Murtaugh in Montréal

Last weekend I learned that I can't travel now the way I did when I was eight years younger.  That may sound silly and obvious, but it's been fairly upsetting to me.  Even before I left I thought--at the time rather jollily--that sometime after my first overnight bus I'd find myself repeating the famous words of Detective Murtaugh in "Lethal Weapon"; little did I realize how true they would prove to be when I was exhausted and hobbling around on astoundingly blistered soles.  Mostly I'm sorry about missing the opportunity to go shopping and buy souvenirs for people, and to look for this book in a used book shop (and in case you were wondering, it's not too late to get me a birthday present).  Rather than dwell on all that, I'll pretend that I don't feel like a failure and just present the things I did manage to do and see.

The weather was better than forecast: though chilly, it was bright and sunny most of the time.  The temperature seemed to fluctuate; at times it was almost warm, but then the wind picked up and it cooled off again.  Still, and as usual, the weather was better than it should have been for spring break.

Early in the morning we twenty or so passengers were roused from the bus and made to go into a building, where Canadian border patrol agents questioned us briefly.  Fortunately, I knew this was going to happen, as I'd read about it online.  I'll admit to being incredulous at the idea; the last time I crossed a border on a bus where we actually had to stop was between Hungary and Romania, and there the guards took our passports and checked them, leaving us to wait on the bus.  Getting off of the bus to be checked out is probably preferable to surrendering one's passport in a foreign country where one doesn't speak the language.  This time I was asked where I was going, why, and for how long, whether I was meeting anyone there and whether I planned to leave anything in the country.  Apparently I seemed safe enough to let enter, and it didn't take too long for everyone to be allowed in.

Despite the obvious border crossing, and despite the fact that most people I heard spoke French, it didn't seem that I was really in a different country.  I'm not sure why that is.  In addition, a lot of people online (particularly on the TripAdvisor forums) say that Montréal feels European, a sentiment I did not share.  No one can deny that the city was influenced by its early French inhabitants, but influence is not ambiance.  I didn't have much trouble because of the language difference, though I did realize that my French sounds better in my head and that my receptive skills are not fantastic.

Though I don't often drink coffee, I definitely needed some upon disembarking at a quarter to six.  There was a Tim Hortons not far from the Gare d'Autocars, and I managed to get a small coffee and a beignet aux pommes (it's not what I'd call an apple fritter, which is what the website claims it is).  Thus fortified I returned to the métro and took the blue line to Jean-Talon.  The métro itself is fairly easy to use; there are only three or four major lines, and you just need to know toward which terminal you're headed.  My problem came whenever I had to leave a station and figure out which way to head on the street.  This is not something I did well at all.  However, this first time I managed to find my way to the Marché Jean-Talon, a daily market.  Though the market supposedly opened at 7, most of the sellers were still unloading their goods when I arrived.  Most of the stalls were produce, but there were others selling other types of food, like bread and pastries, seafood, and foie gras poutine; few of these were close to opening so early.  I was excited to see several stalls with different kinds of apples, though most seemed to be selling them by the basket, rather than individually.  There was also plenty of freshly-pressed apple juice, and lots and lots of maple and honey products.  I bought some juice, and found a stall selling apples singly; the man there was unpacking McIntoshes but let me pick a few.  Then, when I went to pay, he said there was no charge, and gave me another apple, a small plum-colored one, as well.  I couldn't even think of how to ask if he was sure (being fairly sure myself that the only foreign word I could recall at that moment, "Pravda?", wouldn't do the trick), and he insisted, so I got three free apples.  It was so kind that I almost cried.

 

I knew that there is a Polish cafe somewhere in Montréal, and I believe it was that fact that led me to grab my phone at 10 PM to search the Internet for places that might sell Kofola.  A comment somewhere noted that a Romanian deli named Bucarest stocked it at one point, so I made my way there.  Bucarest is on what seems to be a highway that runs through the city--it reminded me of how Fordham Road becomes Pelham Parkway in the Bronx.  Its location means I absolutely would never have found it if I hadn't known where to look.  The deli, which is a good size, had all sorts of Central and Eastern European goods, including the hoped-for Kofola, in one- and two-liter bottles.  I bought two one-liter bottles, for ease of carrying, and a Milka bar; I didn't want to get much more than that and have to carry it around all day.

