The Unknown Familiar Places

The other day I found myself walking down a trail I have walked a thousand times. At one point though, about 2 miles in, I realized that I was now walking where I had never walked. I would say that I know this trail, and I do, yet here I was in an unknown familiar place. It was a space that my mind easily imagined the contours of, but my feet had never felt. My awareness of the beauty around me was heightened as I started to know it in a new way.

Neighborhoods can be this same way, a space that is entirely familiar to us and yet remains unknown. We know the streets, we know the parks, we know the house that leaves their Christmas decorations up until Easter, we know the house that always throws parties, we know the house with the beautiful community garden, we know the streets we choose to avoid, we know the streets we wish we lived on, we know where the schools are, we know our way around, but the people and the space remains in this unknown familiar place.

While walking on the trail I became aware of this, aware of the fact that most times I live in my neighborhood but don't really inhabit it. That I wave at people and say hi without really knowing them. I could tell you a lot about my neighborhood, and even the people that live there. But if you spent a week with me how many of their stories would you hear? How many houses would you walk into? Would you be impressed with my familiarity or confused by how little I really know? This takes time, it takes a continual entering of that space, and it is never ending. I had to walk that trail into the unknown, and I am realizing more and more how much I need to walk my neighborhood. I need to pay more attention to my surroundings, and I am realizing how much more I need to listen. My desire is to inhabit this place, to be a part of the fabric of the Roosevelt Neighborhood, and to have my life intertwined with the real lives of others.

A little after the two and half mile marker I stopped and turned around. I thought it might be a good idea to leave some of the trail undiscovered, it might remind me that I don't really know this trail as fully as I could. I think I also stopped there and turned around because it would have been harder to appreciate my new discoveries if I just charged on, I wanted to take this place in, to fully savor its beauty. In the same way, I am venturing out to savor the beauty of my neighbors and neighborhood as I dig in deeper to inhabit the space where I find myself, and where I imagine my life rooting down for many years to come.