The Universe is an Amazing and Highly Prolific Artist

A friend of mine commented on a photo I'd taken and remarked that they saw the image as beautiful.

Reflections on College Creek - Annapolis, MD

I agree that the mirror finish of the creek where the skyscape and land can be reflected in an undulating sine wave was a truly spectacular view.  The commend forced me to reflect on the fact that his area of Annapolis has consistently delivered great photographs of the sky and water.  Sunsets, when they really come in deep red and angry are a particular favorite of mine in this area, but the cool blue and grey thunderstorms punctuated by a slash of sun are nice too. They give a sense of cool in the muggy heat that you can see, but you certainly couldn't feel.

I remarked to her that the Universe is an amazing and highly prolific artist. She renders scenes like these (and better) every day. I'm grateful that walking has made me more aware that these vistas are happening all the time.

In fact, I found a new spot from which to observe the sunset. Today's wasn't the best because of the billowing thunderheads in the west, but this view is going to deliver some great shots if I'm not mistaken.

Skyscape behind the Navy Watertower - Annapolis, MD

It's hard to believe that a little less than four years ago found me in a very dark place from which I could not imagine any escape. Quite a bit has changed since that day. Much of it has felt like it was for the better. Some days felt like they really were for the worse. The fascinating thing is that I'm not sure that I trust my own judgement in determining if there is a better and worse. My life is filled with beauty and light now. The darkness has been banished, and even the days where I thought I could endure nothing else since then have been honed a bit with the passage of time.

The creative nature of the power of the Universe is truly awesome to behold, and I find myself ever more thankful for each day that I'm granted to experience the wonder. I'm looking forward to tomorrow and the creativity the Universe has in store.  I'm not sure if it will manifest itself in the soft watercolor of the sunrise or the fiery forge of some other experience, but I know that whatever happens will be great wonder and I'm looking forward to seeing the work unfold.

Sometimes Another Sunrise Just Has to Be Enough

I got another sunrise today.  Sometimes...actually every time...a sunrise is all that you have cause to hope for, and when you get another one, you see it for the gift that it really represents. This morning I got a sunrise and a thunderstorm that I was able to observe from afar. The dawning of the day was a particularly nice one.

Sunrise Thunderstorm - Mayport, FL

Today was a great gift filled with wonder. After all, I found myself wondering later in the afternoon just what the hell were forty people hoping to accomplish by meeting over the course of four hours that couldn't have been completed in a much shorter time.  Be that as it may, I'm looking forward to seeing what a new dawn may reveal about six hours from now.

Momentum Tuesday

Yesterday I opined that life appeared to mired in relatively long and marginally deep mud filled bog. That's not exactly what I said, but it's pretty much what I meant. Today felt different. Things started to break free and I gained some small amount of momentum on a number of fronts that have some level of importance to me.

About half way through the afternoon, the folks from Riverby Books called about the books I dropped off yesterday and made me a cash offer that was too high to take so I talked them down a couple of dollars. I may even take some store credit instead. I haven't decided but it was great getting the call back. The primary reason that I negotiated a lower sale price lies in the fact that I really love the venue. A small independent used book store on Capitol Hill. What? I believe strongly in keeping a place like that in business because I know down deep in my heart that the owners are following their passion. That sort of risk taking must be supported, so I negotiated the sale price on some old tomes that offered no other purpose than collect dust on a shelf until yesterday. Those books moved on yesterday, and hopefully, they serve to inspire another reader as they've inspired me.

I took the call on my way out to find the second of three Little Free Libraries  within easy walking distance of my office. I'm happy to report that I successfully located the little nook and dropped off six books to mark the sixth day of my minimalist journey.

Six Books and a Campaign
Poster on a Telephone Junction
Box - Northeast Washington, DC

The joy of exploring new venues with my walking that this path toward reducing the material things that may be anchoring me in the past feels like the right thing to be doing now, and I'm grateful that I've started down this path, however reluctantly that I headed out with the first steps. I'm less than a week into the experiment, and I'm seeing benefits that I never would have predicted.

Little Free Library and It's Matching
Row House in Northeast Washington, DC

A largely uncharted path behind me, I decided to continue rambling through the neighborhoods that had escaped my past explorations. I jumped the street in front of the Library and landed in Lincoln Park. Now I have run around Lincoln Park, and I've driven around Lincoln Park. When I entered the center  of the park, I came in with the knowledge that I'd never been into the interior of Lincoln Park. Let's face it, who could have missed this statue?

