Leonidas recently showed us his drive to work. Dodsonj also said “You show me yours, I’ll show you mine.” So I am showing you my drive to work.

Leonidas lives in the Industrial North. I, having grown up in the Urban West, have lived all my adult life in the Rural South, and have never been to the Industrial North at all, so I found it very interesting. #2 son has warned me, however, not to show you any street signs or recognizable landmarks, just in case. “It’s a question of privacy,” he said sententiously. And of course he is right. He knows a lot of xangans. If they ever found out that he was the subject of cute stories on the internet, he would never hear the end of it. Herewith, then, my entirely incognito drive to work.

This is the corner of the road I live on.

 

 

Here is the first road that I drive on after turning that corner.

 

 

Here is the next road.

 

 

Here I am approaching the intersection. I don’t turn again until I turn into the driveway at work.

 

 

And here is my walk to work. I go the other direction from when I drive, because when I get to the end of the road, I will walk through the gap in my neighbor’s fence.

 

There’s the gap. This is a kind neighbor, who allows all the neighborhood kids and walkers to take this shortcut.

 

 

And yes, it is a shortcut through a cemetery. All the neighborhood kids can get to one another’s houses without crossing a road or walking on a busy street, because all the roads end up here. They radiate out from it, as from a hub.

It is quite a pleasant cemetery, as long as you are not creeped out by cemeteries in general.

 

Here I return to the road, and the rest of my walk is the same as my drive.

 

 

Except that you notice different things when walking than when driving. I really love these frogs. I think there used to be lions there, but these folks have a sense of humor and changed them.

 And when walking, I definitely notice when I get to the top of the hill, here, and start back down again. I live in a very hilly place, and all roads go up and down. This is important for me because I suffer from a slight case of agoraphobia (the opposite of claustrophobia). In some people, this is a debilitating condition that causes them to be unable to leave their homes, but for me it is just a nervousness in flat, open places. My children know that there are some roads I can’t drive on without experiencing panic, and I guess that if I had been born in Kansas or someplace like that, I would have been a very neurotic person, but fortunately I escaped that fate.

So, what do you say? Will you show us your walk or drive to work or school?