Alexandersmap

    Category: Travel

    • A Different Perspective on Liberty

      When you see the Statue of Liberty from the New Jersey side, it feels a bit surreal. We’re all used to that image in our head of the face of Lady Liberty, but how often do we ever think of the back? Yet that’s what New Jersey sees. I recall a joke about Lady Liberty forever turning her back on New Jersey, but let’s flip that script around for what’s really been happening since 1886: New Jersey’s always had her back.

      Liberty Park offers a striking view of Manhattan and Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi’s bold vision of American liberty. He called his work “Liberty Enlightening the World”. Liberty represents the hopes and dreams of millions, standing exposed to the elements for 13+ decades. 1886 was within the lifetimes of Civil War veterans, think about what that statue meant to them. What it still means, when we look at the world with new perspective.

      Liberty connects generations, and she stoically stands, not just American’s, but for the world. The work was literally a gift from the Old World to the New. We ought to remember the message in the gift. Forget the people trying to co-opt her message for political gain, Liberty represents all of us. When you look at America’s Liberty from New Jersey, you aren’t just looking at it, you’re a part of it. And from that perspective, shouldn’t we all have her back?

    • A Quick Hike Up the Nose

      Let’s get the elephant in the room addressed right off the bat: Anthony’s Nose has an odd name. Here’s one story I came across in Kiddle that describes how it got it:

      “Pierre Van Cortlandt, who owned this mountain, said it was named for a pre-Revolutionary War sea captain, Anthony Hogan. This captain was reputed to have a Cyrano de Bergerac type nose. One of his mates, looking at this mount, as they sailed by it, compared it to that of the captain’s nose. He said that they looked similar in size. This good-natured joke soon spread, and the name Anthony’s Nose stuck to this peak. Washington Irving’s History of New York, a satire, attributes the name to one Antony Van Corlear, who was the trumpeter on Henry Hudson’s ship.”

      Whatever the source, it requires that each hiker now forever able to say they went up Anthony’s Nose. How you feel about that is entirely up to you. For me, the motivation was to see a bridge I hadn’t seen in almost 30 years, get a quick hike in to break up a long drive and get a feel for a stretch of the Hudson River from a hill top.

      There are a few routes up Anthony’s Nose (sorry). The most direct route is a steep granite “staircase” that brings you to your destination relatively quickly. This requires street parking on a busy stretch of road. Alternatively, there are a couple of longer routes to the lookout spot, the one I favored followed the white blazes of the Appalachian Trail. The AT crosses the Bear Mountain Bridge over the Hudson River and meanders up through a final stretch of New York before reaching Connecticut. You might expect a stretch of the AT to be lovely hiking. You’d be correct for this stretch.

      There seems to be a lot of confusion about where the trailhead is for Anthony’s Nose. If you’re going to hike straight up the staircase, you begin at a small deck on the side of the road not far from the bridge. If you’re more interested in a 90 minute round trip hike, take the AT route. The trailhead begins on South Mountain Pass Road, which is a rutted stone dust road for a long stretch. If you’ve got a small sedan you might consider driving in from the Blue Mountain Beacon Highway side, which offers a bit more pavement to work with. Driving a truck, I enjoyed the off-road feel of reaching the trailhead after a few hours of highway driving to get there.

      The key for the trail is to follow the white blazes, which leave an old roadbed a few hundred yards up and begin descending towards a small stream before climbing back along the ridge line. The trail head would benefit from a bit of signage and a map, as one hiker after another asked each other if they were in the right spot. Perhaps a Boy Scout Troop could take it on as a project.

      The hike took 90 minutes round trip. Parts of the trail felt like you were in the middle of the White Mountains, but with glimpses of the Hudson River along the way. There was a bit of traffic buzz in the background, but overall it was a perfect hike to break up a drive from New Hampshire to New Jersey for me, or a short destination hike away from New York City. I’d recommend bringing lunch and soaking up the view.