Theoretically not far from Bucarest, though you would not know it from the somewhat meandering route I took, is l'Oratoire Saint-Joseph du Mont-Royal.  L'Oratoire was conceived of by a monk named Frère André and is dedicated to St Joseph, Jesus' earthly father.  Visitors can ascend the steps in front of the basilica--and pilgrims can climb on their knees--or people who are just mildly interested and have already walked a lot can take a shuttle bus from the parking lot to the entrance.  From the outside it looks like a pretty standard, though large, sacred building, one that wouldn't be out of place in Vienna; the inside is a different matter.  For one thing, l'Oratoire has more escalators in it than any other church I've ever been in.  

On the first floor is the shrine, with statues of St Joseph in his different roles, like Model of Workers, Protector of the Church, and Terror of Demons.  There were candles before the statues, and between them racks with canes discarded by those who had been healed.  Behind the shrine was an alcove with a statue of the Virgin Mary in front of a raw, dripping rock wall, part of Mont-Royal itself.  On the next level up is a gift shop, the terrace, with windy views of the city, and the basilica proper.  This is where the stylistic disconnect between exterior and interior was most obvious and jarring, because while the outside is very neoclassical, the basilica is quite postmodern and almost brutalist, made mainly of concrete.  It strikes me as an odd choice to make--though the interior was finished in 1966.  Among the decorations are the apostles, arranged in groups of three, carved from wood and larger-than-life; their size means that they are literally looking down on the viewer, and their expressions are all fairly unimpressed as well.  In the other, larger gift shop, located in a building adjacent to the oratory, among the usual rosaries and such, they also sold prayer cards, though these were printed not on paper but on plastic, the size and weight of a credit card, with the prayer on the back in French, English, or Spanish.  I, of course, bought one featuring St George, with a prayer in French.

If one church is good, more is better.  My next stop, in Vieille Ville and near the old port, was Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours.  Because of its location the chapel became known as a site to which sailors came to give thanks for good weather.  On the port (as in waterfront, not the opposite of starboard) side, the chapel is topped not with a Touchdown Jesus but a Touchdown Mary statue.  The port side also has an interesting wooden gallery attached to the stone building, to what purpose I'm not sure; I think it's part of the museum that I didn't visit. 

The interior of the chapel is decorated relatively sedately and was certainly the brightest of any of the churches I saw that day.  The vault was wood, painted in pastel hues, and I was amused to see that hanging from the ceiling were lamps in the form of small ships.  Despite the fact that it was Saturday, there seemed to be a small school group there, with a docent giving a talk.  That's something I would like to do, I think, though I might have a problem if I thought the kids were being disrespectful.  Still, I think it would be satisfying to work in a beautiful, historic church. 

I did basically no shopping on my trip, but I did wander into a store in the old town that sold Inuit art.  Though there was some jewelry and a whole room of fur coats and accessories, as well as fur rugs, most of what was for sale was sculpture.  Most of the sculptures were of animals, my favorite of which were the dancing bears.  They're just so joyful.

I also spent some time walking around the Vieux Port.  The Saint Lawrence River was moving swiftly, but, as you can see, the marina was still iced over.  There were a few yachts moored there, despite the fact that I thought you were supposed to take your boat out of the water when it might freeze.  But I don't own a yacht, so what do I know?  There was also a truly huge freighter docked in the river, near the Molson building and the Jacques Cartier Bridge.  The Vieux Port has many activities that are better suited to warm weather than when there are still mounds of snow on the ground; no one was taking advantage of the beach umbrellas when the sand below was mostly covered in ice.  The clock tower at the end of the quay was open, and I believe free to ascend, but I chose to sit on a bench by the river and rest my feet.

