Walk A Mile
Posted: Wednesday, July 13, 2011
by Patricia Barbee
http://www.patriciabarbee.com
I'd only walk a mile for a gallon of gasoline.
I'd not walk for help for myself or anyone else. I've a cell phone and know how to signal from wherever as long as I can put my hand on my emergency kit. Having been married to the greatest Marine, I learned from him survival techniques without my kit.
Growing up in Boston we kids walked all over the place. All of us had money and kept it in our pockets for greater adventures. Our adventures were roaming the tourist traps and places of little known City history.
Did you know that the great poet Khalil Gibran lived on Shawmut Avenue? We kids did.
Boston is built what was once swamp land. We kids knew. Fenway Park should be ahint.
I'd not walk for help for myself or anyone else. I've a cell phone and know how to signal from wherever as long as I can put my hand on my emergency kit. Having been married to the greatest Marine, I learned from him survival techniques without my kit.
Growing up in Boston we kids walked all over the place. All of us had money and kept it in our pockets for greater adventures. Our adventures were roaming the tourist traps and places of little known City history.
Did you know that the great poet Khalil Gibran lived on Shawmut Avenue? We kids did.
Boston is built what was once swamp land. We kids knew. Fenway Park should be ahint.
The word: fen is another word for swamp.
The Fens was almost expensive as living on Beacon Hill. The Fens was not serviced by public transportation.
At times we could walk faster than the famous MTA could travel. Snow always slowed traffic and if we kept walking the cold never bothered us. We went to school at zero degrees.
We'd walk to the parks to play in below zero temperatures.
Besides walking all over Boston, we'd become "runaways" to New York City on weekends and holidays we'd hit the ski trails and in the summer the beaches.
We'd not get away with our adventures today because of cell phones and GPS systems and our parents' communication network, we'd not be able to distract any of them.
One of the colleges I attended was on Beacon Hill. That morning walk was sheer torture.
I loved Beacon Hill best of all on Christmas Eve. The residents of gas lit Louisburg Square would dress up in 1800s costumes and serenade the thousands of visitors with their brass instruments. The scene was out of a Dickens novel.
Once I got my first auto, I stopped my long walks.
As long as GM makes Buicks or other vehicles, I am not walking. My car does not know what a quarter tank of gasoline is. I make sure the computer lets me know I have enough petrol to drive three-hundred one miles to dear friends' house.
We are so close, that at any time should one of us be ill or need help, we'll roll the Interstate with the clothes on our backs and an etui with toothbrush and comb to get to the other. We've done it in the past.
Yes, I'd walk a mile for a gallon of gasoline.
Patricia Barbee © 2011
At times we could walk faster than the famous MTA could travel. Snow always slowed traffic and if we kept walking the cold never bothered us. We went to school at zero degrees.
We'd walk to the parks to play in below zero temperatures.
Besides walking all over Boston, we'd become "runaways" to New York City on weekends and holidays we'd hit the ski trails and in the summer the beaches.
We'd not get away with our adventures today because of cell phones and GPS systems and our parents' communication network, we'd not be able to distract any of them.
One of the colleges I attended was on Beacon Hill. That morning walk was sheer torture.
I loved Beacon Hill best of all on Christmas Eve. The residents of gas lit Louisburg Square would dress up in 1800s costumes and serenade the thousands of visitors with their brass instruments. The scene was out of a Dickens novel.
Once I got my first auto, I stopped my long walks.
As long as GM makes Buicks or other vehicles, I am not walking. My car does not know what a quarter tank of gasoline is. I make sure the computer lets me know I have enough petrol to drive three-hundred one miles to dear friends' house.
We are so close, that at any time should one of us be ill or need help, we'll roll the Interstate with the clothes on our backs and an etui with toothbrush and comb to get to the other. We've done it in the past.
Yes, I'd walk a mile for a gallon of gasoline.
Patricia Barbee © 2011
Patricia Barbee
SearchWarp.com
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Top-level comments on this article: (1 total)Good article Patricia, thanks for sharing some of your precious memories.
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