The East, part 3: All Around the Town

Here is the third installment of What I Did on My Vacation: Out and About.

I am not much for mamas running themselves ragged, schlepping their kids to every kind of lessons possible. But when the little school, the YMCA and the dance studio are all within three blocks of home, how can you resist?

So here we go, following the kid around town:

Reminding you once more about the low and stormy light (it’s been raining since we got here) and the fact that I am far, far away from my beloved Photoshop –

This is not Frazz’ usual teacher evidently, but she was so great with the two boys in her class, I really fell in love with her.  The cool thing about this Y is that they have a cool family locker room – and the lockers are small, low to the ground and a nice, brilliant blue.  We were just walking in from the parking lot when I picked up the scent of indoor pool, and I was taken right back to Inglewood and my own years of swimming at the Y.

Kicking like a champ.  Wearing what they evidently call “the bubble.”  Adam, there off to the left, is sporting a noodle.  When I was a kid, they gave you a shove and a kick board.

HA!  Here’s the kickboard part.  But WE never got the teacher as a propeller.  We had to do it all ourselves, uphill both ways.

Frazz actually does way better just sticking his face into the water and paddling away on all fours.

This tree was stuck in a non-descript corner, just off the parking lot.  These clear yellow leaves against the wet black trunk.

Three leaves, on the way home from the Frog.

This is Frazz’ little school.  Actually, it’s a church, The Community Church.  It’s a beautiful building, very traditional inside down to that smell of religion you find in the ancient Norman structures in England.  Perhaps it’s the smell of large spaces and ancient basements, of waxed woodwork and stone and prayer.  The school is in the basement and has its own door, flanked by a Guernsey painted milk box.

The school itself is full of light, festooned with child art and interesting, educational things.  That day, the kids had worked at making pickles for the family feast, a couple of weeks away.  Frazz was praised heartily for cucumber cutting, and evidently ate a significant number of slices even before they’d hit the dill brine.

A good many of the churches here – and there are many, many churches here, most of honorable and venerable age – have Norman towers.  I find this interesting, here in the home of the free and the brave. Especially when the churches they are attached to belong to Baptists.  Here is a Japanese maple (I think), flaming its last.

Frazz’ school-church has this wonderful window in the vast, dark chapel.  We were told that it is supposed to be a Tiffany.  The point at the top of the waterfall is magical, seeming to gather the light outside into a point that glows like a mellow sun.  The light from this window seems to spill down very directly on the alter below it, so that the chunky golden cross that sits on it glows as with life.

The side walls were all illuminated by stained glass panels, some seeming very old.  It was a lovely place. 

Going home from school.

Another maple.

At the roots of one of the ancient trees in the churchyard, just beside the sidewalk.  This place is rich with age – at least, for America it is.  And green things spring into spontaneous being here – moss on roots, tiny ferns in the hollows.

I keep finding myself thinking, “Man, this place looks just like Bend (OR).”  Then I think, “Well, no – really it looks like Kansas City because Bend looks like Kansas City.”  And then I finally realize that everything west of Albany pretty much looks just like this place, since this is where we started.  Even the row houses have charm, and the grace of other ages of time  show up in a montage of architectural  styles.  Shoot, I wish I’d been brought up in every house I see.

Here’s the deal – this casual spree of color; do the people here have time to do anything other than wandering their gorgeous streets in wonder?  If they were Japanese, they’d take the entire month of Autumn off.  (Yes, I know it’s not a month.)  Leaf gazing.  I could dedicate my life to it.

Part 4: Still More Adventures