Alexandersmap

    Category: Travel

    • Thin Walls

      Contemplating the snoring of the person in the room next to mine, I appreciate the consistently good hotels I usually stay in. Not expensive, mind you, but clean, friendly and generally built with thicker walls and floors. This one is old school independent, built economically – I’m guessing – in the 1980’s. The comforter I peeled off looked to be an original. The television, which shall remain dark, doesn’t owe them anything. Yeah, this place was new when Huey Lewis was cranking out hits.

      I’ve stayed in some dive hotels and motels before; from the run down to the truly gross. This isn’t one of those. The owners keep it clean, it just shows it’s age a bit. In this era of Airbnb and chain hotels it’s a throwback to another time. Yelp and other such online review sites has made it less of a mystery what you’re walking into, but I’ve found most people who write negative reviews need to be filtered out. Find the average and go with it. For me, if a room is clean, I received a warm welcome when checking in and the environment is safe you’re already at 3 1/2 stars.

      Ultimately we’re spoiled by the relative luxury we live in. Who am I to complain about the choice of bread in a free continental breakfast? I’m trying to cut down on carbs anyway. I’m well aware of how lucky I am to live here, at this time, with a great job and good health. Most of us have more than enough. I will eat today; that’s more than many can say. Thin walls just remind you that there’s other traveling souls out there, and I learned many years ago to always bring ear plugs.

      “Choose not to be harmed — and you won’t feel harmed. Don’t feel harmed — and you haven’t been.” – Marcus Aurelius

    • The Road Less Travelled: Route 20

      Route 20 runs from the Atlantic Ocean to within a mile of the Pacific Ocean in Oregon. I’ve been on various sections of this route over the years, but my favorite stretch may just be in Upstate New York. The highway snakes along rolling hills, dipping into valleys and small towns along the way. Stunningly beautiful in places, sadly distressed poverty in others, but always interesting.

      In autumn the views can be breathtaking, but it’s always good to remember you’re zipping along at highway speeds with nothing to keep you from a terminal velocity head-in crash but a double yellow line. 55 plus 55 is a bad equation for traveling souls. Yeah… Right lane travel is preferable. It’s not like the roads are jammed out here. Go to Charlton, Massachusetts and you’ll see many white crosses on Route 20 marking tragic endings to road trips. Less so here, not because the road doesn’t present the same risk, but because there simply aren’t as many cars. Another reason to prefer this stretch of this long road.

      Highways cross-cross the landscape, transforming the communities they pass through in the process. Some communities win, some lose; It’s all depends on how you look at it. Fuel the economy or retain the character of your small town? Choices… Route 20 was once the major east-west route across the northern tier of the United States, until the parallel, more efficient I-90 diverted traffic. There’s a lot to be said for a steady speed limit ride across long distances, and I-90, for a price, offers efficient high speed. But you lose the local flavor of the land. Driving will never give you everything, but it gives you more the more you slow down. Slowing down (at least a little) gets more interesting to me as I get older.

    • Ghost Dancers in the Wild

      We’re all borrowing time, and the ground we stand on too. How many people passed through the spot you’re occupying now? And what was their story? That’s history, and you either dance with the ghosts or ignore them. I like to dance with the ghosts – bring them back to life for awhile. Perhaps they’ll welcome me warmly when I reach the other side.

      Yesterday I had a business lunch with a couple of consultants in Boston. After the usual talk of feature enhancements and product roadmap one of the consultants mentioned his drive from Lake George to Quebec City, and suddenly we’re all pulling out our phones comparing pictures of various forts we’ve visited. Were we the hippest table at Row 34 that day? No doubt. But it’s nice to run into people who know the lay of the land as well, or better, than you do.

      I stopped by the Bourne Historical Center recently as a follow-up to a visit I made to the Aptucxet Trading Post Museum a few weeks back. Both are places to meet other history geeks, and places where you can talk openly about King Philip’s War without the listener backing away slowly. Ghost dancers aren’t always easy to spot in the wild, but corral us in a museum and we open right up.

      Aptucxet was missing one artifact that brought me eventually to the Bourne Historical Center. Specifically, a rock. History is all sticks and stones and the occasional cannon, isn’t it? No, it’s the stories behind those things. It’s always the stories, the rest of this stuff just helps you see it better.

      Anyway, that rock. The Bourne Stone. A piece of granite engraved with markings (pictographs) sometime before the 1650’s. Was it some kid with time on their hands scratching pictures on a rock or some ancient wisdom being passed down to us in a language lost to history? Who knows? But there’s a story in that rock, from the person who marked it to the threshold it once occupied at a Native American meetinghouse and the many people who have stepped on it, touched it and speculated on its meaning ever since.