      Bear Mountain Bridge with it’s namesake rising up behind it

    • Avoiding the Bankruptcy of Life

      “To be truly challenging, a voyage, like a life, must rest on a firm foundation of financial unrest. Otherwise, you are doomed to a routine traverse, the kind known to yachtsmen who play with their boats at sea… “cruising” it is called. Voyaging belongs to seamen, and to the wanderers of the world who cannot, or will not, fit in. If you are contemplating a voyage and you have the means, abandon the venture until your fortunes change. Only then will you know what the sea is all about.
      “I’ve always wanted to sail to the south seas, but I can’t afford it.” What these men can’t afford is not to go. They are enmeshed in the cancerous discipline of “security.” And in the worship of security we fling our lives beneath the wheels of routine – and before we know it our lives are gone.
      What does a man need – really need? A few pounds of food each day, heat and shelter, six feet to lie down in – and some form of working activity that will yield a sense of accomplishment. That’s all – in the material sense, and we know it. But we are brainwashed by our economic system until we end up in a tomb beneath a pyramid of time payments, mortgages, preposterous gadgetry, playthings that divert our attention for the sheer idiocy of the charade.
      The years thunder by, The dreams of youth grow dim where they lie caked in dust on the shelves of patience. Before we know it, the tomb is sealed.
      Where, then, lies the answer? In choice. Which shall it be: bankruptcy of purse or bankruptcy of life? ”
      ― Sterling Hayden, Wanderer

      Hayden chose the opposite of a comfortable routine, breaking from a lucrative Hollywood career and a failed marriage, he took his four kids and sailed to the South Pacific. Some might demonize this act of defiance as irresponsible. For why would someone give up “everything” and let it all ride on one spin of the roulette wheel? The question, really, is about what you’re risking. Status and reputation? Or a steady paycheck to cover the mortgage?

      I know this debate. I have it often with others. Life is full of compromise and the occasional break from the routine. Isn’t it? But should it be all or nothing? Is there a place for measured discipline to live side-by-side with an adventurous spirit? Is there a place for the routine traverse sprinkled with small delights, or must we choose?

      I wander about in graveyards now and then. This isn’t a morbid fascination with death, but a visit with those who once lived. Two of my favorite graveyards are both named Sleepy Hollow. The one in Concord, Massachusetts has some of the great transcendentalist writers in history interred there—Thoreau and Emerson. The one in Sleepy Holly, New York has Washington Irving and a bunch of formerly rich people interred there. Most of the rich people build huge monuments for themselves, most of the creative types have modest headstones. It’s like a shout from the grave: “See? I once mattered!” The thing is, they’re all part of the infinity now. How they lived is gone, but for their legacy. And so it will be for you and me.

      Somewhere between the routine traverse of life and the bold adventure of throwing it all away in favor of a life of challenges lies a happy medium. To be present but to be bold. To make choices that stretch your limits of comfort and bend your routine. To feel the urgency of now, and live while there’s still time, but to do it in a way that keeps you present for those who need you the most. And that’s the trick—isn’t it?

    • Learning a Language With Apps, Habits and a Deadline

      With a bit of travel coming up and a keen desire to be able to hold up my end of the bargain in a conversation, I’ve doubled down on my use of language learning apps recently. My primary method of learning to this point was Duolingo, which aims to make learning a language fun with a game-like structure, characters who you either learn to love or do your best to ignore, and a methodology that “align[s] with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR), which describes what learners can do with the language at different proficiency levels.” Nice.

      Duolingo advertises themselves as a free app, and you can definitely use the app free so long as you don’t mind putting up with the advertising. It didn’t take long for me to find the ads frustrating and just pay for the add-free version (mission accomplished). If you’re going to spend any amount of time on the app it’s worth the $60 USD per year for the Duolingo Plus Individual Plan. If you use it every day it works out to $.16 cents per day. Manageable.

      I’ve managed a streak of 767 days sprinkled with the help of a few “streak freeze”protections along the way when I’ve been traveling or simply didn’t get to it. I’m a big believer in maintaining streaks for habit formation, and have tried to check the language learning box every day for a couple of years now. What I’ve found is that as learning has become more habitualized in my routine using the app just takes care of itself.

