I am now on typing on the T, bound for Boston proper, where I will wander around and look at things until suppertime. Good ol’ screechy T. Lumbering, clanking, T.

Wrote the column last night, and was absolutely dead tired by 10 PM body time. Why? There was nothing particularly strenuous about the travel. I sat for a few hours, and then I walked to a train and sat for some more, then walked a few yards to another train. But man. I got eight solid hours for the first time in months. Woke with a light heart and happy anticipation. And freedom! No dog responsibility. I can’t tell you how much I am enjoying dog freedom without any guilt or worry. For one thing, I’m not bumping into him constantly. Birch worries that I will suddenly leave and never return - can't tell you where he got that - so he follows me around, and has that dog’s inability to predict my immediate movements. His particular skill consists of standing in the doorway I am keen to move through.

I am seeing Natalie for dinner. We have some time on Saturday to kick around Sommerville. I wonder how I will dress for this, since I packed quite poorly. Usually I am good at this sort of thing, but Boston presents some challenges: warm, but rainy. Cool, then hot. Right now in the T it’s arctic; when I emerge from the hole it will be subtropical. I see people on the train dressed in shorts and a jacket, a combination I’ve never been able to figure out: I like being warm except for my legs. I have a jacket, slung around the backpack straps for maximum inconvenience.

A backpack! Haven’t worn one around since I quit the job. That’s another aspect of life that seemed immutable, until it wasn’t. I used to carry one everywhere. In college it was a mobile library, with magazines and books, fountain pens with extra cartridges, journal, smokes, matches, change, all the essentials of life. In recent years I still I carried around a Field Notes book and a fountain pen in case things had to be jotted down, but no jotting was ever required of me.

I also forgot a battery for recharging, which shows how out of practice I’ve become. All of my travel items were scattered in different boxes, packed away at Zorg; they felt like relics of a previous life. MAYBE BECAUSE THEY WERE.

Approaching my stop. Old Boston hands will probably roll their eyes, but I want to see Pru Center, just because I am a student of downtown shopping complexes. I will report back soon.

LATER

It's not failing at all. In fact the few blocks I’ve walked since getting off the T remind me that not every American downtown is an empty shell populated by zombies and tumbleweeds, like Minneapolis has become. Shops! Pedestrians! Granted, it’s near the convention center, but there’s nothing comparable near our convention center.

Architecture, architecture. Cities need buildings like this - white terracotta facades, elegant delicate detail. (And an unfortunate addition)

Right across the street:

Thanks, pal.

Cities need blocks like this to provide an anchor in time, a counterpoint to the blunt glossy blocks of modern polished stone.

Across the street:

Thanks, pal.

Of course it’s an architecture school.

They had a lobby exhibit of master theses, and I was keen to see what they’re turning out today. Big train stations that sing of the iron roads, skyscrapers vaulting over their humble kin to pierce the heavens?

No. More empathetic prisons. Right now, the “carceral” environment has harsh induction facilities. Consider an alternative, where the size of the entrances reduce anxiety:

There’s also an office designed for “neurodivergent” people and a homeless shelter for the mentally ill.

The models:

I have no idea. It looks like a second-grade diorama, and it's a Masters-thesis product.

Afterwards, while sitting outside on a flower planter, studying my next destination, an attractive young woman came up and asked if I wanted to come to church on Sunday. I said I would be out of town and thanked her. Made me wonder if I look like a fellow who clearly needs some church. Ah, weary old man, all alone. Git ‘im! I appreciated the offer, though.

I’m now at Shake Shack - WHAT AREN’T YOU HAVING A LOBSTER ROLL oh calm down. We’re all meeting for dinner in six hours, and I just need something to fill the gullet, since I haven’t had lunch. Bad choice, though. It’s taken ten minutes and my chicken nodules are still nowhere in sight -

Ah, here they are.

Update: awful

They texted a survey, which I filled out with enthusiasm. Particularly interesting were the questions about whether anyone greeted me or said thank you. There wasn’t space for “server dropped metal tray on table with an attitude that defined the intersection of boredom and disgust.”

On we go. Many blocks to explore.

Had to visit the library, of course.

There was an exhibition of old maps, and I’ve become more interested in old maps lately. Perhaps I always was, and forgot I was. Mostly Boston, Revolutionary War period. Man, they’re going to dine off that forever.

Snapped this for Daughter, since it's her neighborhood.

But we'll get to that.

In the courtyard, ignored by all, a bust of a man with all the things little boys want to grow up to be: Scholar. Economist. Statistician

Francis Amasa Walker.

Walker was first offered the presidency of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in June 1880 by its founder William Barton Rogers, after its financial stability was severely weakened by the Panic of 1873 and subsequent Long Depression. . . On May 30, 1882, during Walker's first commencement exercises, Rogers died mid-speech, where his last words were famously "bituminous coal."

There are worse ways to be remembered.

He had, in some ways, progressive ideas about Indians, but not enough for modern sensibilities, so they took him down at MIT. They haven't pried this out of the wall yet, though.

Outside. Now is the time in Boston when we juxtapose:

Let's juxtapose again, like we did last year:

It was named the most beautiful building of the year when completed in the late 1880s.