Statue Commemorating Educator and Civil Rights Activist Mary McLeod Bethune

Mary McLeod Bethune started an school for African American students in Daytona Beach, FL which eventually grew into Bethune-Cookman University. She served Franklin D. Roosevelt as a national advisor and she's known as "The First Lady of the Struggle"  for her efforts to improve the lives of African Americans during the difficult times in advance of the Civil Rights Movement gaining significant momentum. She's an example of the going about the work that's placed in front of you understanding that you may not live to see the results of your vision but having the grit and tenacity to advance forward in the face of uncertainty. I'm grateful to have made her acquaintance some six decades later.

When I exited the park, I realised that my assumption of never having visited the center of the park was not technically correct. One night, a long time ago, I was driving a car full of my college classmates home from a night of carousing in Georgetown. We came to the intersection of East Capitol Street and 11th Street, and the sign at the intersection indicated that 11th Street was one way in the southerly direction. Now to get back to school, I knew we needed to go a little north and quite a bit east. I saw a road ahead continuing east, and I took it.

Footpath, That LOOKS LIKE A ROAD - Lincoln Park - Washington, DC

This maneuver elicited a great cacophony of protest from my passengers because they rightly recognized, even in their less than stone cold sober state, that I'd chosen to drive the car onto a sidewalk running into the center of the park. I think the photo above documents the fact that my confusion was justified, but there remain some who disagree with that assessment. They're probably right. Fortunately for all of us, I successfully extricated ourselves and our car from the west end of the park and we carried on smartly back to school from there.

Finishing out my jaunt, I came across a grasshopper on a lightpole.

Grasshopper on a Lightpole, Southeast Washington, DC

Finally, I finished up my wanderings by making my way past the grand old lady of the Anacostia.

Spring Afternoon with the USS Barry at the Washington Navy Yard

The USS Barry has become a thematic feature of my walking and my writing, but that won't last for too much longer. Since, as far as I can tell, no one is reading this missive the repetitive nature of these pictures should not cause too much bother. If it does, know that there are not too many more days of having to put up with it.

I'm grateful that today seemed to be a day where I gained some momentum. Boredom was pushed aside and wonder in the gift of living and working in a great city experienced a rebirth. Days like today give the fortitude to push through those days where no chance is evident and I sense I have lost my momentum. Per my normal routine, I look forward to being surprised by whatever wonders unfold in the coming day.

Donation Boxes

The clouds parted, the sun came out, and although the weather was still a little cool I shifted my focus today and started locating (or at least trying to locate) donation boxes. I'm coupling this foray into minimalism with at least two other aspects of my daily practice. If possible, I'm walking to the "excess stuff" drop off locations, and I'm spreading the wealth in a fit of exploration. I don't know if it will all work out, but it feels pretty righteous right now.

Today, the walk to the donation box took me a different direction primarily along one of my more familiar routes. Due to the foot, I haven't walked this one since the middle of January, and this afternoon proved to be quite a bit more pleasant than 28 degrees and a north wind.

College Creek Under a Spring Sky

The watershed around College Creek shows signs of awakening, and the cherry blossoms around the Maryland Statehouse are still in full bloom.

Cherry Blossoms on State Circle

The sky was clear and blue, and although the air was chilly the sidewalks and streets and businesses were crowded with more than a handful of people eager to get out of their dens and start sucking the marrow out of life again.

Maryland Statehouse on a Glorious Spring Day

All the people out milling around forced me to think a little about some of my habits. It occurred to me that while I'd walked past the Maryland Statehouse at least a hundred times, I had never walked up the hill to get up close and personal. The one time that I ventured off the sidewalk facing the street, I took a quick picture of a statue and beat a hasty retreat to my familiar trail. I walk to explore, but somehow, during the execution of my ambulatory affairs, I forget that spirit of new horizons and push my nose right back into the comforting grindstone. It's a peculiar lack of creativity during an activity specifically designed to break my mold and reintroduce me to a touch of artistry and wonder. Weird.

Maryland Statehouse and Some Sort of Red Tree

However it happened, today the mold cracked a little, and some new vistas caught my eye. They showed a curious mix of the routine coupled with a whole new perspective, and I'm grateful for the opportunity to mix things up just a bit.

Adding the challenge of offloading things that have bound me to my past has been a good exercise for the first four days of the journey. I look forward to sending five more books out into the wild tomorrow and seeing just what kind of adventure those relics of a time past its sell by date bring to bear in the present.

Gratitude Wednesday

I am grateful for my mobility. My feet take me to interesting places, and because of that motive force I learn interesting things. Today, I was walking past the United States Sports Academy listening to a streaming podcast of a woman describing how her recovery from a terrible car vs. jogger accident was greatly enabled by her neighbors in a nursing home filled with older people who walked her through a long and arduous recovery using their advantages of wisdom and time. Being ambulatory is a great blessing.