The first thing I said when anyone asked what I planned to see in Montréal was "the basilica"--that is, Notre-Dame Basilica.  (Oh, francophone Catholics, we know you love Mary, but did you really have to name every dang thing Notre-Dame de Whatever?)  In Place d'Armes, the square opposite the entrance, is a monument to the people who founded the city, which was first known as Ville-Marie (come on, Catholics!): Paul Chomedey de Maisonneuve, Jeanne Mance, Charles Le Moyne, Lambert Closse, and the Iroquois.  From the outside the basilica looks like a small two-towered Gothic cathedral, made of fairly nondescript stone, just like you'd see in any number of towns in England or France.  It's certainly nothing to write home about.  The interior, on the other hand, is a different story.  It's well worth the five dollar (Canadian or American) entrance fee to see it.  As so often seems to be the case, pictures do not do justice to the decoration.  The interior is probably what many of the cathedrals of Europe looked like before their paint jobs were faded by the centuries; it is magnificent, though I can see how it might seem a bit gaudy to someone used to the aforementioned faded style.  The basilica reminds me a little of the one in Kraków, and even like some of the restored synagogues in Central Europe, particularly the Spanish Synagogue in Prague. The blue around the altar was glorious.  I was more than a little put off by the number of people taking pictures of themselves or others in front of it, but I tried to focus less on the annoyance that my fellow visitors were causing me and more on the sublime beauty of the church itself, and what that beauty was created to represent and exalt.

I wandered around on my own long enough that I was there when the next free tour in English started, so I figured I'd stay for that.  "Tour" was a bit of a misnomer, as the group merely sat in a few pews and listened while our guide spoke, but the wedding about to happen in the chapel at the back might have curtailed our group's ability to move around.  Or maybe the tours are just talks after all.  Whatever the case, Julie, our guide, pointed out some things that I'd noticed and some that I hadn't known, and some that were a combination of the two.  For example, the stained glass windows along the walls depict not Biblical stories nor saints' lives but scenes from the history of Montréal, which I had noticed; but I didn't realize that those windows can be opened, an uncommon feature.  I also didn't realize that the vault and even the columns were made of wood.  That's part of the reason why the windows open: the wooden construction is warmer than stone, which is more pleasant in the winter than in the summer.  Julie also told us about a number of hockey players who were married in the basilica, a bit about the pipe organ, and that one of the towers holds ten bells while the other only holds one, named Jean-Baptiste.  Cast in London and weighing 11 tons, Jean-Baptiste is so big that when it was still being rung its vibrations were damaging the tower.  It is no longer rung, only struck on special occasions.  The ten-bell carillon is still used.

One might think that with all of the churches and cathedrals I've been to, I would be less moved by them at this point.  I'm thankful that that isn't so.  

The last significant thing I did was eat poutine.  Poutine is simply cheese curds and gravy on fries.  Restaurants around the city offer a number of variations, including lobster poutine and vegan options, but I went for the classic--or la Classique, as it's called at La Banquise.  La Banquise only offers two sizes, régulier or grande; I got the regular and only ate about half of it, saving the rest for my breakfast the next morning.  It was just as good (if not perhaps better) then.

My trip didn't turn out anywhere near how I thought it would, and I know now that things have changed and will have to change the next time I travel anywhere farther than a few hours away.  I can't say I'm pleased with or prepared for this turn of events, and that discovering these seemingly new limitations hasn't put me off the idea of traveling somewhat.  I hope in time that feeling will fade, and I'll soon be eager to go again, but right now I don't feel sure that will happen.  I'll be here if it does, though.

Guilford

My family is fortunate that we don't need to depend on Black Friday's discounts to afford our shopping, and none of us (unless someone is harboring a secret desire otherwise) is keen on fighting crowds.  While some of us prefer to stay home and avoid the traffic and madness, Black Friday can be a good day to do local sightseeing.  Since we'd watched the miniseries "Saints & Strangers" the night before, visiting a place of similar vintage seemed a good idea.

Just after Thanksgiving dinner I often feel like I never want to eat again, but somehow on Friday I can always manage.  It's also hard to say no to lobster bisque, a fried scrod sandwich, and soft serve.  The sandwich could have used some tartar sauce, so please remind me to ask for it next time, but the lobster bisque was excellent.

