Traipse

To walk or tramp about; to gad, wander. < Old French - trapasser (to trespass).

India

Monuments to Love: the ‘Taj’

Aug 17, 2023
Romantic love announces itself, whispers itself, in a profusion of forms: by poetry, token gift or ballad, by photographs, paisley tales, portraiture, beguiling sculpture, weavings, sometimes by regretted tattoos, or clutch of flowers, by initials notched in a handy tree or desktop, by an altogether extravagant meal.  All are deeply invested signs that cannot fail […]

Monuments to Love: the ‘Taj’

2 Comments

Romantic love announces itself, whispers itself, in a profusion of forms: by poetry, token gift or ballad, by photographs, paisley tales, portraiture, beguiling sculpture, weavings, sometimes by regretted tattoos, or clutch of flowers, by initials notched in a handy tree or desktop, by an altogether extravagant meal.  All are deeply invested signs that cannot fail […]

Written by Jonathan Larson

Asia Highway #1:  A Truth Beyond Bloodletting

Jul 11, 2023
The Pan-American Highway can still lay claim to being the longest road on the planet  (see earlier blog piece).  But Asia Highway #1 running from Istanbul to Tokyo (12,774 mi./20,557 kms.) has no rival for the vast landforms, the spectacle and depth of human story it gathers on a single strand.  Unlikely sinew that spans […]

Asia Highway #1:  A Truth Beyond Bloodletting

5 Comments

The Pan-American Highway can still lay claim to being the longest road on the planet  (see earlier blog piece).  But Asia Highway #1 running from Istanbul to Tokyo (12,774 mi./20,557 kms.) has no rival for the vast landforms, the spectacle and depth of human story it gathers on a single strand.  Unlikely sinew that spans […]

Written by Jonathan Larson

Straits of Mackinac: The Wonder – and Fear – of Bridges

Jun 23, 2023
I have stood helpless, as have many others, beside wild, swollen rivers gesturing madly to figures on a far bank, voice all but drowned by thrashing water and distance.  It is a primal scene as old as humankind, one that we have for millennia fought to remedy with rafts, dugout canoes, ferries but most emphatically […]

Straits of Mackinac: The Wonder – and Fear – of Bridges

8 Comments

I have stood helpless, as have many others, beside wild, swollen rivers gesturing madly to figures on a far bank, voice all but drowned by thrashing water and distance.  It is a primal scene as old as humankind, one that we have for millennia fought to remedy with rafts, dugout canoes, ferries but most emphatically […]

Written by Jonathan Larson

Cemetery Poetry (2):  Hunger for a ‘Vaya con Dios’

Sep 11, 2022
We were standing in the street loading last bundles for a road trip when our good neighbor, Patrick, ambled over to bid us a ‘Vaya con dios’.  But before bestowing his godspeed he offered an aside.  It is these casual asides that turn out to be treasures of insight. He had been to a memorial […]

Cemetery Poetry (2):  Hunger for a ‘Vaya con Dios’

4 Comments

We were standing in the street loading last bundles for a road trip when our good neighbor, Patrick, ambled over to bid us a ‘Vaya con dios’.  But before bestowing his godspeed he offered an aside.  It is these casual asides that turn out to be treasures of insight. He had been to a memorial […]

Written by Jonathan Larson

Cemetery Poetry: The Place Where They Sleep

Aug 27, 2022
You can’t traipse very long on this mortal coil before encountering end-of-life truths.  A friend in Atlanta, in the Delta Airlines master operations room on 9-11, tells with restrained panache her version of such an encounter.  Driving blithely about town one day, she came to a familiar intersection marked by a traffic light (robot).  Since […]

Cemetery Poetry: The Place Where They Sleep

2 Comments

You can’t traipse very long on this mortal coil before encountering end-of-life truths.  A friend in Atlanta, in the Delta Airlines master operations room on 9-11, tells with restrained panache her version of such an encounter.  Driving blithely about town one day, she came to a familiar intersection marked by a traffic light (robot).  Since […]

Written by Jonathan Larson

The ‘Guest Room’: Of Cowsheds and Nightjars

May 18, 2022
Anyone with history of traipsing on a budget will have ample impressions of the phenomenon known as the ‘guest room’: sometimes kitted out in Victorian luxury, sometimes spare as a jail cell.  But always a relief.  The backstory is an ancient admonition that households do well to welcome strangers since heavenly visitors arrive in just […]

The ‘Guest Room’: Of Cowsheds and Nightjars

4 Comments

Anyone with history of traipsing on a budget will have ample impressions of the phenomenon known as the ‘guest room’: sometimes kitted out in Victorian luxury, sometimes spare as a jail cell.  But always a relief.  The backstory is an ancient admonition that households do well to welcome strangers since heavenly visitors arrive in just […]

Written by Jonathan Larson

Howrah Rail Station: Singular Scene of Human Drama

Mar 30, 2022
Sitting on the banks of a sacred river beside a massive Asian city, preens in splendor a rail station without peer in the world. At the Howrah rail complex, largest in India, 600 trains pass through daily transporting one million passengers. In many countries, this single rail station would be denoted as a city unto itself. But […]

Howrah Rail Station: Singular Scene of Human Drama

18 Comments

Sitting on the banks of a sacred river beside a massive Asian city, preens in splendor a rail station without peer in the world. At the Howrah rail complex, largest in India, 600 trains pass through daily transporting one million passengers. In many countries, this single rail station would be denoted as a city unto itself. But […]

Written by Jonathan Larson

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