      I’m no archeologist, but I found it interesting enough to stop by for a look. Maybe the sailboat engraved on the stone captured my attention, or maybe I have a thing for questions with no answer. Whatever it is, I’ve checked a box that’s been nagging me a bit. The mystery of the Bourne Stone for me was solved. What is it? What does it look like? The stories behind it I leave for other ghost dancers.

    • Dancing after the Dragons

      “How could we be capable of forgetting the old myths that stand at the threshold of all mankind, myths of dragons transforming themselves at the last moment into princesses?  Perhaps all dragons in our lives are really princesses just waiting to see us just once being beautiful and courageous.  Perhaps everything fearful is basically helplessness that seeks our help.” – Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

      The Ninth Wave is a painting by Ivan Aivazovsky on display at the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, Russia.  I stood in front of it 30 years ago and it stays with me still.  There are two paintings from that visit that keep coming back to mind, the other being Henri Matisse’s The Dance.  Both are stunning when you stand in front of them and immerse yourself in them.  Google both and look at the images that come up, and you’ll see a wide range of colors, from vibrant primary to muted mixed colors.  There’s nothing like seeing each in person, where it literally washes right over you and you swim and dance with the subjects in the paintings.

      I’ve got a bucket list of art and architecture that I hope to see in my lifetime.  I only have to reconcile the images I see in a book or online to know that there’s nothing like seeing the real thing.  Travel gives you that gift.  And more than seeing The Ninth Wave or The Dance in my mind, I see the entire picture of that time.  Babushkas sternly looking at college kids to make sure we weren’t taking flash photography or crossing past the ropes.  Black market traders trying to swap blue jeans for assorted USSR military stuff.  Seeing Cuban soldiers for the first time when we visited the Aurora (As a Cold War kid being in the Soviet Union and seeing Cuban soldiers was heady stuff).  Such is the richness of world travel; Seeing the world as it is and not some portrayal on a screen.

      I may never get back to St. Petersburg, but I would surely go to the Hermitage again and re-visit these two masterpieces.  I’ve changed quite a lot in 30 years, and so has St. Petersburg and Russia.  When I visited I was a college kid visiting a city with a different name in a country with a different name at the height of Glasnost, which would inevitably wipe Leningrad and the USSR names off the maps in favor of what once was and is again.  The enormity of the changes we’ve seen in the last 30 years cannot be understated.  And we’re in the middle of massive change still.  What will the next 30 years bring?  I hope I’m around to report on it.

      The image of that dragon in Rilke’s quote above brought to my mind The Ninth Wave.  This is the moment when the subjects in the painting are either driven to their deaths under the sea or they find salvation. Aivazovsky leaves it for us to interpret how it ends.  The optimist in me sees the brightening sky shining light through the wave.    Have the courage to hold on just a bit longer and things will get better.  Rise to the challenges of the moment and turn that dragon into a princess.  30 years ago it was Glasnost and Tiananmen Square.  Today it’s Climate Change, the rise of political extremism and the Hong Kong protests.  Is this the Ninth Wave?

      The optimist in me sees a positive future, and eventually the scarcity mentality that leads to extremism and greed giving way to a better world.  The report that showed the dramatic decrease in child mortality is a good example of how the world is getting better.  I’m well aware of the dragons in this world, and a little light shining through the storm clouds doesn’t mean the wave isn’t going to crash down on you.  But I see the joyful dancers of Mattise waiting for us if we can only have the courage to find the princess and join in.  What will we do to get us there?

    • A Day at the New Hampshire Highland Games

      This weekend the New Hampshire Highland Games take place at Loon Mountain in Lincoln. Want to feel like you’re in the Scottish Highlands in America? Go to Lincoln. The games seem to grow more popular every year, now a 3-day event peaking in popularity on Saturday. Saturdays bring a crush of people soaking up all that is Scottish culture, sampling whiskey, buying kilts and t-shirts, watching the games and the pipers, listening to lectures and traditional music, and of course eating; eating fish and chips, haggis, meat pies and the like.

      Advice for anyone going: Friday and Sunday are less crowded and less expensive. Purchase tickets in advance and bring cash. Both help you avoid long lines for those using plastic to enter. Almost everything is cash only, so come with plenty. The ATM line was as long as the beer line, and three machines were down to one for a time as they struggled to keep with demand. And by all means get there early! The lines to get on a shuttle bus were extremely long. From parking my car Saturday morning (when admittedly I got a late start) to when I finally entered the games was just north of an hour. As with the ATM’s, the shuttle buses struggled to keep up with the hordes of people. Get there as early as possible!

