Category: Hiking
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Summer Summer Summer
My kid has started counting down the days until Summer vacation. (She has 17 days left.) Schools about to be out forever, and the sweaters and coats are being packed away for another season. She is talking about swimming and vacations, and going to the beach all the time now. The start of Summer is so close, yet still far away for her, but the idea of Summer seems infinite – long hot days, and then cool evenings sitting on the couch in air conditioning.
I try not plan too much of her Summer. We’ll do some trips to museums, and we’ll hit up the local community pool. The kid has told me that she wants to work on her soccer skills, and I think I can convince her to go hiking. What I would really like to do is put her to work on a few home improvement projects around here. I would like to paint the living room, and I think I could make that a life lesson that she needs to learn.
You know, I enjoyed my time as a kid, and to be honest, if I had a choice of going back and being a kid again, I would not take it. I like being an adult. BUT! If there is one feeling I could relive one more time, it would be that feeling on the last day of school, when the bell rings for the final time, and you are free to go forth on your Summer vacation. That felling of weight being lifted, of freedom, excitement, possibility… That! If I could just grasp that feeling once more.
I do get the next best thing, which is seeing my daughter live it.
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Need to Get Outta Here
I have been feeling a little stir-crazy in the apartment of late. Spring has arrived, we even had two days of Summer, and with the windows open, warmer weather, and everything turning green, being in the City all the time has started to feel like a drag. It’s time to do some travelling and see something new. Well… newish would also work.
We are fortunate enough to have a car, and during the Pandemic, it was a lifeline as it allowed us to get out of New York, and see green spaces, or spaces that had no people so we could spread out. We even went through, what we can now define as, our hiking phase which took us all over the Tri-State area. But the wife has a back injury, so hiking has taking a backburner role in our life, at least until the wife gets her full mobility back. Yet, with the car, we can travel in the realm of day trips.
That’s where I am at right now. I’m a bit anxious to get in the car and just drive up along the Hudson, and look at antiques. Maybe even a charming café would be nice. I won’t say no to a craft brewery, as I am a man of that age, and the wife can drive home.
But what I really want is to just go. To move, get action, sully on to someplace. To be in motion and not feel static.
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Short Story Review: “Five Bridges” by Colm Tóibín
(The short story “Five Bridges” by Colm Tóibín appeared in the March 10th, 2025 issue of The New Yorker.)
Photograph by Todd Hido for The New Yorker
Sometimes when I start reading a short story, in the back of my mind, I start rooting for it. You know, cheering it on, hoping that the story succeeds. Like wishing that your favorite ballplayer hits a homerun when they’re at the plate. So you see, I found myself really pulling for Colm Tóibín’s “Five Bridges” to do well, and accomplish its goals.
Here’s an overly simplified synopsis: Paul, an Irish guy who has been living in the United States illegally for over thirty years, has decided to move back to Ireland, but in so doing, that will mean he will have to leave his daughter, whom he fathered with woman he never married. But before he leaves, his daughter wants Paul, the mother and the mother’s husband, to all hike Mount Tam which is outside of San Francisco.
It all starts well. The first section is about Paul hiking with his daughter, Geraldine, and then she tells him her idea about everyone hiking together to Mount Tam. Then at a very leisurely pace, we learn about the strained relationship Paul has with Geraldine’s mother, Sandra. We learn about Paul’s profession as an unlicensed plumber, his socks filled with cash, and his recovery over his alcoholism. Then the story takes a rather hard right turn with the introduction of Paul’s friend Kirwan, another Irishman, and the semi support group Kirwan creates for other single Irishmen living in the Bay Area. Then the story shifts back to Paul, Geraldine, Sandra and her husband, Stan, as the hike up the mount. I’ll leave it there as to not ruin the ending.
As you can see, Tóibín layers his story, and generally it all works together smoothly, with the exception of that hard-right turn with Kirwan. Also, several themes play under the surface here; fathers and daughters, blended families, immigration, culture clashes, redemption, penance… And as the story went on, and I got closer and closer to the final page, that’s when I started hoping and rooting for this story to all pull together.
I was enjoying what I was reading, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that nothing was getting it’s full due time to resolve itself. When I encounter stories that feel like this, it’s hard for me to shake the feeling that the piece needs a larger format (a novel) to explore the characters, motivations and themes. I wouldn’t go as far to say I was disappointed with the story; more like I was pulling for it, and wanted to it work.
