Happy anniversary

Alla got an offer from Travel Zoo, offering a fancy lunch for two for $33 at the restaurant in a new hotel on the waterfront. She accepted the offer, and told them when she made the reservation that we’d be celebrating our anniversary. That worked out really well.

The restaurant, Aragosta, faces the Boston Harbor. They gave us a table by the window and offered us complimentary glasses of Champagne in celebration of our anniversary. Alla was very pleased by her drink, and was disappointed that I asked for a glass of sparkling water instead, since it turns out she was hoping I’d accept the Champagne and then let her drink it. Anyway, I enjoyed my water.

The menu didn’t strictly match the Travel Zoo coupon, so the waiter gave us a very liberal interpretation of the coupon’s value. We started with a huge platter of Italian meats and cheeses, moved on to seafood/pasta main dishes and ended with tiramisu and tea. The waiter included it all in the value of the coupon, even though we’d managed to order about a hundred bucks’ worth of food. It took us a long time to eat, and we ended up taking home a pretty big bag of leftovers after having a really good time.

We didn’t go directly home, however. We took a meandering walk along the shoreline, exploring hidden residential areas (where we’d love to live), various parks and the Boston Garden. The Boston Garden isn’t really a garden. It’s a big sports arena, home to the Boston Celtics and the Boston Bruins. The Bruins were getting ready for a Stanley Cup playoff game that night, so a festival atmosphere surrounded the building. We got carried away with the craziness and bought some small things in the souvenir store.

Boston is a great city for walking and touring. I’ve been making regular excursions in various directions on my bicycle, enjoying the spring flowers and all the other people enjoying the city. A couple of weeks ago I saw some musicians posing with their instruments for a picture. I stopped and asked them if they had any gigs coming up, which they did. They would play this evening at the French Cultural Center, so I got the information and promised to go. We came back from the concert a couple of hours ago, happy that we went. We enjoy an abundance of great music because we’re near several great musical schools. Since I like jazz and other types of popular music, I’m particularly happy about being near Berklee College of Music. Come to think of it, I’m pleased about most of what surrounds us.

Can this really be New England?

I used to embarrass myself here all the time by talking to strangers who pretended they couldn’t hear me. New Englanders weren’t as friendly as the Californians I’d grown up with, and they frequently preferred to ignore me rather than speak with a stranger. It’s gotten much better, and I don’t think about that much now. But still, I experienced so much friendliness in a few hours this morning that I’m having a hard time believing it.

I started out at the post office, mailing a letter. A few years ago, postal workers considered the Beacon Hill post office the worst place to work in the Boston area. Everybody wanted to transfer out, and they didn’t try very hard to hide their displeasure from their customers. That’s changed too. The disgruntled employees got their transfers, Mary the Clown (really! She works children’s parties) started working there and everybody else seems pretty cheerful most of the time. This morning they acted outright jolly.

I went from the post office to the athletic club where I work out. Fay sat down next to me at the Life Fitness machines and started to chat. We love Fay. She’s a garrulous Irish lady who practically lives at the gym. She does yoga, aerobics, Zumba, weight lifting; pretty much everything.

When Fay and I parted ways, I walked over to the water cooler to refill my bottle. Four people sat nearby, cooling off after a couple hours of group workout classes. One of them looked over at me and remarked, “You look like you’re ready to take on the day.” I answered affirmatively and she introduced herself and her friends. Everybody appeared happy to be meeting a stranger.

The last detail, that made me want to write all of this down, happened in the elevator as I left, carrying a recovery smoothie. Another passenger in the elevator had a smoothie too, and she raised her glass to mine. We toasted and the third passenger joined our conversation with animation as we rode four floors to the lobby. Everybody is so outgoing! It amazes me how much my surroundings appear to have changed over the course of a few years. It’s wonderful, and I hope it’s like this for everybody.

Scary

I scared a stranger yesterday, as I walked home from church. Nicely dressed, I walked briskly down Newbury Street thinking about the pros and cons of a new cell phone plan. As I overtook a slower pedestrian, she glanced over her shoulder. All in an instant, she saw me with alarm, her eyes bugging out and her lips rounding into a little knot of fright, and she spun off sideways in a defensive crouch. I laughed and told her that I’m not all that scary.

She responded, “Why would you do that?”

If I had greater presence of mind, I might have asked, “Do what?” but I didn’t. I explained that I was just walking past, and hurried off, stung by guilt and shame for alarming this person. So I ended up playing the event over in my thought. I presume she thought I was sneaking up on her, and maybe she found it scary that I was walking so much faster than she.

