I come from a long line of walkers. My family walks to think, to discuss hard or happy matters, to make decisions, to celebrate nature and, of course, to get places.
Some of my earliest memories are of charging down the paths of San Mateo Central Park in California with Wilda, my paternal grandmother. We entered the park via a gate behind her apartment building, and perhaps because of this proximity — or maybe it was just the times — we never changed our clothes to go into nature. Wilda, who insisted on being called by her given name, wore her gray wool pencil skirt, pearls and pumps; I wore my Mary Janes.
Wilda walked in long, energetic steps and, as a child of 5 or 6, I had to skip beside her to keep pace. It was worth it because she had a wonderful knowledge of songbirds and plants, and a long, amusing narrative of all she could see poured from her as she strode along. She told me more than once that I, too, should try to learn the names of all the wild things. “It will make your world bigger,” she’d say.
Imagine looking into a crowd of people, seemingly strangers, and seeing the face of an old friend come into focus. I think that’s how Wilda looked into her neighborhood park. “Look,” she’d say, “the yellow rhododendrons are finally blooming. Don’t touch, very sticky. Oh, there’s the rotten scrub jay that’s been harassing my hummingbirds. On the ranch, my mother used to shoot them with a potato gun. We don’t shoot birds, Susan, but I really am half-tempted. I’m told this fig tree is over 200 years old — it came all the way from Australia … .”
My grandfather John also loved Central Park, but our walks together were less rambling, our conversations less focused on the nature around us — though we stopped to appreciate it. He talked about the goings on at his ophthalmology office, where he specialized in fitting contacts to odd-shaped eyeballs. He recounted, in great detail, the plots of books and operas. Sometimes, he whistled entire arias or an Ella Fitzgerald tune. Sometimes, John said very little at all. I didn’t mind. He’d buy us ice cream cones, and they made the silence companionable as we walked the length of the park, stopping at our favorite bits.
[Appeared in Finding Nature News.]
Pagani & Co. 