{"id":210,"date":"2017-04-02T15:08:42","date_gmt":"2017-04-02T15:08:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.juliannathibodeaux.com\/?p=210"},"modified":"2017-04-02T15:08:42","modified_gmt":"2017-04-02T15:08:42","slug":"life-in-boston","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juliannathibodeaux.com\/?p=210","title":{"rendered":"Life in Boston"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>The following is a glimpse into a day spent in the city not long after we moved to the Boston area, a return for me after decades living in the Midwest. I have enjoyed reacquainting myself with this beloved place\u2014a process that continues nearly three years later.<\/em>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Morning started at 50 degrees and quickly moved up into the 60s and then broke 70 by noon. I had brought along my flip-flops, hoping against the October chill that the prediction of warmer temps wasn\u2019t a lie, and I would be able to switch out my suede knee-high clunker boots for the scantier footwear, and it looked like I was in luck.<\/p>\n

What was the reason for my urban adventure? Turns out this was our first tradition in Massachusetts since moving here summer of \u201914: take-your-kids-to-work day at my husband\u2019s employer in Cambridge. I, on the other hand, having just begun a newish part-time \u201cmom hours\u201d job to supplement my creative writing and teaching, took the day off to spend the day city-side\u2014and, I hoped, get some writing done.<\/p>\n

So we rose at our usual school-day time on this sunny Columbus Day, rushing through consumed-at-the-counter zucchini bread punctuated by verbal pushing from the parents to get the two girls out the door, neither one happy about the early departure on a holiday. We make it to the train station in plenty of time\u2014if only because the train is running late\u2014and have a few minutes to breathe on the platform as we wait for the train to screech into view from Salem.<\/p>\n

As always, the train ride itself is a swift 25 minutes, easy with banter and window-gazing. The morning sun casts shards of light onto the water as we wheel through derelict industrial areas and swampy tidal flats before reaching the river, the Tobin Bridge arcing overhead, and into North Station. On this day the train is not packed, but with a Boston Bruins game brewing that afternoon at the adjoining TD Garden, the station is abuzz with sagging jeans, sneakers, and backwards baseball caps with the iconic spoked black-and-brown \u201cB.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the train cruises to the end of the line in a clickety-clack woosh, we line up in the aisle, my 8-year-old announcing \u201cI love walking in the train while it\u2019s moving.\u201d This, of course, suggests a great deal of experience doing just that; and while we\u2019re relatively new to this adventure of train riding to and from our new home city, she\u2019s taken to it like a little pro.<\/p>\n

$\"\"$ <\/a><\/p>\n

We leave the station stage right so my husband can take the girls via bus to Cambridge; soon after, I head to the left to find a coffee shop, ending up at Boston Common Coffee on Canal Street, strictly by accident. I order a vegan bagel sandwich and take a seat. As often happens when I\u2019m in the city, there\u2019s too much static for me to write anything of depth\u00a0or profundity. All I can manage is a brief and dull description of where I am at the moment.<\/p>\n

Giving up on penning anything meaningful, I give up and start my three-mile trek across town to the Museum of Fine Arts. While on foot, still in my clunky boots, I make the mistake of returning a call to my mother and proceed to get quite lost\u2014ending up in China Town amongst the chatter of spoken and written mandarin and cameras slung about the necks of slight men with salt and black pepper hair wearing loosely fitting windbreakers. China Town feels like an alternate universe. I stand out as a non-Asian amongst high-heel clad young women with glistening onyx hair, older women with short cropped or piled grey hair shuffling past in embroidered slippers. Despite the sushi and sashimi signs everywhere, not a fishy smell is to be discerned, just the intoxicating odor of baked goods wafting\u00a0from pastry shops.<\/p>\n

I push\u00a0on through the same intersections I\u2019d passed moments ago\u2014retracing my once over-confident steps back to where I first took a wrong turn. Finally I find\u00a0the right path, turning at Copley Square and its famed russet church with tourists clumped in front as the guide waxes on about Boston history. Now I can\u00a0reach out to my college-age daughter, having spoken with Mom already, this time sure I won\u2019t\u00a0get lost. I\u2019ve been down this road before.<\/p>\n

After I find\u00a0my way to the MFA, logging more than 4 miles when it should have been 3, I see\u00a0that the Rembrandt and Vermeer exhibition is\u00a0on view\u2014it had just opened the day before\u2014so I decide to take a look. And that\u2019s all I can manage: the crowds, the frenetic energy carried over from downtown Boston into the museum, is\u00a0just too much for me to process in my tired brain. So after an hour and a half I find\u00a0my way to REI on an errand for my husband who is\u00a0in need of a new helmet to go with\u00a0his commuter bike.<\/p>\n

From here I begin the walk back: this time a bit more sure of my footing, pulling out the flip-flops after stuffing my clunker boots into the bag with the helmet. I happily flip-flop across Boston on Boylston Street passing the New England Conservatory, Berklee School of Music, Back Bay shops and restaurants, and Beacon Street neighborhood, finally arriving at Boston Common where a foot race is underway: I look for the break and jog into it, computer and REI bags slapping on my shoulder. I make my way through the park with the scattering of other folks\u2014those who have finished the race flushed with exertion, mothers and grandparents pushing strollers, homeless snoozing on park benches, burka-clad women in clusters, sneakered teenagers in spandex\u2014and find my way back to the North End.<\/p>\n

I cruise past the West End branch of the Boston Public Library, the Government Center, and then past TD Garden to my second Boston Common Coffee Shop of the day\u2014this one in North End. This is where I sit now, contemplating the city and its many travelers: shoppers and sightseers, businessmen and businesswomen, park regulars, music students lugging their ubiquitous black cases, parents herding their children through the city on their school holiday. I may not have accomplished what I set out to accomplish, but I did enjoy the show: Life in Boston.<\/p>\n<\/body>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"