Bicyclist Sculpture at the United States Sports Academy in Daphne, AL

I am grateful that my sense of wonder and my ability to dream of adventure has not been stamped out by the more mundane aspects of life. I talked to a guy today whose fiance told me that he was truly interested in space travel and being an engineer with NASA. I approached him about applying for the Astronaut Candidate Program, and based on his reaction I'm pretty sure he is not going to apply. I don't really understand why someone would react that way. There really is no downside to throwing your hat in the ring. I intend to do so because I know that I'll always regret not trying when the opportunity presented itself. On the off chance of being selected, I have a hard time believing that getting on top of a rocket and heading off the planet would not be just about the most exciting proposition possible...a real adventure.

I'm grateful for the people around me. Over the last three years or so, I've become increasingly aware of just how special the people that pop into and out of my life really add value to the days that make up the time I spend on earth. Each person has a unique and interesting story to tell. They are more dear than money or material things, and usually they have a way of helping me escape from the prison of my own personality.

Today was another great day, and I look forward to what tomorrow has planned (if anything) for me.

Optimistic Awakenings

Today we caught the early morning showing of "Star Wars Episode VII...The Force Awakens," and from my perspective the film lives up to it's substantial billing. The movie was excellent and will introduce a whole new generation to the epic odyssey that I was first introduced to in the late 1970's.  The story line from the original trilogy holds together nicely, and though the technology of movie making has grown substantially over the intervening twenty eight years, there did not appear to be too much reliance on computer generated graphics and animation.  I'm sure it was there, but the blending of real world scenery, animatronics, and computer generated effects gave the newest installment the same feel as the original movies.  The film is a well done and worthy successor to the original cannon.

A movie like this sparks the imagination, and kicked off what turned out to be a good long day on the trail as well as an optimistic series of reflections fed by the overlying audio of TED Talks on the Future.  It did not hurt that the weather was more consistent with early springtime temperatures in the low 70's with more than a hint of blue sky shining through the occasional clouds.

Fitch Bridge over College Creek looking North toward Hospital Point

I have grown to appreciate the chance that these long walks give me to reflect on my environment, my evolving role in the world, and the optimism with which I am more able to look forward (though not too far forward) into the future. Walking is a world that, by its nature, is defined by the next short steps. It's a world where you can look to the horizon and imagine what it is going to be like when you get there, but the horizon is many steps and minutes, if not hours, away. The only way to get there is to take one next step over and over again. In this manner, you can make progress, but you are better served not getting too far ahead of yourself and looking back has limited utility as well.  It is good to glance over your shoulder now and then to make sure the weather isn't indicating a pending requirement for more appropriate clothing, but that's about the end of the utility there.

Hospital Point on a glorious Winter Day

Today, I covered just over seventeen miles, and I did that distance over ground that was never more than about two miles as the foot falls from my starting location. I covered the same general  between one and four times, and I never got bored. As the day wore on, the environment ebbed and flowed just enough to always keep things interesting. I'm also growing to appreciate covering the same ground time and time again because it forces me to stay in tune with the way the world is unfolding around me. Nothing is ever so static as to preclude a sense of wonder if I'm open to the possibility of being surprised and the opportunity to observe and learn something new.

College Creek Sunset

I wrapped up the day with another unique sunset that left me with a sense of warmth and connection to the palette of the universe.  It was another great day on the trail, and I hope to have another one that's similar but completely unique tomorrow.

Expanding Horizons

Today, listening to a TED Talk from 2009 during my afternoon ambulation, I was introduced to Singularity University.  This center for continuing and higher education was established in 2009 as a partnership between Google and the NASA Ames laboratory.  I like to think of myself as pretty well connected, but this is definitely a new and interesting topic for me.

I've written a little about why I started walking, and the practice has most definitely expanded my horizons in a much greater manner than I ever imagined that it might. For one thing, I imagined that the whole idea of walking longish distances was rooted in shrinking my world down to the one meter diameter in my immediate vicinity. In the physical world, the practice has most certainly done that to a degree, but the expansive nature of taking the time to reflect and contemplate on my role in the world is not something that I ever imagined would be a byproduct of the time spent on the road.

Automobile Bridge across College Creek

I don't know where all this is leading, but it feels to me like it's leading me in the direction that I should have been headed all along. My mind has opened to opportunities that I never imagined existed. As the asphalt passes under my feet, I find myself dreaming of adventure again. That feeling is something that's eluded me over the last several years, and it is fulfilling to see a glimmer of that vision begin to return.