      The New Hampshire Highland Games are spectacular, and no surprise it grows in popularity every year. Blessed with good weather, I soaked as much as possible (lot happening this weekend and I only had the one day). Waiting in lines is a requirement, but simply staking a claim on the ski slope and watching the caber toss and stone press was easy enough, and wildly fun. The crowd roared when Steve Schmidt set a world record in the stone press, and was abuzz when the announcer pointed out a bear passing by further up the slope. The crowd was here for a good time and they found it. And so did I.

      In just over a month I’ll be visiting Scotland for a week. Thats not nearly enough time to see everything, but it just means I’ll have to go back. The Highland Games were a good primer for that trip, but they certainly stand on their own as a must-do event. I’m already planning for a return next year.

    • I Mourn for the Undiscovered

      Up early, reading some Robert Frost poetry I don’t remember reading before.  I’m mesmerized by a line and read on.  I get like this.

      Millions of songs on iTunes, and I’ve barely scratched the surface of what’s out there despite a lifetime focus on music.  I’ve spent huge chunks of my time exploring new music, Shazam’ing songs in loud bars and quiet coffee café and back in the day hanging out in used record stores in Harvard Square trying to find that one gem, that magical song.  And I’ve found many over the years.  Eclectic collection perhaps, but dammit, interesting.

      A bucket list of places to see, and slowly I chip away at it.  My list grows shorter, not because I don’t want to go to all the other places, but because I want to focus on the specific few.  Linger in special places, like listening to a song over and over until you really know it.  Instead of trying to chase everything in a spin of futility.  No, not that.  Give me Thoreau at Walden or Hemingway in Key West.  Or Frost in Derry.  I’ve visited each of these places and understand the power of immersion it had on them.

      I mourn for the undiscovered songs, poems, books and places.  The conversation you never had with a grandparent.  The sunrise you slept through, the lonely beach you didn’t stroll on in winter, the ridge line you didn’t cross, the Northern Lights that danced unseen, the big city that woke up without you, the swims in bracingly cold water and salt on the tongue that you’ll never taste; the places you’ll never be.

      We can’t be everywhere of course.  But I’ll do my best to be present in this moment at least.  Tomorrow will come and I hope to see it.  But don’t mourn for losing today if I should get there.

    • Boston’s Changing Seaport

      When you walk, or worse, drive through Boston’s Seaport area you see an explosive leap to the sky (capped by height restrictions from nearby Logan Airport). At the same time every inch of available real estate is being gobbled up in a feeding frenzy of leveraged transactions. All this construction encroaches on the roads, closing sidewalks and lanes, wiping out parking lots and small businesses. What grows is beautiful and modern, if challenging to navigate in the short term.

      The seaport used to be desolate 30 years ago. Cross over Fort Point Channel and…. not much. An active seaport to be sure, and fishing piers, a seldom-used Hynes Convention Center, a few restaurants but not much else. Talk of the Red Sox and Patriots opening a shared sports complex blew up in political opposition. But then the Federal Courthouse opened up, with prime water views. A larger Massachusetts Convention Center opened along with an outdoor concert venue popped up. Then Legal Seafoods opened a large restaurant and there was wind in the sails. And suddenly the floodgates opened up.

      Today the Seaport is madness, thriving and accelerating in growth. High end steakhouses, trendy beer gardens, hotels and mixed-use buildings everywhere. The only thing they neglected was open public space and the infrastructure to support the crush of people commuting in and out. Surely there’s a grand plan for that, but honestly it seems the city is just winging it on mass transit and the roads.

      I finish this post still in the Seaport, but now at Trillium Brewing Company. An IPA and a pause before driving home. Wait out the traffic and get out of dodge. But [please] don’t do it under the influence of an IPA. There’s plenty of business in the Seaport, but New Hampshire and home calls. But perhaps a 4-pack to bring home with me… call it a souvenir if you will.

    • Move to Live

      “To be human is to be on the move, pursuing something, after something. We are like existential sharks: we have to move to live.” James K. A. Smith

      Early start today, and my routine was subsequently turned upside down. Writing and exercise were postponed for commuting and work tasks. And so be it, here I am writing, and the exercise will happen this evening instead. We all need a little agility to effectively navigate life’s twists and turns.  If I look back on this summer, I’ll say I regret not swimming more, not hiking more, not taking more late night star gazing walks….  but also not meeting with more customers, not writing more, not reading more.  I do something, but I could do more.

      It all counts. Do more. Keep moving forward or we atrophy and die. Existential sharks… moving to live.  Write the book, start the business, ask for the date, take on the project, take the chance today on something bolder than you might have done yesterday.  Fortune favors the bold, after all.