Or maybe she was frightened that I looked into her eyes when she turned. I enjoy making eye contact with passers-by and it’s become my pleasant habit. At least it usually seems mutually pleasant, but this time I wondered if I did something unusual or unkind. I don’t think so, but I thought about African-American friends who confided to me how unpleasant it is to have people respond with fear to their approach. This was the first time I remember having such a stark encounter. I did not like being identified as a Scary Person.

Years ago few in New England acknowledged strangers and I was definitely the outlier. When I started working downtown I’d seek out non-whites because I could make eye contact with them, and even say “hi” when appropriate, and they’d respond. The “Yankees” (lifelong New Englanders) would not. To the Yankees, I generally did not exist unless they knew me. Things have changed since then. Boston has become a more cosmopolitan city, and the influx of foreigners and immigrants has softened the populace so people generally seem pretty outgoing and welcoming of strangers.

Yesterday, however, I felt strange. But I’m really not all that scary.

When the weirdos come out

My step-daughter didn’t like to ride the Red Line through Harvard Square after 10 p.m. because, she insisted, that’s when the weirdos come out. I had my own encounter today long before Nika’s cutoff. A guy wearing an Arabic scarf around his neck got onto the train at Harvard Square and started harassing the young woman seated beside him. I heard him bellow, upon learning that she’s from Saudi Arabia, “Do you realize how f___ed-up your government is? It’s the most f___ed-up government in the whole world,” and carried on from there.

“Hey,” I called out, “why don’t you come over here and pick on somebody your own size?”

He didn’t move, but carried on with his theme. He asked if perhaps I were unaware of how evil things are in Saudi Arabia. I replied that I wasn’t interested in discussing that topic, but that I wished to spare an innocent guest from mistreatment as a result of her country of origin. Once again, I welcomed him to come over and carry on a conversation with me rather than bother the woman beside him.

He warmed to his task. Shocked, he accused me; “You probably support our government don’t you?” and proceeded to expound on his opinion of how I must feel about Obama, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and what a loser I must be.

I smiled and told him he was doing a good job.

“What?” he asked, incredulous.

I said, “I asked you to harass me instead of her, and you’re doing a very good job of it. Come on over and sit here beside me so the rest of the subway car doesn’t have to listen to our conversation.”

He wouldn’t budge. Staying in place, he suggested a few more things I must mistakenly believe. I pointed out that he didn’t know a thing about me, repeating my offer of a seat where he could more comfortably ask my opinions. It became quite a scene, as this fellow worked himself into a little frenzy without the slightest inkling of my political convictions.

I felt good, completely without malice and glad to have distracted this fellow from the foreigner beside him. Altogether it proved to be a rather pleasant ride home, in its own weird way.

Town Day

When we moved to New England we discovered a tradition called Town Day. Many small towns set aside one day in the fall fall to throw themselves a party. These parties always involve food and they often include a parade. It creates an opportunity for residents to bump into each other after they’ve had their summer vacations and returned home. After moving from a suburban town into Boston I forgot all about it, though we have our own neighborhood traditions for getting residents together for some sort of party or event.

I stumbled upon several town days this year by accident. Somehow I kept encountering them on bike rides, and always managed to ride around them without experiencing much more than the smell of grilled sausages. Last Saturday, however, we rode into an event we couldn’t avoid.

We didn’t really know where we were going to ride that day. I found some old notes I’d saved about a bike ride to a farm stand somewhere. Since the notes referred to the names of streets but not the names of towns, I had only a general idea where we’d ride. Alla had never been on this ride, so we both experienced a sense of discovery as we followed my notes. At one point we rolled into Weston with intent to turn left on the main street, go through town, and turn right. The main street, however, was lined with spectators and filled with the beginnings of a parade. We talked to a local about the possibility of avoiding the parade by turning right and going around town in another direction, but by the time we’d figured this out, the parade had cut off our alternative.

We figured, then, that our best course would be to walk behind the spectators toward the origin of the parade and dart across when we finally got to the place where we wanted to turn right. A huge marching band passed by, then a smaller marching band, and then various floats representing local businesses and clubs. A bunch of people dressed like carrots accompanied the float from the Community Gardens, and then along came a small-time entrepreneur with an old Coca Cola truck. Inside the truck, instead of beverages, he had a player-organ with pipes, drums and a mechanical band leader. Somehow he’d gotten into the wrong place in the parade and he stopped in front of us, so I walked around and took pictures from all sides. The organ played loudly, like a calliope. The Weston High School Marching Band came up from behind, also playing loudly. The band passed the organ. Neither stopped playing. The organ, being mechanical, had no problem. I’m not sure how the musicians did, because I couldn’t really hear them. But when they finally got ahead of the organ once again, they appeared to be playing together.