I'm not disagreeing, although the busyness of the style doesn't make it my top choice. Astonishing craftsmanship, though.

I didn’t pay to see the interior. If you can say you’re going to pray, they’ll let you right in, gratis. A volunteer asked if I wanted to go in and pray, and she pointed to the side door, and I could've said "yes" and just taken pictures, but that seems like a special type of sin.

Next door, an old friend. No, not that one.

This one.

By "old friend" that I mean something I read about in high school, partly for its design, and then for its, ah, difficulties.

The building is widely known for its prominent structural flaws, including an analysis that the entire building could overturn under certain wind loads and a prominent design failure of its signature blue windows, which allowed any of the 500-pound window panes to detach and fall

It was the work of I. M. Pei, and you're not.

In addition to the problems described above, it also swayed too much, which would've made upper floor tenants barf in the middle of important meetings, so they had to brace it with 1500 tons of steel to keep a stiff breeze from pushing it over. It has a certain abstract beauty, I suppose. It has a notch in the side and that makes all the difference. I'm not the nation's most enthusiastic Pei fan.

Compare it to its predecessor across the street, which was probably regarded at the time as a stolid standard example of the most basic possible interpretation of an office building.

Which it was.

"We want the construction date on the front in Roman numerals."

"Okay, but you realize - ah, well, could be worse. Could be 1933."

Nearby, a 1989 Johnson / Burgee beast that might be mistaken for a KPF. But no, it's those mad lads Phil and Jack. How they loved their overscaled classical motifs:

Post-modern and classical-revival at the time, and yes I prefer it to another rote shiny reflective glass box, but their work today wouldn't be out of place . . . in Vegas.

LATER I stopped into a Starbucks to revive, even though I do not like Starbucks. (The last bag I bought - just last week, it was on steep discount - smelled so fishy I couldn’t wait to be done with it.) There was a line and, also, it was Starbucks. Nah. I left, and a block away, Cafe Nero, for which I will always have a warm spot.

After reviving, I headed back to browse more old glories:

Tthe original storefronts! I'm sure they were covered at some point, but no more.

Finally paused in the park, where I thought “I should see if Daughter is ready for a beer before we meet the in-laws for supper.” She was! Down into the bowels for the Green heading North, except of course it’s East. It croaked and crawled along underground, stopping for prolonged periods of time; I never like that. Then into the sun, one stop after the other. I looked up to see Gilman Square as the next stop, but no: the zipper said next stop was Medford-Tufts, which was the end of the line.

Blew right past Gilman.

I went to the front of the car and asked a uniformed fellow if we weren’t stopping, and he said no, it’s an express. Well, how am I to know that. To my surprise, the driver overheard, and she stopped at the next stop. She also got on the blower to say this was a courtesy and that’s it folks and it’s straight on to the end of the line now. Once out on the platform I waved my thanks and she smiled and waved back. What a buncha massholes out here, eh?

On the way out of the station there as a table with some people handing out things, and a nice bright-faced woman handed me a piece of paper, and I took it, and she said “willing to vote Socialist next election?” And I said Oh GOD no and gave it right back. And shuddered.

I'm always curious about this old citizen.

The Knights of Malta building.

Says this pdf history:

It housed a charitable organization with roots dating back to Europe in the Middle Ages. This yellow brick building with brownstone and galvanized iron trim is a major landmark by virtue of its 4-story height and distinctively angled main facade that complements the bend in the intersecting path of Pearl and Medford Streets.

Particularly noteworthy is the equestrian bas relief near the top of the main façade which apparently alludes to the early good deeds of the Knights of Malta, also known as the Knights of the Order of St. John.

It was a business college for a while, and of couse a Signet Commandery.

Also known today as "The Piano Building," as it has, I believe, two piano merchants.

Now I’m here at the Highland Grill, waiting for N. Got an email en route from -

LATER You can guess. Didn’t read at the moment, since all emails from that source, good or ill, can be classified as a “mood altering substance.” Anyway, Natalie arrived with a big smile, and we had a fantastic IPA and an immediately delightful talk about all manner of things, work and art and life and such, and then she said one of the reasons she wanted to meet her was -

And I knew without even looking, because I’d seen them too when I arrived: the brain-testing beer coasters. Last time we got at least one; this time we were stumped. I mean, C’mon.

		We had no luck with that one. Last year I had to a special Narangasett website to get the answers; this time I just took a picture and sent it to Grok. Heavy Metal Rock Band.

After we had gotten somewhat up to date on the particulars of the day we walked to the restaurant to meet the in-laws, and passed by the usual urban decor.

Gosh whatever could it mean

		Perhaps whatever you want, because isn’t it thought provoking? Devilishly provocative? Just like the Frankie Says shirts! Eh. People in the local subreddit are either bored with it, or angry that they’re putting up the stupid stickers with superglue over murals.

Dinner at Josephine, which was all-around delicious. The day ended with a long walk around the neighborhood back in Newton, letting Walter the dog wander and stalk the rabbits.

The best day I'd had this year so far.

NEXT: Better and better.