Long Walks On Leafy Streets

6/5/2016 Kansas Ave NE, Washington, DC.
Today is a lazy Sunday, as lazy as you could have when you have an infant baby. Yesterday we celebrated Prashant’s first birthday at Wheaton Regional Park. Through some luck we got the auditorium at the visitor center. It has tall, wide glass walls on one side facing a meadow and a small pond where many Canada geese seem to have taken residence with their little ones. We were blessed by the presence of family and friends, as many as we could afford to invite. A good friend of Nicole, Rev. Theresa, led the blessing ceremony and Prashant’s uncle Mike read some scripture. It was great to see the kids enjoy the park and the geese and playing with each other. I was happy that it was very environmentally friendly, including a couple of spots for charging electric vehicles in the parking lot. But at the end of it we were both exhausted especially Nicole who did most of the preparations while I took care of Prashant. So today we are trying to relax a little bit.

Speaking of electric car charging we got to do quite a bit of it last weekend. We went on our first real outing of the year, visiting Ocean City, MD. Our Nissan Leaf gets about 80 miles if you drive a mix of city and highway speeds, with some use of the air conditioning. Ocean city is about 140 miles, so one has to charge at least once. Unfortunately the main fast charging station is not quite at the halfway point and I didn’t want to depend on smaller stations where it might take longer. So after charging at the NRG supercharger at Queenstown, MD for about half an hour we decided to charge a second time in Rehoboth beach, about 20 miles from Ocean City. I missed a turn at one point and ended up driving an additional 5 miles or so, for a total of about 70 miles. We also had to use the air-conditioning some because it was hot. It was a bit nerve-wracking in the final ten or twenty miles as the battery kept draining, so we felt great relief when we pulled into the Tanger Outlet Mall in Rehoboth Beach and got the charger going. On the other hand our drive took us through mostly rural areas. We enjoyed passing by cows grazing on the grass near farms and driving on sleepy small town streets. Our hotel in Ocean City had a great view of a wetland area and you can see the picture on my flickr page. We had a good time there, albeit short because we ended up staying barely more than a day. On the way back the charging went more smoothly but the traffic was one of the worst I had encountered. Apparently this Memorial Day weekend record numbers of people were driving. We started from our hotel around 8 am and got home only around 7.30pm, although some of that time was spent at stops, either for charging or for shopping along the way. I would say in both directions our average speed was only 20 to 30 mph. Nevertheless it felt great to drive to Ocean City in our own car, that too without burning any gasoline.

It rained during most of our drive as it did during most of last week. But there were a few days when it felt like nature was cradling you in her embrace and caressing you gently. The sun shining but with a comfortable temperature and a gentle breeze in the air. Yet there is a certain beauty to rainy weather as well. Last Saturday I ran in a misty rain most of the way from my home to Dupont Circle, along Rock Creek Park, a distance of 8 miles. While stretching before starting the run on a nearby street I happened to stop and look at the green scenery in that gray cloudy afternoon. Suddenly it brought back to me memories of how fascinated I was by the beauty of the land here when I first arrived here. This new world feels so familiar now but only a few hundred years ago was all lush forests and rivers with Indian tribes living in harmony with nature. The run itself was one of the best I have done. I enjoyed the smell of the rain, what they call petrichor. I don’t know if it had something to do with the rain or the trees but it felt like there was more oxygen in the air and I could run faster. Perhaps I am just getting better at controlling my breathing, which really is about keeping a calm state of mind. For the first mile or so I saw nobody in the park. I enjoyed running by the swollen, muddy, rushing waters of the creek and the quiet leafy forest.

Although it was slightly warmer, it was similarly quiet last night when I ran 10 miles, finishing up with soda (!) and wasabi peas in Dupont circle (again), my favorite place to end long runs. I enjoy the place in all its variety -- the trees, the rats, the benches, the homeless guys, the alfresco chess games -- and maybe because of all the variety. When I was single ending a date on the benches of Dupont circle meant that things might work out. The last lady with whom I had such a date became, eventually, my partner for life. We were lucky we didn't encounter rats on that first date, though.

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