The oldest house in Connecticut and the oldest stone house in New England dates to 1639.  The Henry Whitfield State Museum includes the house, a visitors' center, and an interactive/craft area.  The visitors' center, which includes the gift shop, had samples of colonial-era food, including pemmican (deer jerky) and cornbread.  There was also an exhibit on autumn holidays as they relate to the site.  Particularly of interest was the explanation of why the house isn't decorated for Christmas: the holiday was thought to be frivolous, and was often celebrated in ways that belied its religious significance.

The house, in which photography is not allowed, is fairly large, with two floors accessible to the public (I believe the guide said there is a cellar, and I don't know why there wouldn't be).  The artifacts on display were gathered from various sources and did not all belong to the Whitfield family.  Visitors enter through an anteroom, whose displays discuss the house's history and restoration, before stepping down into the great room.  This long hall shows the influence of European architecture, subtly reminding us that the early modern period was not so far from the Renaissance and even the Middle Ages.  There is a large fireplace on each end, particularly necessary when the room was partitioned into two; at one end there is a settle, a high-backed bench designed to trap heat around the sitter.  An interpreter there was dressed in a military outfit.  I'd hoped he would provide a wealth of information about the house, its original inhabitants, and their time, preferably with a period accent like those of the interpreters at Plimoth Plantation, but alas, this was not the case.  The upper floor has more displays of objects and things like looms and whatnot.  While I enjoyed it, I'm not sure the Whitfield House is a site that would stand many repeat visits, and were I taking children I would check to make sure there was an activity available that day.

On the way home we drove by Long Island Sound, and jumped out at a marina parking lot to enjoy the sunset.  On one side of the lot was this marshy area, with swathes of localized fog, while on the other side was the blue and pink and orange Sound. 

I think you'll find, pal...

In the space of a week my dealings with public transportation left me with a handful of dollar coins (two Susan B. Anthonys, two Sacajaweas, and seven assorted presidents, to be exact): I often forget that the Metro North ticket machines give dollar coins in change, and the parking-payment machine at the Alewife T station did, too.  I don't mind the coins too much, but I'm often a bit hesitant to use them in situations where money needs to change hands quickly; even the gold-colored ones are often mistaken for quarters, as one was today at the movie theater, and I don't relish the idea of having to explain to some harried cashier that yes, it is real money and yes, I have given you what I owe.  In those times a line from one of English comedian Michael McIntyre's routines always runs through my head. Have a look and see for yourself.

Flashback: Black Friday 2014

One of the reasons this post has languished unpublished for so long is because I honestly thought I'd already posted it, and was surprised, while working on something else, to see it in my Drafts folder.  AND THEN I told it to post on Black Friday this year and it failed to do so, which I only just noticed.  Better late than never, I suppose.

I spent a few days in Connecticut the week of Thanksgiving.  A day or two before the holiday itself one of the aunts mentioned Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in the town of the same name (possibly while discussing the TV show purportedly set there), and on Friday we made the short drive to New York to see some graves at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery and Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla, New York.

There are actually two cemeteries adjacent to each other in Sleepy Hollow.  One is the graveyard of the Dutch Reformed Church, with 18th- and 19th-century interments, and the other is the cemetery that shares the town's name.  The church itself was closed when we arrived.  We bypassed the Old Dutch Church's graveyard to drive through the other cemetery, stopping the car to jump in and out as necessary.  This was a welcome way to visit, because the cemetery is large and hilly, and because, being the end of November, it was fairly cold out.

Located in the Hudson Valley with views of the river, Sleepy Hollow has its fair share of famous residents.  There are Rockefellers, Astors, Chryslers, and Helmsleys, as well as several people involved in newspaper publishing in the city.  The Helmsley mausoleum features a stained glass window of the New York skyline, centered on the family's building.  I was disappointed by the entirely unremarkable Chrysler mausoleum; I'd expected something more akin to the Chrysler Building--not the chrome, really, but the Art Deco style of it--but it was plain, with a set of columns at the front and no windows whatsoever.  And not a fin in sight.  What a missed opportunity.

