chose Dan Fogelberg's "To the Morning." 

There's a line in the song I've always liked: "There's really no way to say no to the morning." It's an obvious statement but one I need to hear sometimes.

To listen to it as I walked this Monday morning was to hear how beautifully reality can be crafted. Yes, there's no way to say no. But there are so many ways to say yes.