We had breakfast at our Cape Cod hotel, which... not a great idea. Nick thinks he got some light food poisoning and I barely touched my food because it was just gross. We also missed pretty much all of Cape Cod except the way we took back to the highway, which sucks, but it got us to Boston faster. We got there around 9 or 10 am after parking somewhere near Boston Common, which is a park full of monuments and statues, with souvenir stalls and people in 1700s period garb happy to talk to you. It's also the start of the Freedom Trail, which takes you along the sites of the American Revolution. You follow a red line in the sidewalk and it leads you through sixteen sites. There are tours available, but we walked it on our own and it was fine. It takes you through the State House and cemeteries and meeting houses, and it was at the site of the Boston Massacre, commemorated with a giant marker in the sidewalk, that I realized how weird it was to be standing at the site of a massacre, no matter how long ago it was. Also, the Old Corner Bookstore is now just a plaque because it is now a Chipotle, and I will never stop being sad about it. You can stop inside places and there are people who will answer questions, and you can stop at Samuel Adams' grave, where every day someone puts a bottle of Sam Adams on it. It's across the street from a pub, which is also fitting.
It's a good way to see the city, a mix of the old stuff and the new. I took pictures of tall buildings as seen from outside buildings that were built in the 1700's, and in one area, I think outside the visitor center and City Hall, we watched a guy on a unicycle juggle babies. Just in case you thought street performers were only in New York. We walked across the Charleston Bridge to see Paul Revere Park before deciding to abandon the trail because we were on some time constraints. So Nick somehow got us to cut across the Italian part of town, where the streets weren't as well-paved and it clearly wasn't touristy, and I have no idea how he managed to get us anywhere near our car, but he managed it. And it was a neat detour! Parts of the town are definitely divided up, where you know when you're in the Italian part of town based on the restaurans and you definitely know when you're in the Irish part because there's an impressive amount of Irish pubs, but it was nice to see something off the beaten path.
And before you ask, yes, we went to Cheers. It is a working restaurant/bar, and is a good stop if you like some kitsch. There's a shooting bar, which looks like the bar from the TV show except way better lit, but it was too crowded that day, so we ended up in the restaurant section. I sat under the Sam Malone jersey, and felt really weird about just ordering water there. But at least everybody knew my name. You know, theoretically.
We stopped at Boston Public Garden, which is very pretty. It's a big park filled with flowers and monuments, and there's a lake where you can ride a swan boat around. We went through one section and then out to see Trinity Church, which is gorgeous, and then off to Copley Square.
So, two weeks before we went on this trip, the Boston Marathon bombing happened. Even Copley Square, where it happened, looked okay, and you might not have known it happened except for all the memorials around. You'd see "Boston strong" written in chalk on sidewalks and statues or as graffiti in the bathrooms at Cheers. Outside churches there would be ribbons tied to the fence; you picked up a ribbon, wrote your message of support on it, and tied it on. Copley Square was of course the biggest reminder. It was still very new, so people were there to pay their respects and sometimes leave things at memorials. There were literal signs of support, and the whole area was filled with groups of things people had sent. There was a wall of baseball hats people had sent from around the country (including one from a grudging Cubs fan), and a section for stuffed animals, for signed shirts and American flags. Some people had taken Sharpies to the ground to declare their love for the city.
And there was this feeling there that I'm not sure I can describe. It was something heavy that everyone there seemed to feel. Anywhere else in Boston you could find someone talking and having fun, but here it was somber and almost funereal at times. It made my heart hurt. At one point I felt my cheeks were wet and realized I was crying, and I tried to hide it but the fact was I wasn't the only one doing it. After wandering around by myself for a bit I met up with Nick and we decided to leave, he said, "Just when I thought I couldn't take anymore, I saw this woman walking around pushing two cats in a stroller. And I thought, life goes on."
We went back through the Public Garden to get to the car, and buzzed past Harvard because we had to, and we got out on the road up towards New Hampshire just before the rain started. And after a day of walking around looking at historical sites and getting our hearts ripped out, we turned on the TV and laughed that The Town was the first thing on. Which was followed immediately by a shot of the Charleston Bridge and us going "Weren't we just there?"
That was Boston. Going into the trip, I always thought that it'd be one of my favorite cities ever. I think starting the trip with New York might've wrecked that, because I loved New York so much that everything else paled in comparison. But the timing also means I feel a little connection with this town, and next time I go back, hopefully I won't end up sobbing in public.
No comments:
Post a Comment