Being a regular walker on a regular route is a great way to get to know your neighborhood . . . and your neighbors. You may never be able to put a name to a face but at least you begin to recognize the faces you see every morning and evening on your strolls.
I pass two elementary schools on my way to work each morning and there is always plenty of activity as parents are dropping their kids off for a day of learning about the same time that I am heading down to the office for a day of earning. About half the parents walk the kids in and almost all the other half drive them in. There is a very small minority of bikers, including this morning an amusing mother and pre-school son couplet with the youngster safely enhelmeted, but his mother not setting a similarly good example.
The schools are a place of learning for me too. Did you know that almost all the newer mini-vans (whatever vintage is being driven in Santa Monica and newer) have remote control automatic doors these days? I sure didn't. I am also amazed at the high percentage of drivers who use their drive time to talk on their phones. However did we cope before Sprint and Verizon?
The air outside the schools in the morning is thick and polluted with the exhaust of the idling mini-van caravans, much to the annoyance of all the walkers -- the walkers who have business at the school (dropping off the offspring) and the walkers who are just passing through like me.
But I don't waste too much time focusing on the annoying parts of life these days and soon my attention rises to the beautiful gray clouds in the skies, the moist feel of the suddenly humid air in Southern California and the amazing contrasted blue where the clouds are breaking up in the sky to the North and West of where I am.
Our earth is indeed a wonderful and beautiful place and I, for one, consider myself immensely lucky to be here right now!
I pass two elementary schools on my way to work each morning and there is always plenty of activity as parents are dropping their kids off for a day of learning about the same time that I am heading down to the office for a day of earning. About half the parents walk the kids in and almost all the other half drive them in. There is a very small minority of bikers, including this morning an amusing mother and pre-school son couplet with the youngster safely enhelmeted, but his mother not setting a similarly good example.
The schools are a place of learning for me too. Did you know that almost all the newer mini-vans (whatever vintage is being driven in Santa Monica and newer) have remote control automatic doors these days? I sure didn't. I am also amazed at the high percentage of drivers who use their drive time to talk on their phones. However did we cope before Sprint and Verizon?
The air outside the schools in the morning is thick and polluted with the exhaust of the idling mini-van caravans, much to the annoyance of all the walkers -- the walkers who have business at the school (dropping off the offspring) and the walkers who are just passing through like me.
But I don't waste too much time focusing on the annoying parts of life these days and soon my attention rises to the beautiful gray clouds in the skies, the moist feel of the suddenly humid air in Southern California and the amazing contrasted blue where the clouds are breaking up in the sky to the North and West of where I am.
Our earth is indeed a wonderful and beautiful place and I, for one, consider myself immensely lucky to be here right now!
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