It was a great day, and I look forward to the gift of another.

Something to Do While Walking

Walking is its own reward.  Through my walking over the last year I believe I've become more observant and less critical.  I've embraced the concept that there is no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing.  I have a much better idea what people living on the street have to face, and I've gained a higher level of empathy for their circumstances.  I've learned to appreciate finding a bathroom, a cool drink, and the little chemical hand warming pouches.  I've gotten to see things that I never imagined even existed in the neighborhood where I live and where I work.  I've been accidentally caught up in a Mardi Gras parade.

One of the more beneficial aspects of walking is that I've found extra time that I never knew existed.  I'm not quite sure what I was doing with this time before...probably watching television or something equally unproductive.  Having this gift of time gives me the space to create something to do while walking.  Some of this time...actually quite a lot of it, I've spent talking to Rory Conlan.  I've spent a fair amount of time on the phone with other people.  I've listened to some music, and recently, I've been listening to the extensive library of TED Talks.

Street Art Portrait of Edgar Allan Poe in Annapolis, MD

Today, I was listening to a talk by Louie Schwartzberg titled "Nature. Beauty. Gratitude." given at a TEDx conference in San Francisco, CA.  Mr. Schwartzberg is a nature photographer who specializes in taking time-lapse photos nature, but that's not really captured my attention. What really grabbed me was the gist of a project that he was working on in 2011 that dealt with the gratitude of living in the moments that make up a single day.  One of the narrators pointed out the unique nature of every moment. That when we open our eyes, hearts, and minds there are endless things that enrich our lives and make mindfulness of gratitude an easy and natural state of mind.

My shadow on the trail...feeling grateful

To open my eyes and observe is to break the bonds of generalization.  Weather becomes what's happening in the moment rather than something to be clinically described by a weather predictor on the television.  The currents in the air, the moisture or dryness, the clouds in the sky that show apparently endless variation, or the nature of a particular rain.  They're always different and always interesting. This talk I was listening to reaffirmed the sense of wonder that's come back into my life since I hit the trail a little over a year ago.

A Water Tower and the Sky - Annapolis, MD

Observing the day like it is the first I've ever seen and the last I may ever see is the sense of wonder that I relearned while out on the trail. Looking back, I'm not sure when that lesson began to sink in and I began to recapture that sense of wonder we're all naturally born with, but somehow, seems to fade with the intervening years.  By recapturing the wonder of life, the gratitude for the gift of the experience seems to naturally rush back into my consciousness, and a sense of contentment and happiness follows closely in its wake.

It was another great day, and I hope for the privilege of another tomorrow.

Always carry some coins in your pocket...right hand toss over your left shoulder is the key

On my afternoon jaunt today, I happened to take a left at an intersection where I normally go straight, and it led me to a place that I've probably passed over a hundred times and never really noticed.  I know, I know, I've been encouraging observation and drinking in the moment.  It's a good speech, but in practice a distance of only a few meters can make a difference.  The thing that I discovered, that's been hiding in plain sight since 1898 is the Neptune Fountain in front of the Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress.

King Neptune, Centerpiece of the Neptune Fountain

When I saw this fountain, I was immediately struck by how similar it looked compared to the Trevi Fountain in Rome, Italy.  The size and scope of the Neptune Fountain is far less extensive than the Trevi Fountain, but the overall layout and symbolism seemed to fit.  I was fortunate enough to see the Trevi Fountain on two separate occasions when work travel took me to Italy.  It turns out that the sculptor who built the Neptune Fountain had studied in Europe and readily proclaimed that he had modeled the fountain in part on it's counterpart, the Trevi.

Neptune, a Triton, and two Nereids (sea nymphs) riding horses

I immediately did a quick pat down of my pocket for coins because the legend associated with the Trevi Fountain holds that a coin tossed over the left shoulder with the right hand of a person facing away from the fountain will ensure a return trip to Rome.  There are other legends about two and three coins, but without one you can't even get started.  Sadly, I was not able to make a coin materialize in spite of my best efforts, and I left with no promise of return.

I guess the moral of the story is that one should not be caught without a cent to their name because one never knows when a chance at a very small investment might change the course of your life.

"Super" Moon Full Lunar Eclipse 2015

Today, with a great deal of media fanfare, the moon experienced a total lunar eclipse that was visible across much of North and South America at a point in its orbit where it was relatively close to the earth (perigee). The media called this event a number of titles, but Supermoon Lunar Eclipse is representative.  NASA took a slightly more balanced and scientific approach and has covered the event in a way that I find both refreshing and exciting.  NASA's description of the celestial phenomenon that we witnessed this evening (if the weather cooperated for you) can be found here.