Where the Chryslers disappointed, though, other less well-known but still wealthy people had better taste.  The two mausoleums (mausolea?) I liked best were the Archbolds' and the Lewis'.  The latter, pictured at right, was a stone chapel with chunky architectural elements; something about it seems very Scottish, though I'm not sure why.  It also has a lovely stained glass roundel.  With its round shape, smooth dome, and mosaics, the Archbold tomb seemed to be modeled after Italian Byzantine churches.  That style, to me, makes more sense for Christian(ish) American cemeteries than does Egyptian Revival.

I was surprised to find on the map that Andrew Carnegie was buried in Sleepy Hollow.  The Scottish-born businessman was probably the greatest patron of libraries and education in the modern age.  His site is fairly simple; there's a plaque with information about his philanthropy nearby, and stones inscribed with his name and his wife's in front of a Celtic cross.  At the base of the cross were an American flag and a Scottish saltire.  Perhaps in appreciation for his exceptional generosity, people had left coins on the stone bearing Carnegie's name; since both Carnegie's name day and St Andrew's Day were coming up, I added the shiniest penny I had as my present.

In the context of the cemetery, the most famous grave is that of Washington Irving.  The author's tomb is among several of his relatives', and the plot, along with Irving's home and the Old Dutch Church, is a national historic landmark.  Irving's grave is slightly larger than the surrounding ones, and is set off by a pair of American flags.  Someone had also decorated it for the season with pumpkins and yellow flowers. 

We also saw, among the graves of the common folk, a stone with our name on it.  It wasn't anyone we knew, but it's somewhat unusual to come across people with our surname who aren't related to us.

Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla is huge.  The office has multiple brochures, including general maps and tours focusing on trees or architecture.  One large section, Sharon Gardens, is all Jewish graves; we drove through but didn't spend much time there.  In Kensico proper there's a big section full of tombstones inscribed with Chinese characters, and some really nice Art Nouveau monuments.

There are fewer industrialists and old-money type people here than in Sleepy Hollow, but more people from the entertainment world.  Sergei Rachmaninoff and his wife Natalie have a nice little plot surrounding by bushes, though the large Orthodox cross that is the center of the plot only features the composer's name.  A popular grave for visitors is Lou Gehrig's, if the baseballs and glove left there are any indication.  I think what looks like the headstone is actually a mini-columbarium; a pair of bronze doors with a keyhole are set into the stone.  I liked seeing Tommy Dorsey's grave, decorated with a trombone and the opening bars of "I'm Getting Sentimental Over You."  But by far the one I was most pleased to see was the grave of Danny Kaye and his wife Sylvia Fine Kaye.  Their monument is a stone bench; a bronze plaque with symbols of their work and interests, including a grand piano and UNICEF's logo, is set into the back.  Danny's name is on the band of a chef's hat on the left side of the plaque, and Sylvia's is on the bottom of a sheet of music on the right.  Much like Katharine Hepburn's at Cedar Hill, the Dorseys', the Gehrigs', and the Kayes' memorials are all fairly understated for people as famous as they were; that kind of humility seems to have fallen by the wayside.

As our time at Kensico was coming to an end we saw a group of graves most intriguingly carved.  The Kirby family included a naval engineer (Frank), a Phi Bete (Russell), and a PhD/author/scholar/musicologist/magician (Frank II).  All of them have stylish and possibly arcane decorations on their headstones.  While I wish Mary's had listed her accomplishments as her husband's and sons' stones had, I did appreciate the squirrel and flowers on hers.

Though I was happy to see Danny Kaye and Tommy Dorsey, on the whole I liked visiting Sleepy Hollow more than Kensico.  The former felt much cozier, and I think on the whole the graves were more interesting there, in part because they were older.  That age also meant that the graveyard felt more organic and less planned.

Boston Burying Grounds

Some of Massachusetts' most famous burying grounds prove once again that there's a good reason stereotypical old graveyards in films look the way they do (though I can't for the life of me find a picture of one of said films that illustrates my point).

Until last week the weather had been pleasant, with temperatures into the 70s at the end of last week and bright, clear skies.  Acutely aware that this trend would not last--and indeed it has not--I wanted to take advantage of it, and of the driving that I'd be doing anyway.  So I did some plotting and made a plan to visit three of Boston's burying grounds two Mondays ago, a number that increased by one in the course of the day.

