Bestest Friend and I are doing a blog project. Each day we will write a blog post on a different theme chosen by a random noun generator. The theme for the sixth day of the month is "Reflection."
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I found myself with a list of four things to do in town today: go to the library to drop off books I've already read and pick up a book that had come in, pay our water bill at city hall, get a prescription at the pharmacy, and stop by the community center to say hello to the new director. I could have gotten in the car, I guess, but instead I put in my earbuds and hit the sidewalk. I love that I can just walk to these places. I love that I can be outside instead of in our second car that smells like gross. And along the way, I walked out of my way to go by the riverwalk and went really out of my way to go to our local park that looks out over a different river.
I love living in this small town. I love that when I asked the librarian where the children's book in Spanish* were, she laughed like I did because they keep moving them and both of us thought they were in a different place than they really were. I love that when I stopped by the community center, everyone was so happy to see me, even though I just brought bad news. I love that the biggest controversy in town is that the city council went against the recommendation of the Liquor License Committee and voted to give the available liquor license to a proposed new business, rather than one of the two established businesses** that also applied. I love where I live and am grateful for it every day.
*I have a very long streak on Duolingo for Spanish, over 1000 days. I can sort of understand Spanish conversations when I overhear them, mostly at the grocery store or standing in line at the taco truck, but I'm super shy about actually talking to anyone in Spanish because, you know, I have the vocab of a five-year-old. ANYWAY. I wrote about this in a comment on Elisabeth's blog and Kae gently pushed me to start actually using these language skills and stop depending on Duo. So I vow to get a book or two in Spanish out of the library every time I go there this year. I'm starting with a children's book that has Spanish on one side and the English translation on the other and I'm going to treat it like homework where I write out the translation before I look at English and give myself a grade.
**In the interests of full disclosure, the community center where I volunteer is one of those businesses. We lose a lot of weddings because we can only let people have beer and wine. People also frequently leave our events to go next door to a bar to get liquor. In the interest of even further disclosure, we were never going to be able to compete with either of the other two businesses that applied for the license, in terms of economic impact for the town, but damn it all, we tried.
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To see what Bestest Friend has to say about the theme of the day, go visit her at Too Legit to Quit.
What a lovely photograph. And what a sweet tribute to your town which you are obviously fond of.
ReplyDeletePoor Agnes! Even a car air freshener doesn't help, I take it.
Well, once there was the unfortunate incident with mice, we changed the air filter, took it to the dealer who did a thorough cleaning that involved changing the air filter again AND putting some air freshener through the whole system and then it just smelled like air filter on top of gross. We just roll down the windows now. Poor Agnes indeed!
DeleteThat is so great that you could walk to so many places! I am able to do that in downtown Minneapolis thanks for our skyway system, although the 23 in '23 challenge pushed me to walk outside yesterday to run an errand. We can walk to several places in our neighborhood, too, like the library, Starbucks, the grocery store, and then in a different direction, a coffee shop, consignment store, running shoe store, handful of restaurants, etc. I love walking places! That is what prompted me to move from my suburban condo to downtown Minneapolis back in 2011. I had just come back from my 30th bday trip to Paris and wanted a pedestrian lifestyle. Now I much prefer the area of the city where we live and am glad that I can still walk to quite a few places.
ReplyDeleteThat is great that you are going to start to use your Spanish more. I'm just past the 200 day mark but I have a lot of opportunity to practice my Spanish at the boys' daycare. Will's teachers do not speak much English (which is fine - Phil understands everything/can speak if needed although he is very shy/insecure as he's lost his fluency. Plus they bring in a translator for conferences). So at pick-up, I try to talk to them a bit. I think Duo Lingo is super effective, though. I have learned more in 200 days than I did in 1.5 years of taking Spanish in HS/college.
I really miss the walkability of Minneapolis. We rode our bikes, took buses, or walked the whole time we lived there. It was just so nice, particularly the skyways downtown!
DeleteI do think Duolingo does a nice job for starting to learn a language, but I worry that I've really plateaued at what it can do. I did overhear some woman at the grocery store today talking about an immigration interview and I am so excited that I'm able to understand things "in the wild." I'm just not confident about actually speaking it, so that's something I need to work on! I am not a little jealous of your Spanish immersion daycare! Will is such a lucky little guy!
I live about a mile from the downtown on my little suburb, so I *can* but usually don't walk for errands. Every once in a while I will, and I always enjoy those trips.
ReplyDeleteYes to pushing yourself further into Spanish! I've never been very good at learning other languages, but it's still fun to try.
Yes, if I had to walk a mile just to get somewhere, I would probably not do so unless the weather was absolutely perfect! It's really just a quarter of a mile for me, so I don't really have an excuse to get in the car for most errands.
DeleteI live in a very walkable town and it is probably the single biggest boost to my mental health. We can walk...everywhere. Dentist, grocery store, doctor, after-hours clinic, a theatre (2 actually; one for live events and one for movies), library, the kids school, restaurants. We looked at 40 houses before we bought ours and though we ended up with an older home that needed a lot of work (which quite honestly has been terrible for me because I hate renovations)...we made the choice to buy an older house for MORE money than much newer ones 15 minutes away, because if we didn't live here...we'd have to drive everywhere.
ReplyDeleteYay for Spanish, and I think that picture books are a perfect place to start. I really want to do more work on my French (I quit Duolingo after a little over a month because I broke my streak and I'm such a completist; SIGH), but picture books would be SUCH A great place to start. Especially with the Google Translate photo app getting so advanced, too.