J. Melone and Sons came by with their newest and oldest surviving trucks. The oldest truck, a dump truck, cost $10,000 in 1954. The newest truck, a cement truck, cost $200,000 and has never been used. I chatted with the drivers and learned that the guy driving the dump truck was one of the sons mentioned in the name of the business. A grandson drove the new cement truck.

We enjoyed our parade and the jovial atmosphere of Weston’s 300th anniversary Town Day. By the time we got to the farm stand, we were hungry and grateful that they made good sandwiches. I liked the buttercream cupcake they made too. We ended up a little farther from home than we intended, and farther than Alla was ready for, but we did ride home successfully. Alla definitely did not, however, want to get onto the bike the next day. We’d had enough fun for one weekend anyway.

Mad-keen cyclists

Apparently “mad-keen” is Australian for very enthusiastic. I learned this on a MassBike supported ride across Massachusetts with my friend Larry Reed and almost a hundred other riders. One rider came from Australia and described her parents as mad-keen cyclists. As a result of their affliction, they had lots of excellent spare parts around home, which they put together on a spiffy carbon frame and gave Courtney a fine bicycle to bring to America.

We also met a fellow named Rashah. Well, that’s not really his name. He got the nickname after a year of backpacking around Europe. When he finally settled down and got a job in England, his boss declared that he was so skinny that he looked like a rasher of bacon. That was my second foreign word of the trip. I’d read of rashers of bacon, and always thought a rasher must be some English unit of measure. However, my Merriam-Webster dictionary says it’s ”a thin slice of bacon or ham broiled or fried; also: a portion (as of bacon) consisting of several slices «eggs with a rasher of bacon».” But our guy is a New Englander, so he threw away the final r and became Rashah. He sports a wide moustache that curls up at the ends and wears stylish one-of-a-kind bicycle pants.

Since I’ve already started singling out characters from our ride, I must conclude with Erika, who went from running a vegan restaurant to opening a meat market. She’s into food, and she’s happy to prepare whatever people want to buy. She’s also a strong cyclist, an avid fund-raiser for charity, and a brilliant conversationalist.

I’m happy to describe all three of those people as mad-keen cyclists. Larry and I are pleased to describe ourselves that way too. We rode hard, ate and slept well, and repeated. We enjoyed the ride and the roads we traveled, and we had a great time chatting with the extremely diverse group of people who came together for this trip. I wasn’t sure, when I saw folks gathering, that I’d have much in common with many of them. It turns out, of course, that we found a great deal in common and the commonality went far, far beyond bicycles. I enjoy meeting new people even more than I enjoy riding my bike, which means that I couldn’t help but have a great time.

Climbing Sugarloaf

Tree surgery

As I passed through the Boston Public Garden this morning, I noticed a guy pruning a big tree. He had a gleaming truck with a very long double-articulated hoist which he controlled from inside his bucket. When he saw me taking pictures, he swung his bucket over to me and came down so I’d get a good picture.

The whole situation caught my attention because it differed so greatly from tree surgery in my other home town of Minsk. In Minsk, the tree-pruning teams arrive in old Soviet trucks that leak oil when parked and billow black smoke when running. According to someone in a position to know, nobody on the job, and possibly nobody in the home office, has any special training in tree surgery. And as far as I can tell from the ground, the guy doing the cutting gets positioned by a confederate sitting on the back of the truck, and he can’t position himself. The two guys drive the truck up to the tree however it’s convenient for them and then hack away until they declare themselves finished.

The Boston guy’s truck was parked on wheel mats which protected the lawn from his truck’s tires, and the clean truck proclaimed the presence of a certified arborist. His confederates were far away, grinding up the branches he’d removed from another tree. The Boston guy could go almost anywhere with his double-articulated lift with telescoping extension. The Minsk guys have to jockey around in their trucks to get in a convenient position for the simpler arm (like a human arm with one elbow) that lifts the woodsman.

The arborist in Boston suggests to me a difference in the relative wealth of the two cities, though it may represent simply a difference in priorities. Perhaps I wouldn’t have stopped to marvel at the gleaming truck in the Public Garden if I didn’t have a point of comparison, but today I’m impressed.