Transportation tip: If you're taking the T, aboveground stops may not have machines where you can buy tickets.  You can buy them on the train, but the machine can't give change, so don't use too big a bill, or you may end up with unused fares.

Below is a general map of my route, starting from the North T station and ending at the Boylston Street station (both on the green line).  I mapped it out because I really just wanted to see how far I'd walked; it felt like more than two and a quarter miles, but the number of lunges I did while taking pictures certainly contributed to that feeling.  By vaguely following the Freedom Trail and my recollections of last spring's visit with Mom's class, it was easy enough to find the way from the North End to the more central sites.

Copp's Hill
For some reason I seem to refuse to believe that any East Coast city has hills.  I'm not entirely sure why this is, particularly when the word itself is in the names of places; but I did indeed have to charge up a bit of a steep one to reach the first stop.  Despite Mom saying something about their proximity, I was also surprised to see that Copp's Hill is about a block from Old North Church, with the entrance to the church visible from the cemetery gate on Hull Street.  In fact, a school group came through while I was there.

Copp's Hill is the largest of the cemeteries I visited.  The half of the burying ground furthest from the gate is hilly, revealing a view of the bay.  There is also a square section along Hull Street that is set a few steps down from the rest of the cemetery; it seems to have later burials than the rest, and certainly fewer.  Of the four described here, Copp's Hill and Central burying grounds are the two that allow you to walk among the stones--Copp's Hill does have paved paths, but no barriers or markers asking you to keep to the walkways.  I appreciated this, but unfortunately, so did the family that let their children sit on the (restored) tomb of the Mather family.

King's Chapel

King's Chapel is the oldest burying ground in the city.  It's adjacent to the church of the same name, and on the small side.  Like the Granary, King's Chapel is bordered on three sides by buildings that keep most of it in shadow.  Some of the stones are nearly entirely sunk into the ground.  Several members of the Winthrop family are buried there, including the first governor of the colony.  There is also a grave dedicated to William Dawes, Paul Revere's less well known partner in midnight riding, though whether or not he's actually there is uncertain.

Granary

Interment place of Crispus Attucks and the other Boston Massacre victims, Benjamin Franklin's parents, Samuel Adams, Paul Revere, John Otis, and John Hancock, the Granary is arguably the most significant of the city's burying grounds.  I felt satisfied by being able to answer a man when he asked if I knew where Crispus Attucks was buried, though I certainly didn't explain the location very eloquently.

When I arrived, there were dozens of bags of leaves arrayed near the entrance, and before I left more were added by a team of hardworking groundskeepers.  I suppose it's necessary to remove the leaves, since the burying ground is such a prominent tourist destination, and since it would be a hazard if they were to spill out into the busy city street outside; but I missed the autumnal scenery.  And, while I appreciate the work that the crew was doing to clear up, I also wondered what they thought of the tourists wandering around while they were working.

Central
Unsurprisingly, the batteries in my camera died shortly after I arrived.  Central is on the edge of Boston Common, just near the Boylston T station, and is squirrel paradise.  I don't know if I've ever seen so many squirrels in one place.  Now the question is would I rather be a cat in an Italian cemetery, or a squirrel in a Massachusetts one?

Between my camera being kaput and the approach of the time I'd appointed for my return to campus, I didn't spend much time at Central.  It has quite an odd feature, though.  Part of the cemetery is as you see in the picture, but off to the right there is a large ditch that surrounds what I assume must be mausoleums, though they're covered with grass.  That area is where Washington portraitist Gilbert Stuart is buried; I didn't get to see him on this trip, but I did get a glimpse during the infamous Forced March through Boston Common of 2008.

East Parish Burying Ground

And we interrupt the London recap once again. At this point I think the remaining UK posts will be headed for the Flashback file...

If there's one thing Massachusetts is good for, it's old cemeteries, and if there's another, it's autumn.  In my opinion this is the best time of year to visit a cemetery, because combining the aesthetics of turning, falling leaves with old stone makes for some pretty gorgeous contrasts.