Images of the "Super" Moon Total Lunar Eclipse that I took this evening with my cell phone camera

The weather was a little dodgy, but we were able to get the family out and about, and at 2243, the height of the total lunar eclipse when the moon was fully within the earth's umbra or shadow, I was able to image it with my cell phone camera.  The collage above is a selection of the photos.  

Once again, I'm forced to admit that the photos did not completely capture the grandiosity of the event that we were able to witness as the clouds parted for brief windows at just the right times.  I'm told by the astronomers that follow these things that the coincidence of a full moon, full lunar eclipse, with the moon very close to its orbital perigee (hence the term supermoon because the size of the moon is a few percentage points larger than usual) is a relatively rare event.  The last time this coincidence of events occurred was in 1982 and the next time it will happen again will be in 2033.

It's difficult to imagine that the next time we'll be able to see this that my oldest child will be 29 years old, and my youngest will be 26.  I'll be pushing 60.

While hopefully not a once in a generation event as is being touted in the press, I find the ability to experience this a remarkable gift.  I still remember when my dad took me out to view Halley's Comet in 1986 when I was 12 years old.  The next opportunity to view that will be in 2061, and if I make it, I'll be 87 years old.

While this lunar event is not as rare as Halley's, it serves to remind me of my smallness in the vastness of the universe.  Hope to see you again in 2033.

Keeping it Brief on a Friday Night

I managed to sleep in again today.  Not intentionally, but if I can sleep through an alarm and a phone call, I probably needed the rest.  As a result, my walking was curtailed to a just a little over six miles, and I had to park on what I like to call the penthouse suite of the parking garage.

Washington, DC skyline from the top of the parking garage

As you can see from the photo, the day was spectacular.  I've seen a handful of really unique events from the top of this parking garage.  The final flyover of Space Shuttle Discovery on the back of the specially modified Boeing 747 Shuttle Carrier on its way to the Smithsonian Air and Space museum was particularly memorable.

Being Prepared to be Amazed

Today, I was certain that I would not have anything interesting to write about, so I took what I thought at the time were some relatively mundane photos of some buildings and the sail of a submarine in a field that I thought I might squeeze into a few column inches or so.  Yes, you read that right, a submarine (or at least the conning tower) of a submarine in a field.  Here's the panorama that Google Auto Awesome stitched together for me out of that series of photographs.

Sail from SS 285, USS Balao

It strikes me that earlier this morning, I had been prepared to call this type of experience mundane.  I did get to see, and could have touched it if I wanted, the conning tower of the USS Balao, the lead ship in the Balao class diesel electric submarines that conducted 10 war patrols in the Pacific and sank a number of Japanese ships.  The ship was recommissioned in the early 1950's and saw further service until she was decommissioned and sunk as a target in 1963.  She even played a prominent role as the "pink submarine" in the 1959 movie "Operation Petticoat" starring Cary Grant and Tony Curtis.  She also deployed to the western Atlantic during the Cuban Missile crisis.

As if coming across this visible and very storied bit of naval lore was not enough for today, I was able to see Nancy Pelosi, Minority leader of the United States Senate give a speech on the steps of the Senate side of the Capitol Building this afternoon with a number of her fellow Senators and Congressmen in a show of support for the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action concerning the nuclear capabilities and limitations on those capabilities of Iran.  Just eight minutes ago, the AP reported that Senate Democrats had secured enough votes to block a filibuster tomorrow when Congress takes up debate surrounding a resolution of disapproval.  It is likely that the resolution of disapproval will pass in the House of Representatives but may not pass in the Senate.  If the resolution for disapproval passes in the Senate, President Obama will veto the resolution, and as things stand there are not enough votes in the Senate to override the veto meaning that the agreement will stand.

Here is what the announcement by Senator Pelosi looked like from the vantage point on my walk this evening.

Senator Pelosi and colleagues speaking on the steps of the Capitol during my walk this afternoon.

It's worth noting that I did not specifically time my walk to correspond with any of this political speechifying, and that my seeing this announcement was strictly coincidental to my daily practice.  It's also worth noting that only a street's width of air separated me from this relatively large group of Senators.  There was really no crowd to speak of, and I could come and go as I wished.  There were a few folks dressed like these guys floating around the area.

Capitol Policemen, one armed with an M-4 hanging around during Nacy Pelosi's presser.

The whole experience made the process feel very accessible, and if anyone is interested in seeing the federal government in action, there are precious few barriers to being a passive (or active) participant in that process from what I've observed.

