Charles and Lizzie

I realized today that I’ve lived very close to Boston for about a third of my life. For even less than a half percent of my life, I lived in London. But when I lived across the pond, I managed to determine every weekend to go out and find what made that city fascinating. I know the fact I had a deadline made the accomplishment of such ventures more immediate… but I’ve really… made no such attempt in my home city in ten years. Until today.

A beautiful April afternoon. I spent much of my Saturday in idle recuperation. No need to kill the momentum of last week with another twelve hours of sloth when the sky was blue, the air was just the right amount of warm, and the trees all over the city are in bloom. So what is a girl to do? Well, cross something off that list of one of these days, I’ll… take a walk around the Charles River.

I’ve walked along the river before. In college, one of my favorite walks was down JFK Street to cross the bridge… halfway. No need to go all the way to Boston. But it was the end point. One day a few years back I played hooky and walked from Boston Common across the Longfellow Bridge and back into the city in time for a movie. But never any sort of committed distance on those footpaths.

I passed so many runners and strollers on my way. So maybe this isn’t an altogether new pursuit, but I did have a ulterior motive as I went from Mt. Auburn Street in Cambridge to the Boston side all the way to Longfellow and back again. I took a camera with me and determined to collect the images I created when I wrote my novel.

The Charles River has many appearances in my novel. It is the setting for many important scenes… both as it is now and two hundred years ago when it was a marshy swamp. So I started from history, parking on Brattle Street, another important location. I snapped up photos of the historic houses and headed towards the river, not realizing that I had some couple thousand companions on the footpath walking for MS. Well, that was an unexpected detail… and challenge to photos I wanted to take of the river – and not of orange t-shirts. Still, it was inspiring to see so many donating their Sunday afternoon to a worthy cause. And wouldn’t you know? My old roommate (with whom I’ve had no contact for three years) was one of them. 

But I left their route when I crossed the river and made my way towards the Longfellow Bridge. The Boston side isn’t a thrilling walk until one gets to the Esplanade. But here we go with one of those, really, you’ve never been to that part of your backyard details. Yup. Never. Not once traipsed in front of the Hatch Shell. But I picked a perfect day for a first visit, with tree after tree exploding with blossoms. The wind picked up, shaking off those petals so it turned into a mystical cascade of color falling on the green grass. The Anne Shirley in me relished that visual splendor, clicking away on photos that had nothing to do with my novel.

Then I crossed the bridge and made a slight detour into Kendall Square for an iced tea and a smallish lunch. I confess the walk back was more a determination to make it to my car before my feet fell off. The sum total of that walk was probably nine miles. But there were more photos and a confirmation of how one very important scene could really work close to Central Square.

Overall, the walk confirmed the verisimilitude of my piece of fiction. But… beyond that photographic mission, it was the perfect day for a walk… and a reminder that there is so much within easy reach of my front door to appreciate.

I didn’t take my iPod. I carried a purse… but really… all I needed was my camera and some cash for that iced tea. Some day I would like to run this route… but walking along it with my camera gave me enough pause to stop and see the beauty of the wide, blue water and the daffodils haphazardly blooming along the banks… and a suspicious group of swans hanging out beneath a bridge. They were plotting something unfortunate, I swear.

So, I’m happy to know that what Lizzie saw through my creation is something any reader might find on a spring stroll along the river. But I’m going to bed tonight tired from a windswept nine miles and blissfully aware of what makes this city really quite breathtaking.