Once again, I briefly thought of going to Salem this week before my class in Boston.  It's still just a bit too far to justify, though, and I wouldn't have had enough time to spend in the burying grounds there.  But in the course of looking over my cemetery spreadsheet I noticed a name that's become familiar on my jaunts on the turnpike: Newton.  The town is basically in Boston, and only about five miles from campus if the GPS is to be trusted, so I could certainly make a stop there.

East Parish Burying Ground is one of three old cemeteries in Newton.  Without having visited the other two, I'm still confident in considering this one the best.  It's also the oldest of the three, occupying the spot where the first meetinghouse in Newton was built in 1660--and now across the street from Boston College's law school.  Using the school's address for GPS coordinates might be a good idea, since most websites only listed the cemetery's location as the corner of Cotton and Centre Streets; that is indeed where the entrance is.

The only problem with the cemetery is that there isn't anywhere convenient to park.  Parking is prohibited except for weekends and holidays on Cotton Street, and some other streets in the neighboring residential area are similarly marked.  I figured the law school might not be amenable to foreigners using their lot, so I finally decided to part in front of someone's house around the corner from the cemetery entrance, within sight of a one-hour-parking sign.

The earliest graves are from the 17th century and the latest (and least) from the 20th.  The southern end, the section nearest the entrance, seems to have the older graves, and they get newer as you move north.  The cemetery isn't all level; there are a few mounds near the entrance that hold mausoleums covered over with grass, and the ground slopes a bit higher above them as you move further in.  Then it falls away toward the north.  I liked the uneven terrain.  It wasn't hilly enough to be too challenging to walk through, but enough to provide interest.  And as I'd hoped, there were a few trees in a really prime state of leaf-changing.

The thing that sets East Parish apart from other cemeteries is the quality of the carvings.  Of course there are some toppled stones, and reassembled ones, and lichen-streaked ones, but there are a number of 18th-century slates whose carving is fantastically crisp and fresh.  It was almost unbelievable; several of the stones looked like Halloween decorations, both in their design and in their apparent newness.  I was really very impressed, and still am a day later.  Plus there were some wonderful old names, like Sylvanus Wetherbee, Deliverance Hide, General Michael Jackson, and my favorite, Patience Pigeon.

East Parish had great light, great leaves, and great graves.  While you may not be guaranteed the first two on your visit, you'll definitely get the latter.  I highly recommend visiting if you can.

Mirabilis

We interrupt your regularly scheduled London recaps for this postlet. 

I
Walt Whitman I think would not be surprised to know that there's a cocktail named after him at the Dead Poet on the Upper West Side.  A variation on the Long Island iced tea, it's sweet and fruity and strong.  Whether or not he would enjoy the drink as I did, I don't know; but I cannot imagine that he would not be both delighted by and matter-of-fact about its existence.  Of course we still remember and celebrate him in this city.  How could we not?

It avails not, neither time or place—distance avails not;
I am with you, you men and women of a generation, or ever so many generations hence;
I project myself—also I return—I am with you, and know how it is.1

II
As we sat at an early service in St. Paul's Chapel, I wondered what George Washington would think of this.  Not about the fact that the vicar leading the service was a woman; not about her wireless mic and the speakers in the balconies or the electric lights; not about the fact that all but two of the box pews have been removed (one of those remaining being the one he sat in) and that the congregation now sat in chairs arranged in concentric circles; but what he would think to see us in 2015 still worshiping in the same church he did.  I wondered if he would be surprised that St. Paul's still stands all these years later, or if his reaction would be one of confidence in the building's endurance.  What must it feel like, to see a building from your time now dwarfed by the unfamiliar architecture of future years?  The chapel has survived for over two centuries; that it survived these past fourteen is all the more astonishing.

III
Noted cinematic masterpiece "Kate & Leopold" begins in the late 19th century, with a ceremony at the not-yet-complete Brooklyn Bridge attended by Hugh Jackman's character.  When he's transported to 2001, Leopold happens upon the finished bridge and is awed to see it still standing, so much so that to an unimpressed sanitation worker he declares, "That, my friend, is a miracle!"

IV
It is a city of miracles upon miracles, and not the least of them that the sky was blue on Sunday afternoon.

from "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry" ↩