      I feel that Duolingo does well in teaching reading comprehension, but I’ve found myself lost in rapid-fire conversations with native French, German and Portuguese speakers (the three languages I’ve focused on with this app). I felt like something was missing with Duolingo, and began looking around at other apps to supplement my daily learning. And that’s when I came across Pimsleur. If Duolingo falls short in one area, it’s in keeping up in conversation with native speakers. Pimsleur uses a couple of tricks to help with this. First, they structure learning modules around a specific conversation, using four tricks to help you understand a conversation that might have overwhelmed you when you first heard it:

      “Graduated Interval Recall — a scientifically-sequenced and proven schedule which moves the items you learn from short-term to long-term memory.
      Anticipation — by “anticipating” the answer to each question, your brain is actively learning and developing new neural connections.
      Core Vocabulary — The Pimsleur Method teaches the most common words and grammatical structures so you can start speaking immediately … in a meaningful way.
      Organic Learning — you learn grammar, vocabulary, and pronunciation in context using conversational exchanges — just as you learned your first language, but with the added benefit of a method scientifically-proven to accelerate learning in the adult brain.”

      I’m still using the unpaid version of Pimsleur, focusing specifically on German with it, and I find it beneficial. The graduated interval recall and anticipation jump out at me as being really helpful. I found myself inserting the right word or phrase more often than not, and the way they break down the phrase for you makes it easier to leap forward conversationally. But it is a conversation, so you can’t just quietly sit in a room with others while using the app if you want to learn to speak, you’ve got to talk. This is powerful, but it also requires that you carve out a time and place for it (I don’t anticipate using Pimsleur on my next flight, but I’ll surely use it while driving).

      When combining Pimsleur with Duolingo, you can effectively “immerse” yourself in a language if you put enough time into it. Sure, nothing beats true immersion for learning anything, but let’s face it: most of us have day jobs. Combining the two competing apps seems to be the right formula for me.

      The essential ingredient in any learning tool is focus and commitment—actually using the tools to learn. That’s where habit streaks and deadlines help you become focused. I’m happy just to keep the streak going every day, but I really feel more urgency to learn German knowing I have a trip to Austria and Germany locked in. And French doesn’t get a pass now—I’m sticking with the routine of learning both French and German (sorry Portuguese), and plan to book some time in either France or Quebec soon to dial up the urgency with French too.

      The Holy Trinity of habits, the right tools and the urgency of a deadline bring focus to the task. For nothing focuses the mind like the possibility of being hopelessly lost in conversation. We ought to hold up our end of it instead of expecting the world to just switch to English. Êtes-vous d’accord? (Ja, ich stimme zu)

    • What Do We Make Of This Texture?

      “What do I make of all this texture? What does it mean about the kind of world in which I have been set down? The texture of the world, its filigree and scrollwork, means that there is the possibility for beauty here, a beauty inexhaustible in its complexity, which opens to my knock, which answers in me a call I do not remember calling, and which trains me to the wild and extravagant nature of the spirit I seek… The texture of space is a condition of time. Time is the warp and matter the weft of the woven texture of beauty in space, and death is the hurtling shuttle.”
      — Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

      “Every religion that does not affirm that God is hidden,” said Pascal flatly, “is not true.” What is man, that thou art mindful of him? This is where the great modern religions are so unthinkably radical: the love of God! For we can see that we are as many as the leaves of trees. But it could be that our faithlessness is a cowering cowardice born of our very smallness, a massive failure of imagination. Certainly nature seems to exult in abounding radicality, extremism, anarchy. If we were to judge nature by its common sense or likelihood, we wouldn’t believe the world existed. In nature, improbabilites are the one stock in trade. The whole creation is one lunatic fringe. If creation had been left up to me, I’m sure I wouldn’t have had the imagination or courage to do more than shape a single, reasonably sized atom, smooth as a snowball, and let it go at that. No claims of any and all revelations could be so far-fetched as a single giraffe. The question from agnosticism is, Who turned on the lights? The question from faith is, Whatever for?” — Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

      At some point a month or two ago I gently put aside Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. It was right around when things got very busy, when bad news began to stack up around me like junk mail, when processing the deeper concepts behind Annie Dillard’s words became a bit more than I wanted to tackle at the moment. Everything has its time.

      Yet the questions remained.