YES! Location is so important in homebuying and I would say you made the right choice for you and your family by buying a less fabulous house in a great, walkable location. I see how much you take advantage of the walkability and you're absolutely right that it's such a mental health boost.
DeleteHooray for a walkable town! That's similar to the town I grew up in -- everything was packed into about two square miles. (Give or take, I did not confirm this in actual measurements.) These days, I live in an urbanish suburb and it's very walkable. I always feel very smug when I walk to the nearby grocery store. It's not big enough for me to do all my shopping (and I don't have a cart, so I limit myself to a bag), but it feels very green and locally-supportive.
ReplyDeleteI love that you are working on your Spanish this way. I really wish I had enough interest/motivation to consistently study a language. I would love to polish up my French or learn German, but I just... get bored very easily. Know thyself, I suppose.
Yeah, I like Duolingo because the time investment each day is really small. You can complete a lesson in three to five minutes. I've definitely done mine while brushing my teeth at night! But I guess it might be time for me to figure out more advanced language learning options.
DeleteI cannot walk anywhere in my neighborhood... except the pool/tennis court/bar LOL-- who needs more than that? But my office is downtown and everything is there. Even the kids' pediatrician because I used to take Harry to work with me when he was teeny. Now he drives downtown and I walk and meet him if he has an appointment, sunrise; sunset, etc.
ReplyDeleteOh, it would make me SO SAD if there was nowhere to walk to. LOL. It's crazy how different people have different priorities, but that's what makes the world go around!
DeleteI have never thought of getting Spanish children's books, but this is so smart! I'm going to do that too!
ReplyDeleteOne thing I love about my neighbourhood is that I can walk to so many places. Everything is so close!
Yes, picture books and children's books are where everyone says to start, along with kids' cartoons and shows in Spanish (or dubbed in Spanish). My husband thinks listening to Spanish podcasts might be helpful for me because you can slow down the speed if you need to. Let's see how well this goes!
DeleteI've been thinking of trying Duolingo for Spanish; I never studied it, as I liked French, but familiarity with Spanish would make much more sense in Florida.
ReplyDeleteI think you'd be able to segue nicely into Spanish. There are a lot of cognates, the sentence structure is quite similar, and the masculine/feminine stuff is similar in French. Give Duolingo a try - it's free and easy!
DeleteWell, I'm getting pretty envious that so many people can walk to do their errands. I have some great running routes, but if I want to actually walk to a store I would have to walk about a mile, cross a six-lane highway, and then I'd be at a Walgreens or a Target. Not exactly quaint and picturesque. I can see why you like your town.
ReplyDeleteIt would be nice to live so close to a Target, to be honest, but it would drive me crazy if there was not a way to run errands by foot. Growing up the middle of nowhere taught me early that I can't hack it if I feel trapped in my own house! But, again, I'm jealous that you have an actual store near your house.
DeleteOmg, it sounds like you live in a romantic comedy. I can walk a few places, but it's definitely more suburbia than small town. I grew up in a small town and loved it, although there was no river (a river walk! I die!), just a lake called Meatbird. I'm sorry about the liquor license - if this was a real rom-com, there would be a miraculous last-minute save.
ReplyDeleteIt's no Stars Hollow, but our town does its best to show off our geographic assets! The riverwalk is beautiful and local artists have decorated the town with murals and sculptures. There are jerks and obnoxious people who live here, too, so it's not perfect, as we learned from the liquor license debacle.
DeleteI love when a town is walkable. That's not always the case, esp. in the US. When we picked out where we live, part of the decision making was, if there were shops/parks/etc. in the vicinity that we could walk to.
ReplyDeleteWalkability is definitely key to my world, especially now that we have a dog. I can't imagine ever living somewhere again without at least some place to walk to.
DeleteBeing able to walk places you regularly go to is fantastic. It's one of the things I love about where I live too!
ReplyDeleteIt really is a game changer if you love where you live!
DeleteI'm envious of your walkability to all those places!
ReplyDeleteyay for you on learning Spanish--that's awesome.
I even added that I'm conversational in Spanish to my resume. I'm going to OWN it.
DeleteI thought of you this afternoon as I walked to the pharmacy to pick up a prescription! We normally go to a different pharmacy, but due to some med supply issues, we've filled a med rx twice now at a pharmacy within a clinic instead, which is actually right in our neighborhood. I needed to go pick it up and also had wanted to go for a walk today, so, win-win! I was thinking how much I wish we had a true grocery store within walking distance. (There kind of are a couple international groceries that are technically walkable, but they are a good couple miles probably away. My ideal walking location for "errands" is ~10 minutes one way, so the whole trip can be completed in 20-30 minutes). We do have a Kwik Trip gas station within that range, so I will often walk over there if we need a quick item or even just to get a snack/ ice cream with the kids in the summer. But otherwise, not much in the way of walking. Actually, my gym is walkable too in ~5-8 minutes, but I drive there an embarrassing amount of the time.... In the summer I am much more likely to walk there. I am not a fan of having to lug my big coat and hat and scarf into the gym, because then it requires a locker. If I drive, I will usually just wear a hoodie and then scamper into the gym with no actual coat on, bc the hoodie then fits inside the little cinch bag I carry around with me. It's a well thought out process. LOL.
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm excited you are checking out Spanish books!! Let me think if I have any good Spanish suggestions for you.... I'll get back to you on that.