Hiding in Plain Sight

I took a walk at lunchtime today, still exploring in my new work neighborhood. I had an errand to run and needed to pick up something to eat (which I really have to stop doing because it is pricey in this neighborhood!), and I wanted to get some steps in.

My new work neighborhood isn’t completely unknown to me. It has, however, always been an area of the city that I’ve passed through, not an area that was a destination. So it’s good to find out what’s here (a branch of my comic book store!) and what’s missing (I still haven’t found the post office!)

When I’d been walking about 15 minutes, I knew I needed to head back so I could set up for my next meeting. I wasn’t quite ready to be inside, however, so I decided to add a little time to my walk with a crosstown loop — a crosstown block to the east, a couple of blocks down to my street, and then another crosstown block to get me to my office. And then I decided to tack another crosstown loop onto my original loop … which was when I remembered that there is a secret neighborhood right near my office.

“Secret” is a silly way to describe it, maybe, but still feels accurate. If you aren’t paying attention, you can wander into this neighborhood and suddenly realize you are walking in an elevated area, and yet you haven’t walked up a hill to get there. When you looked down the block, it looked like every other block, and yet it leaves you in this not-at-all-like-every-other-block place. And then you realize that the street you’re walking on doesn’t just go straight through to the next avenue the way you expected it to but dead-ends, so you have no choice but to turn in a place where there shouldn’t be a street … and yet, there is one. And then you descend — a for-real descent, down a long staircase — to the neighborhood you’d thought you were going to find when you started your bit of wandering.

I’ve been in this neighborhood before, and it always catches me by surprise. How did it get there? Why was it made in this weird part-of/set-apart-from way?

It made for a nice walk today, adding close to 2,000 steps to my day’s total. And I was reminded that it has a very nice little park where I might start going with my lunch now that the weather is turning to spring!

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