      What do we make of all this texture? Every ridge line traversed, every waterfall’s mist tickling our skin, every deep conversation with another, every swim in a salty bay, and every sunrise glimpsed are but texture to our lives. But then again, so is every mosquito bite. It’s all so damned far-fetched, and yet here we are.

      I have a sister who is firmly in the God camp. I’m more skeptical of the Hallmark version of a loving God moving the world around like so many chess pieces. We both know life isn’t fair and throws you a curveball now and then to keep you on your toes. We just happen to disagree about “who” is winding up to throw it. And yet we peacefully coexist in both the universe and family dinners—we just don’t question each other’s beliefs.

      It’s easy to be outraged by the other side of the coin. They’re tossing around beliefs that just don’t jibe with our world views. Yet we’re the same coin. It’s fair to ask both “Who turned on the lights?” and “Whatever for?” We’re all asking our version of What’s It All About Alfie? Who said that we are ever meant to know the answers?

      Thankfully, we aren’t alone in pondering the imponderables; as with Dillard and Bacharach framing the questions in this post, we may draw on the wisdom of the ages at any time. Philosophy doesn’t answer the questions for you, but it does help you structure those questions better. We only have our short time to dance with the mysteries of the universe, and will never have all the answers.

      And yet… we get so caught up in the “who, what and why” questions that we forget to ask: How do we make the most of our present condition? For the universe only asks us to live in our time. You come to appreciate the tapestry of life a lot more when you learn to weave yourself into it and let the questions fall away.

    • The Late Night Star Run

      “The sky is the daily bread of the eyes.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

      Last night offered a small chance to see the northern lights as the skies cleared just enough to open up the universe. What are you to do with an opportunity like that but chase after it? With son and daughter as my two co-conspirators we jumped in the truck and drove northward over twisting country roads. Higher elevations, darker skies, reason for hope to witness that elusive sky dance.

      We never did find the northern lights. Instead we found the starry dome, the wind whispering a chilly welcome, and time to catch up with each other in a random field far from home. The sky above didn’t disappoint, even as we recognized that it wasn’t going to show all its cards to our power trio. As the clouds rolled back in, we jumped back in the truck for the drive home. We agreed the chase was worthwhile, if only for the billion stars dancing infinitely above and for locking us in the amber of the moment in revelatory quiet below.

      We don’t just stumble upon revelation, we must seek it out. Having a spirit of adventure mixed with a sense of place may seem contradictory, as if chasing dreams means leaving home. But the spirit that calls is the universe, and it in turn is our place. You see it more clearly when you get away from the ambient light.

    • Upon Further Review

      “Suppose we suddenly wake up and see that what we thought to be this and that, ain’t this and that at all?” — Jack Kerouac, The Dharma Bums

      The world is full of revelations, for the way we see the world is never really how the world is. Collect enough revelations and you learn to take what people tell you at face value. People have funny beliefs about everything from political or religious affiliation to the subjectivity of the officiating at sporting events. Waking up to the truth in the world requires humility. We all think we’ve got it all figured out. Often what we figure out is that we didn’t really have anything figured out.

      There’s been a plethora of articles in business publications recently about The Great Resignation. Millions of people decided to leave their jobs and to leap into another or just get out of the rat race entirely. I know a few of these people, and easily understand their desire to change things up. Millions of people looked around and said, “This can’t be my purpose here, can it?” They finally saw that it wasn’t all this and that.

      Every day offers an opportunity to review all those things we think we have figured out. All those beliefs we cling to. Every day offers an opportunity to change it all. But it also presents an opportunity to celebrate what we have. Isn’t that something?

    • Live in the Open-Mindedness

      I live in the open mindedness
      of not knowing enough
      about anything.
      — Mary Oliver, Luna

      There’s a liberation in knowing your limitations in this world. Understanding what you don’t know offers a fork in the road to either learn more or move on and embrace your ignorance. Which we choose is determined by who we want to be, or who we must be.

      I was presented a wine list by a waiter during a team dinner at a high end restaurant. Scanning the list, I quickly found the familiar wines. And hundreds of wines I’d never heard of before, each categorized in general groupings based on the region of the world they came from. Determined to try something new, I welcomed the sommelier who quickly rattled off a few questions that brought us to a bottle. The sommelier and I each met that fork in the road at different points in time. Sometime in his past he embraced learning about each of those hundreds of bottles. When I reached that same fork he was right there to guide me. And every other name and region on that extensive list faded away from my mind.