      “Make mistakes of ambition and not mistakes of sloth.” – Machiavelli

      James Clear highlighted this Machiavelli quote in his weekly newsletter and it hit me like jumping into a cold lake early in the morning (something I’ve been known to do):  Boom!  You’ve got my attention!  I’ve made many mistakes of sloth over the years – we all have, but use Machiavelli’s advice and choose your mistakes wisely.

      “Some say risk nothing, try only for the sure thing,
      Others say nothing gambled nothing gained,
      Go all out for your dream.
      Life can be lived either way, but for me,
      I’d rather try and fail, than never try at all, you see.

      Some say “Don’t ever fall in love,
      Play the game of life wide open,
      Burn your candle at both ends.”
      But I say “No! It’s better to have loved and lost,
      Than never to have loved at all, my friend.”

      When many moons have gone by,
      And you are alone with your dreams of yesteryear,
      All your memories will bring you cheer.
      You’ll be satisfied, succeed or fail, win or lose,
      Knowing the right path you did choose.”

      – William F. O’Brien, “Better To Try And Fail Than Never To Try At All”

      Well, there it is; Go all out for your dream.  ’tis better to try and fail than never try at all.  Make the mistake of action instead of the mistake of sloth. Keep moving forward. Be an existential shark already.

    • Flight Delays and a Dose of 80’s Arena Rock

      Strobe lights probed the crack in the curtains, finding my eyes. Loud rumble of thunder found the ears shortly after. A glance at the clock confirms what I feared. 1:14 AM and under two hours until the alarm on my phone is set to go off. 2:54 and various atttempts at sleep, meditation and mental math have carried me to the inevitable and I was up before the alarm. I’d switched to a morning flight when the evening flight delays and cancellations started stacking up, grabbing a room at a Doubletree I’ve spent too many nights in over the years.

      Too early for the airport. I know this. But the alternative is to toss around in bed trying to squeeze an hour more sleep out of the night. Not me. So I shuttle over to the airport with a crew of Spirit Airlines talkers listening to which airports have quiet places to sleep when your flight plans get blown up. Finally in the airport, too early for TSA Pre-Check, but with only 12 people in front of me who cares? The guy in front of me, that’s who. We all handle sleep deprivation differently. In the morning, no matter the sleep pattern, I simply don’t care about slight affronts to my Pre-Check ego.

      Gliding my carry-on through the airport I try to avoid waking up the nappers trapped in the airport. If I had a restless sleep in my hotel they surely have more to say. I won’t be the one to wake them up. Looking out at the sheets of rain rolling down the glass punctuated by heat lightning I wonder if I should have just stayed at the hotel. Flight is still listed as on time, and all I have is optimism and a healthy dose of hope that this flight goes as planned.

      Talking heads on CNN analyze last night’s debate. My noise canceling headphones barely overcome the volume of the speakers blasting through the waiting areas. I count my blessings again for getting a hotel room. This trip on balance is still positive, but it’s also another vote for less business travel. Time is fleeting, and this is no way to spend it.

      “Be still my heart; thou hast known worse than this.” – Homer

      I revisit this Homer quote at times when optimism wanes. That hasn’t happened just yet but I have it at the ready. The other is “This too shall pass”. And it will, so I roll with the changes, like that REO Speedwagon song, which sounds like the perfect choice to drown out debate talk right about now. And just like that the pulse quickens just enough. It’s going to be a good day.

      And then before I know it we’re at 34,000 feet and things look brighter. Things do pass, given time and patience. I keep reminding myself of that, and the world keeps reinforcing it in return.

    • Early Morning on Navy Pier

      East Ohio Street leads right to Lake Michigan, as so many other roads in Chicago do. This road ends at a tunnel under North Shore Drive into Jane Addams Memorial Park and the Navy Pier beyond. As with most things, being out on the water a bit changes your perspective of the world, and on my last morning in Chicago I finally got out there.

      The city was shaking off some overnight rain, and fog was descending quickly as the sun rose. In that brief window I caught a glimpse of sunrise, appreciated the good fortune and took in the waking Navy Pier. Boats all docked, restaurants all closed, just the joggers, dog walkers, construction workers and me. And one tractor driving noisily by on its way out to the end of the pier. I grumbled to myself about the noise until I looked up and realized what he was doing. There’s a row of flags at the end of Navy Pier, and all were at half staff to commemorate the anniversary of 9/11. This gentleman was riding out to raise the flags. I caught up to him as he was completing the raising of the first, paused for a moment and moved on. There was a lot of “where were you” talk yesterday, and it was interesting to hear how people from around the country took in the events of that day.

      Making the turn and heading back to the hotel the fog began to swallow buildings. There’s beauty in fog too, and I took in Chicago from this perspective. Beautiful city and a joy to behold. Reflection time over, its time to move ahead with the day.