What started out as an incorrectly assumed mundane day turned out to be a pretty amazing event for my when it was all wrapped up.  It serves as a lesson to me to maintain my sense of wonder and an openness to being amazed at what life will unfold around me if I am both patient enough and open enough to let it.

The Ups and Downs of Routine

When I was a bit younger...quite a bit younger, I used to dream of all the things I would do when I finally got old enough to call my own shots.  Just a few short years of high school, or finishing college, or establishing myself in a job or marriage or with the children were all that separated me from the freedom that I had been seeking for all the time leading up to those particular milestones and the ones that came before them.

Back in the early days, I suspect what I really wanted was the same sort of freedom that I already had at my fingertips, but with just a little more means to truly accomplish those things that I wished.  This kicked off a whole series of events that would eventually lead to me mustering the means that I'd sought to truly take advantage of the freedom that I already had.

The way the system here works is that (generally) the more means you muster, the more responsibility that you have to execute to hold onto those means.  More responsibility means a little less time on your hands, and suddenly I found that I had fallen into a bit of a routine that responsible people like me call "time management."  I began to resemble this...

Now in all fairness, this sentiment has a number of detractors, and Mr. Kain has a point about speaking this way from a position of privilege. That said, there is quite a bit of truth in this statement and it's worth remembering when the routine of responsibilities and the struggle to earn a living get a bit out of balance.  In the midst of all the struggle, there is still the opportunity to change your perspective, and for me, that's an important aspect of retaining the perspective of freedom that can so easily be lost in the execution of the routine.

Earlier this morning, I was treading along one of my more familiar routes wondering what I was going to write about tonight, when I decided on a whim to jump up on top of a wall that runs along Annapolis Harbor to see if that change of a couple of feet from my usual route might offer some inspiration.  It's something that I've seen my kids do time and time again, and I've probably even done it myself although I don't remember the specifics.

The first thing that struck me was that the act of stepping up removed me from the minor crush of pedestrian traffic that was out and about in the cool Labor Day morning.  I had space to my front and my back, that had been there the whole time (and many other times before) that I'd just failed to see clearly enough to take advantage of at the time.

Also, while the view was largely the same as the view from the sidewalk, the act of stepping up a double handful of inches changed my routine just enough to gain a new appreciation of the view.  This is what I saw.

Annapolis Harbor from the top of the sea wall.

The simple act of breaking my routine added a new perspective on a familiar view.  It put a bit of spring back in my step, broke me out of some mental complaining that I'd been engaged in, and set the tone for a day a little more full of doing things to maximize the freedoms I'd dreamed of achieving at this point in my life as a younger man.

Routine is a very useful tool in getting the things done that need to be done, but I think it's important to inject little ups and downs into the routine to serve as a reminder of the joy that the routine enables.  When the responsibility and routine become an ends to themselves life becomes a bit more of a honing experience than was intended by the architect of the wonder that exists all around us.

For the most part, this speaks for itself....

Sunset at College Creek, Annapolis, MD

You have worked those things that were put before you today.  You have done what you can.  Rest easy because tomorrow, if we're exceptionally fortunate, we'll be given the opportunity to strive for greatness again.

A Long Day of Non-Pedestrian Travel...And Gratitude

Today I was afforded the opportunity to spend a great deal of time in airports and on the road between airports.  Four states (MD, NC, FL, and AL) and the District of Columbia (DC).  It was not the smoothest travel day I've ever experienced, and the scenery for a number of hours looked like this:

Actually this was one of the better scenes - Notice that there are only embryonic thunderstorms and not the fully developed variety that was the source of some delay later in the day.

Even though I was on the road again, I was accompanied on my journey by some lovely ladies:

Beth and Kristy were there for me from the start.

Stranded in Charlotte, NC for a little bit, but at least I was with the Twins

I did manage to get in a relatively short pedestrian excursion earlier in the morning, so I kept my running streak going, and I'm still on track for the daily average over the course of August although it cost me all of my cushion.

At the end of a day like this it's probably best if I end with some gratitude, so with that in mind I am grateful:

1.  For having a good job that never really gets boring...much to my chagrin at times.
2.  For being able to get into an aluminum tube, travel about 500 mph over 1500 miles, at 30K feet (that's 5 miles) above the surface of the earth and ultimately arrive safely.  It's pushes the limits of sanity if you think about it too much, so I don't.
3.  For the noticeable uptick in the quality of foods available in airport terminals.  It's still delivered to you at company store rates (another First World Problem), but gone are the days of the soggy gas station sandwich delivered at those same usurous rates.
4.  Air conditioning.  You only have to step in the elephant like blanket of heat and humidity in the deep south once to be grateful for the engineering behind this little luxury, but it's good to be reminded of the benefits from time to time.
5.  Hotels that know me at the front desk and have the room key ready after a long day of travel.
6.  Connectivity, so I can make quick in-stride adjustments that suit my plans and requirements.  At one point today, I was simultaneously on the phone, talking in person to a ticket agent, and using the Oracle (Google) to provide insight into optimal routing and rental car reservation adjustments on the fly.  I remember when I used to get once a week phone calls from Rory Conlan from England through the SATCOM network for about $8/min.  You could actually hear the echo and feedback as the radio waves made the measurable travel up into orbit and back down again to the ground station for further processing.  These were analog lines for the last mile.  The rise of the connected individual is truly remarkable in the last quarter century.

