Sidewalks
Stand-still-ville (really Stanfordville) is an old community whose initial settlers never made sidewalks. After three years of residing in the town, it hit me how much I missed cement slabs. Standstillville’s a half hour from anything, so I’d often be driving to and through other towns to get something I needed. In these travels, I passed development after development of the cookie cutter, vinyl sided box houses, the kind with neutral beige/tan (lack of) color schemes. These newer developments often didn’t have sidewalks. The older communities through which I drove often had sidewalks, but not a single pedestrian was using them.
It was strange to me, driving though towns with abandoned sidewalks and passing new developments with no sidewalks upon which to walk. Maybe sidewalks are disappearing, I thought, Or maybe I’m just crazy. A couple weeks after that thought, I saw a news banner online while checking my email. The headline read:
Top Ten Things Disappearing In America
I clicked the link. As the page loaded, I wondered what would make the list: spirit, jobs, a fair shake, retirement, an honest politician, face to face communication amongst the citizenry. To my surprise, none of those made the list, but sidewalks did. This little article helped me realize that my theory of the disappearing sidewalk was not crazy. I find it rare that my inside voice is ever validated on the news.
We all have these inside voices. They speak with thoughts of ‘whatever happened to...’ or ‘I betcha things could be different if...’ Our inside voices often go unexpressed to each other and to the world. Thoughts just tumble around the dome in conversations with one’s self and the multiple personalities that exist within us.
It’s humorous when I hear the condition, Multiple Personality Disorder. There’s a chorus of personalities living inside of us. There’s the lover, the hater, the joker, the angel, the devil, the selfish, the self-less, the dreamer, the pragmatist. As if that’s not enough to juggle, there are those personas issued by society. The student, the teacher, the worker, the boss. We are simultaneously all these things and none of these things.
As I wander on the remaining sidewalks wondering, whatever happened to the human spirit, I talk to all my multiple personalities. We all chime in, building the right conditions to create radical shifts and quantum leaps in consciousness starting with little steps. And after a good dream session with all of my multiple personalities, I tell them all to take a hike.
I’m just a soul walking around, on sidewalks again (thank you Rhinebeck). I’m waiting for this dream to manifest. The dream where we all wake up from The American Dream. The dream where we all meet up outside on the sidewalks and let loose our multiple personalities. The dream where we live and let live. I think that could happen. Or maybe, I’m just crazy.
Chicago is full of sidewalks but you'll never know!
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