Our Beautiful Backyard - Communally Speaking

I went on another long walk.  I want to take advantage of this weather - and the freedom to walk in the middle of the day - as many times as I can before it gets hot and buggy.  Within less than a mile of my house is a large park where I have brought my children to play since they were little. It’s wooded, but also has a very nice playground, and areas for skate boarding, baseball, and tennis. There's a path around it all for jogging/walking.  It’s an oasis in the middle of a busy area of town.

A short distance from the park is “Loblolly Woods.”  It’s a wetland area, regularly flooded in places during the rainy season, so never “developed.” Paths were carved into the woods by mountain bikers, and many children (mine included) used the area for “adventures.” Several years ago, a group in the city proposed a paved trail - the “Hogtown Greenway” which would allow more people to enjoy it and prevent further damaging erosion; it would have connected to other greenways throughout the city and provided a beautiful, safe alternative for bike commuting as well.  Another group, homeowners whose property backed up to the area, organized quickly and shot the plan down.  Unfortunately, much of their argument was built on misinformation. While they called themselves an environmental group and claimed that the plan for a greenway was akin to “paving paradise,” their real worry was that more people would be enjoying the woods that they thought of as their own.  It was a shame.  Fortunately, an alternate plan of dirt trails and boardwalks was put into place. Although it’s not accessible to wheelchairs or older people without sure-footing, and it isn't well-connected as a greenway system, it is much more accessible to hikers.  I’m glad for the persistence of the folks in town who want to truly preserve and protect natural spaces like these – and make them available to the community. Being able to safely enjoy wild spaces like these can only make folks appreciate and want to protect more of them while we have them. Once they’re gone, they’re gone.

It was about a six-mile walk - around the park twice, then through both the north and south sides of the woods (divided by 8th Avenue - a major road).  I enjoyed it so much I wondered why I don’t do it more often.  I think looking through a camera lens provides the minimal distance and perspective needed to see things with a “new eye.”  I was reminded of Joe's friend, Mathilde, a French college student who visited us during Christmas and exclaimed, "You live in a forest!"  It’s true.  But it doesn’t stay that way on its own. Again, we owe a lot ot gratitude to the folks in town who had the foresight – and love of this place – to protect it. They do the hard work of getting laws passed to protect trees (damn tree huggers) and of getting hard cash allocated to preserve urban parks like these.  It doesn’t happen on its own.