There are so many more things to be grateful for, but for now I'll leave the scene with these.  It's an early morning tomorrow, and I've got a comfortable bed that's calling my name.

Escaping, Shrinking, and Enriching

Wold Traveler Bird - West Street, Annapolis, MD

To really understand the nature of the Newport to Newport Transcontinental Pilgrimage,  you should probably understand some of the history behind the idea (and it still remains only an idea) and how that idea has evolved over the last several years.

In the beginning, the idea of the walk was a fairly irresponsible escape fantasy.  I was not happy in my work (for no real reason other than a sense of entitlement and a gigantic ego, I might add), I was consuming far too much alcohol, and both of those situations were having the predictable negative impacts on my family life.  I'd sit in my cubicle and think about running away.  Leaving everything behind and just hitting the road.  I suspect it would have probably taken about a week for anyone to notice and then care enough to report my absence at work.  My departure would have probably been noticed at home sooner. At the end of the day, I did not have the gumption to carry through with this idea.  I didn't even make any preparations for it though at the time it seemed like a solution, however temporary to many of my problems.

Fast forward a little bit, and with a little help I reigned in my use of the legal anesthesia, my work life improved, and my home life, though challenged, began to take on a semblance of tolerability.  The one thing that didn't vanish from those dark days was the kernel of the idea of walking.  The thought had taken root and I just couldn't let go of it.  Certain aspects of the idea began to shift.  Instead of seeing it as some last great cannon ball run across the country to escape my troubles, the thought of walking shifted to being a mechanism to shrink my world.  I thought it might be a way to keep my thoughts in the present.  To focus on the relatively mundane happenings that were occurring about a meter in any direction from where I found myself in the universe.  I needed a way to bring myself into the present.  I was no longer a mechanism to escape my past, but it did take on the theme of escaping my imaginings of the future.  I thought that if I walked, I could focus on what was happening just a few paces from where I was sitting.

Another development happened around this time.  I actually started to walk.  My initial efforts along the B&A Trail that runs between Annapolis and Baltimore in Maryland were not particularly successful in bringing me into the present and shrinking my world.  I found myself thinking of the next three of four miles and imagining what they would be like to traverse.  I was restless, and if I'm honest I was bored.  Walking was also surprisingly difficult physically.  My feet hurt.  I chaffed.  Don't get me wrong, I could strike out and cover a couple of miles in relative comfort, but then my mind would begin to wander.  It would wander forward and backward.  It was also a relatively solitary exercise, and I found that I did not particularly enjoy being in my own skin.  The downside of walking was that it was doing exactly what I hoped it would do, and it was shrinking my world down to the meter around me.  There we no great distractions to take my mind far away from where I found myself at a particular moment.  The great thing with walking was that it took a fair number of moments, trudging along, to change my environment appreciably at all.

For reasons that are really not clear to me even now, I stuck with it.  Slowly, incrementally, walking became a practice rather than merely an exercise.  What started as an exercise in boredom became a time where I could quiet my mind with practice.  I learned not to worry about mile #8 when crossing mile #1.5.  I shrunk my world to the meter around me.  I learned not to imagine how tired I'd be in two hours.  I learned that it was enough to take the next step.

Somewhere along the way, I started to observe rather than see.  I started to pay attention to what was happening, both within and without.  The boredom receded.  The worry about the future and escape from the past grew less.  I started to see and hear and smell things that I had long since discounted as unimportant.  I began to see the value in things that I'd previously defined as unpleasant.  I began to enjoy them.

I've stumbled across two great paradoxes associated with my walking.  The first was that I could not ever escape by this creepingly slow means of transport.  Those fantasies were about escaping my situation, but at the end of the day, I was creating those situations, and walking is a terrible way to escape from oneself.  My fantasy was a fallacy since the means of escape (as I experienced) ensured that the thing I was running from became front and center to my existence.  This had always been the case, but it took the exercise of walking to realize it.

