Travel and culture
On a recent evening, H and I were walking home late from a night out. Walking home late — from a bar at our nearest square, the T station, a friend’s house, it doesn’t matter — on a winter evening means we were walking on cracked gray sidewalk, swaddled in jackets, gloved hands shoved in pockets, shoulders… Continue reading Drab: New England Winter Chic
In my last post, we talked about the surprisingly low amount of physical preparation required before starting on your first big bicycle tour. For me, one of the most important methods of preparation is to start cycling as much as possible — that’s all. In this post, I’ll discuss how to incorporate cycling into your… Continue reading How to Start Cycling Every Day
It seems crazy to say it in hindsight, but I really did wonder if I might see him. He lives in Hawaii and Cape Cod — makes a point of mentioning it in the little bios that appear under his byline, alongside a series of mugshots-through-the-ages in which the increasingly elderly author tries to convey his… Continue reading Paul Effing Theroux
It’s been three years since I last went home. Three long years in which my own blissful little life — romance, marriage, friendships, a loving family-in-law, testing the limits of “working from home,” outdoor adventures in the paradisiacal Pacific Northwest — has shone in ugly contrast with a plague-ridden civilization that feels like it’s shutting down, turning in on itself.
A few crucial ways to physically prepare your body for a long distance bicycle trip.
“We’re from Minnnn-eh-sOOOHta,” a woman explains. “It’s our third time. We love it here.” She looks like an experienced visitor: her sunhat and lurid, shoulder-covering mumu speak of one-too-many sunburns splashing across the pale expanses of her skin. She takes half a step towards her acquaintance, a younger Black man in a billowy white t-shirt.… Continue reading It Ends A The Water’s Edge
Early in the spring, H and I spent some time on the coast in northern Oregon. We did this every so often during our time in Seattle, and especially during the pandemic. We’d sneak our names onto the schedule and avail ourselves of the famous beach cabin. We’d drive down in the night, bringing work… Continue reading Take A Moment On The Oregon Coast
Friday Afternoon A sliver of a river slides beneath the rails and then we’re in Queens, floating over a great plain of brick row houses and tessellating backyards, little boxes of space framed by high fences. I love the train for its glimpses at unseen places: rooftops covered in broken glass, a hidden tag from… Continue reading Portals: Cycling From NYC to Boston
...And it knows it.
It took us eight days to cross the United States from end to end, speeding over prairies in our lozenge-shaped craft, floating inches above the tarmac of Interstate 90 on four rubber-bound air cushions. Washington was a rolling brown farmland they call the Palouse. Idaho was a brief, gorgeous jaunt across the panhandle: sapphire lakes… Continue reading Eight Days Across America