Nods on the Path

o you have your own personal favorite path?

Maybe it's along the river or in a park or around a lake. It's that familiar, beloved route that you hit regularly, for exercise, fresh air, a time and place to clear your head. Maybe it's the path you take when you're out with your walking buddy or the dog or your radio headset. It's that place where the pace is familiar...and so are the faces that you pass when you're out walking, running, skating, biking.

For me, it's Lake Harriet. I love the dual route that encircles this city lake. Sometimes I'm on the walking path and sometimes I'm on the biking path, but I'm always in a good mood when I'm near the shore of this scenic body of water. It's a good three mile hike--at my pace, I can stroll it once--or roll it three times on my bike-- in just under an hour. A good way to raise my heart rate.

The walk does make my heart soar. I like to watch how the water's hue mirrors the sky. From the path, I admire the classic curve of the band shell, pause to soak in the splendid smudges of color in the rose garden, listen to the lap of the waves smack against the anchored sailboats. I gaze at the old stately mansions and monitor construction work on those getting additions or face-lifts. I smile at the Lake Harriet Streetcar conductor, looking spry and proud in his uniform. (He wears shorts all summer and has surprisingly shapely legs!) As I make my circle, I look forward to cranking the arm of the green iron pump by the South Beach, then relish the faint taste of stone in the water that arcs up in the fountain.

But more than that, I watch the people.

Those of us who are regular walkers know each other. We may not be familiar with one another's names, but we see each other. And if you pay attention, you can watch your fellow walkers change before your eyes.

I watched one woman on my path shrink this summer. I suspect she's taken up both running and dieting and she's dropped 30, 40 pounds since I started noticing. (You go, girl! Lookin' gooood!) There's a determined bearded guy who began roller blading earlier this spring and has gone from stumbling along, arms outstretched to break his fall, to breezing along with comfortable confidence. And it's not just people that I mark. There's an adorable Golden Retriever that I've watched elongate from a blond fluffball into a junior dog.

These are my path comrades. I don't exactly know them, but I know of them. Because I see them regularly. And they see me too.

And we nod at one another.

This summer, I nodded at several women while I monitored their pregnancies. One of my favorite nodding acquaintances is a fit, peppy mom-to-be with a pony tail that swings like the metronome on a piano as she strides briskly along the path, always accompanied by a man I presume to be her husband. She must be due soon. I've watched her belly swell and recently noticed that her belly button has done the old Third Trimester Pop. By Halloween, she'll be walking along with a flat stomach and a stroller.

There's another mother that I've kept my eye on. I first nodded at her last spring, just as the buds were bursting and the weather warmed up enough to welcome daily walking. When I first noticed her, she wasn't motoring too quickly. She kept her eyes on the lump in her stroller, not the path. She must have taken that baby out for a first walk the day after she came home from the hospital--when I first noticed them, the little one looked like a larvae, still all red and crumpled up upon itself, a little white cap on its head like a mushroom on its stem. She was wearing sweat pants and a shapeless shirt. I've kept watching and have observed this beloved heap of protoplasm turn into a laughing little boy, who wiggles and looks around and can almost sit up. Now his mother is back in slim yoga pants, walking with confidence, gazing at him with that contented look of love as she pulls of the path to adjust his funny hat to keep the sun off his face.

Then there was that couple. Young and clearly in love. I nodded at them, but they were often too distracted to nod back. Fit, attractive, intense. Probably late teens. They couldn't keep their hands off each other. They walked with arms wrapped around each others' waists, face turned to face, always locked intently in passionate conversation. I tried to stroll behind them on a few occasions to eavesdrop and find out exactly what they were talking about that held them in such rapt focus, but they murmured and whispered and I could never pick up more than a phrase. I regret to tell you that when I did overhear them, they were talking about where they

were going to eat. I expected more.

Now, I see her, alone. Walking slowly, staring at the path. I try to nod at her but she doesn't look up. Once I saw her seated on a bench adjacent to the path, talking and gesticulating wildly to her girlfriend. Is she working through a breakup? Did he leave her for another--or did he leave town for college, so maybe they are still together and she is just lonely for him...?

Am I the only one who is curious like this?

It's been three decades since I've lived in a small town, but I'm realize I'm still a small town kid--in fact, a hick--at heart. Call it nosy--I prefer the word 'curious'--I can't help but feel connected to those I share a city with.

I think that's one of the reasons I've always felt at home here. Minneapolis and St. Paul, the suburbs and the exurbs, are filled with people just like me. We grew up in villages, burgs, wide spots in the road and our small town values are deeply embedded in our DNA. Even people who grew up in The Cities were raised in neighborhoods and parishes, small town islands in the midst of the metropolis.

We like to know people, even if it's just to nod at them.

This summer, I know that some of the nodding strangers on my path have been watching me.

People on my path have noticed me this summer. They nodded when they saw me walking slowly on the path in June, right after surgery. I was wan and weak, wearing baggy clothes to camouflage the drains that I came home with when I was released from the hospital. They watched and nodded... as my strength returned and my pace speeded up. As my hair was shaved off in a buzz cut. As it fell out altogether. They nod when they see my bald head under my bike helmet.

They see me and the outward changes in me.

I have noticed that there are a few people don't look--in fact, they look away. They don't nod. What they see in me may be too threatening. It may make them think, Why her and not me? It may remind them of someone else who had to walk the path that I'm on and that may make them too sad to contemplate.

I've never had to be the person who is the Grim Reminder.

I don't take it personally at all. Most times, when I walk around my lake I feel part of that community of strollers, bikers, skaters. I almost feel like I felt growing up in my small home town. That I was a thread in the fabric that created the pattern of civic life. That I was acknowledged and known. That I had a place, a role, a function. That I was part of a whole that needed me.

Of course, I have real relationships, not just nod-in-passing ones. I am fortunate to have true friends who have demonstrated their devotion and affection this summer. I am also lucky to have gotten incredible support from my radio friends--people who I have a wonderfully odd relationship with. Listeners who spend time with me. This year I have felt them reach into the box to touch me and I have appreciated it more than I can say.

It is good to walk a path where you can be seen. Thank you for the nods. They make me feel like I'm home.