The second great paradox that I slowly caught up with (or more likely was just overtaken by) was that over time the practice of walking shrunk my world while at the same time expanding my horizons.  Even though I walk the same paths time after time, I am no longer bored.  The scenery and environment are always different and new.  The process of creation is alive and well all around us, and if I take the time to observe it, live in it, drink it all in and revel in the glory of it, I am content.

That's a whole lot of words that inadequately describe a bit of the journey I've traveled to get to this moment right now, so I'll leave you with some pictures captured during my walk today.  I've seen versions of all of these things numerous times over the last eleven months, but for some reason all three struck me today.  These images were all new and exciting and thought provoking earlier today.  They were that way in spite of the dozens if not hundreds of times I've encountered them before.  Today, I found them enriching and I really don't know why, but I'm grateful that they did.

Miss Anne II at the City Dock in Annapolis - The winding key on top is new this season

Main Street, Annapolis - Generally looking North

The First Day of Fall 2014...Another Great Day

Sunset Jogging - Spiritual and Physical Synergy

Today was another good day for progress on the Pilgrimage.  I took a jog that covered the sunset, the weather was beautiful, and the view...well, judge for yourself.

Today is the first day of fall, and it is difficult to imagine that in the next sometime in the next several years, the N2N-TCP should be just about wrapping up in the Pacific Northwest on a day that I see as being much like the day that presented itself to me today.  There are quite a few miles to go, but I put in a small part of that distance tonight just before sunset.

One of the unexpected benefits of this focus on the N2N-TCP Adventure is that I am more content, and performing better in the day job that I'm currently spending my time in to earn a living.  The whole idea of this Pilgrimage really started as a means of fantasizing about an escape from (at the time) my current condition.  It's evolved quite a bit from that fantasy without a great deal of effort on my part.  There is something to be learned from that observation.  

Back then, I was well and truly unhappy.  Today things are different.  My circumstances (from the outside looking in) have really not changed all that much.  One could credibly argue, if one were so inclined, that certain aspects are in fact worse from the original thought of walking across the country.  This is not how I view things.  My outlook has shifted, and I believe that shift in perspective is mostly based on the pursuit (however nascent) due to the pursuit of a dream.  It's an expansive dream, and the daily steps are quite small (and therefore manageable), but the pursuit has changed the way I see.  The progress feels quite remarkable.

The Rat Race in the Rear View Mirror

The Commute

I briefly touched upon the fact that the idea of walking across the United States has been an ongoing compulsion of mine for the last couple of years in the introductory post of this journal.  One of the things that I hope I can develop over time, is a somewhat reasonable and rational explanation for just why this idea has become so "sticky" or resilient in my mind.

When the idea of walking across the country first entered my consciousness, I was in a very dark period of my life.  It would be comforting to blame this on external circumstances, but if I am honest, most of the reasons were largely self-induced.  I strongly suspect that, at the time, I was manifesting a fairly strong desire to run away...run away from my problems...run away from my circumstances...but mostly just run away from myself.

A relatively short number of months later, I find myself with a completely different outlook on life.  The path to this point has not always been easy, fun, or rewarding in the traditional sense, but I am truly grateful that I have had the opportunity to wind my way through it.

That being said, the idea of walking across the United States has not gone away.  I'm no longer running from all of the circumstances in my life, but the compulsion remains.

One thing that I have discovered over the last twenty-four months is that life is an endlessly fascinating journey.  Each moment is a special gift, and staying with this "Present Moment" mindset is both rewarding and surprisingly challenging.

The photo above is representative of my thirty-four mile commute (each way) every day.  It is an analogue of one of the myriad of things that I had grown to loath and was I suspect was trying to escape during those darker times.  I would find myself on the road, at least two hours a day, with 200,000 other people making the daily slog to a job that I did not find fulfilling to support responsibilities and obligations I had collected over the course of my life (often unthinkingly) and absolutely hating every minute of it.

The irony that the drive is about the same distance as the distance that will be required to walk from Newport, RI to Newport, OR in the timeframe I am planning on has not been lost on my.

One of the ways the idea of taking on this adventure has evolved is that I'm no longer running, but I do want to put certain aspects of that "Rat Race" in my rearview mirror.  I don't think I'm particularly unique in this desire, and I think that just about everyone could take the time to live, take the time for a real adventure, put the things we are collectively encouraged to value in the rearview mirror and make our own path.  That is an underlying value for me in this endeavor.  To prove to myself that I can do it, and to show to others that they can as well.  It's an effort to shrink my world, to live in the present, to revel in the now.

I invite you to join me on this journey of discovery with whatever small sense of wonder that I've been able to renew since the idea of the walk first struck me during the darker days.