      Not knowing enough about anything and knowing just enough about something aren’t so different. Being open-minded about experiencing what the world brings you offers opportunity. Experience develops the confidence to accept what you’ll never know.

    • Floating Across Time

      Now I’m a reader of the night sky
      And a singer of inordinate tunes.
      That’s how I float across time
      Living way past my prime
      Like a long lost baby’s balloon.
      — Jimmy Buffett, Coastal Confessions

      Time flies, and we all go along for the ride. The question everyone asks is how long will the ride be? Fair, but I think the better question is, will I be enjoying the ride to the end? Put another way, how do we get there without the wheels coming off during the trip?

      It begins with a sharp mind, and diverse interests. We must find things to do with our time that excite us, make us want to leap out of bed and get to it. I’ve never understood the snooze button, though I love a good night’s sleep. Rest is important–I don’t need any reason for my mind to fog up. When dementia runs in your family, you think about nutrition, exercise and rest more than you might otherwise. Fully living to the end involves being fully aware of yourself and the world when you get there.

      Those pillars of good health, nutrition, exercise and rest are the foundation that carry us through the ups and downs of life. When you don’t feel good you can’t fully live. I’ve seen too many examples of health letting someone down just as they set out to finally “live”. What we do today matters tomorrow: Each workout matters. Each bite matters. Each day is a building block. Each should be vibrant, challenging, consistent and fun.

      You might think writing about fitness and nutrition means that I’m consistent with each. That would be ridiculous. I’m doing the best I can like most people. When it comes to pillars, two out of three ain’t bad. Three is a very good day. Try to keep the streak alive and do it all again tomorrow. Break the streak? Start a new one. It’s the trend that counts, not the individual highs and lows.

      We’re floating across time together. Wondering about the end is fair, but focusing on keeping the wheels from falling off goes beyond wondering. It’s actionable. It seems a worthy goal to work on our daily pillars. If we can influence our quality of life while maybe extending it a bit longer, shouldn’t we try?

    • The Benefit of Being Lost

      Lately I’ve doubled down on getting lost. Now, I understand that deliberately putting yourself into a place where you’re lost might seem counterintuitive and odd. But the thing about being lost is it forces you to find your way out, and this is where learning takes place.

      Case in point: I dove into the deep end with learning languages, doubling down on French and German (!) and forcing myself further beyond my comfort zone with each. I’d been doing the bare minimum with French for a couple of years, never really proceeding beyond “Je m’appelle John. Je suis un homme. Où est le toilette?” Barely functional and not exactly conversational.

      Something triggered me to dive deeper into lost. With French it was a lingering dissatisfaction with scratching the surface of feminine and masculine terminology, never diving into the nitty gritty because I stuck with the bare minimum to check the box for the day. With German, well, I booked a trip to Austria and Germany and forced my hand to figure it out.

      The only way to truly learn a language is to immerse yourself in it. That’s true for a foreign language or the language of your craft. Want to understand the world of finance or a testing laboratory? Immerse yourself in that world and learn the world of pie charts or pipettes. Want to know how to build a house? Join a crew and start hauling lumber. Every apprentice begins completely lost in the world they’ve immersed themselves in. But then something funny happens—your hand is forced and you slowly, awkwardly begin to learn. We’ve all experienced this in school and in our earliest days after graduating and beginning careers. But then we get comfortable and stop challenging ourselves. We stop getting lost. And in our comfort we stop growing.

      Taking the easy path slowly kills our learning and kills us in the process. Comfort kills our brains. Kills our dreams. Kills any momentum for big leaps and dramatic turns. In nature we grow or we die, there is no stasis. Yet so many seek stasis.

      Maybe diving deeper into a couple of languages doesn’t quite equate to growing or dying. But then again, maybe it does. Challenging our own status quo begins with making ourselves uncomfortable now and then. It begins with stumbling through challenges and finding our way out of it. As with physical fitness, growth comes from stress. There are benefits to being lost. For in being lost we may find our way.