The Battle of the Wilderness, one of the crucial turning points on the Union’s path to victory in the Civil War, encompassed three days of horrendous combat in May, 1864. Those fighting to keep part of the original battlefield safe from a Wal-Mart and big-box retail development hope their own campaign will live to see […]
Entries Tagged as 'Beyond Gotham'
Wilderness Wal-Mart: A Day in Court
February 5th, 2010 · 3 Comments · Be a Mindful Activist, Beyond Gotham
Walking With the Haitian People
January 15th, 2010 · 3 Comments · Be a Mindful Activist, Beyond Gotham
The images are almost beyond belief, the damage and the suffering beyond comprehension. An earthquake gauged at 7.0, the first rumble striking Tuesday evening and lasting at least 35 seconds, destroyed an entire swath of Haiti, particularly much of its capital and largest city – Port-au-Prince. The scenes have been horrific. Bodies are lying strewn […]
Tags: architecture·cities·international
New Year’s Meditation On Snow
January 5th, 2010 · 4 Comments · Beyond Gotham
The snow is falling slowly, in its own time, on the evergreen. All is quiet. The New Year presents new possibilities and new questions. The possibilities are uncharted, the questions unanswered. Still, the present moment is enough. What if we just reside in it, stop the running thoughts, and simply behold the surroundings? Take a […]
Tags: meditations·nature
The “Fairest” Land: The Lake District
September 28th, 2009 · 10 Comments · Beyond Gotham
Beautiful landscape calls us to dream and to wander, to take paths unknown. In it, we fix our eyes both on the distant horizons and on the tiniest details at our side. It reaches into our souls, rewards and soothes us. It is the Earth’s embrace. Standing in an open field in England’s Lake District […]
Tags: England·historic preservation·international·nature·spiritual places·stone·trails
Summer Day’s Meditation at the Ashokan
August 25th, 2009 · 4 Comments · Beyond Gotham
It’s the very essence of calm, a still surface of blue-silver water reflecting billowy cumulus clouds above. Large shafts of light pour down through the clouds at angles on the shoreline, creating swaths of light-green trees in the middle of darker pines and bejeweled light on the water. On a 90-degree humid day, I can […]
Wal-Mart: A Step Closer at the Wilderness
July 1st, 2009 · 6 Comments · Beyond Gotham
If land where the Union and Confederacy fought the Battle of the Wilderness in the Civil War is to remain hallowed ground, now is the time to speak up. Within the boundaries of this historic battlefield in Orange County, Virginia, Wal-Mart proposes to build a 138,000-square-foot supercenter. Its plans for the commercial development received the […]
Kingston Point’s Varied Lives
June 10th, 2009 · 11 Comments · Beyond Gotham
Sometimes, surprising beauty lies behind a nondescript gate. At the end of a long street in Kingston, N.Y., and behind a wrought iron gate, lies a sparkling little park. It’s situated on the Hudson River near where the Rondout Creek flows into the wide river, so that water seems to surround the park. It has […]
When GPS Becomes Gee…BS
March 13th, 2009 · 2 Comments · Beyond Gotham
The headline at least – “Blazing a Trail With a Smartphone, Visual Signposts Included” – promised a wondrous experience. The New York Times column on Wednesday, March 11 focused on some software that can turn your GPS-enabled cellphone into a dynamo that allows you to navigate a route and post photos, audio clips, and descriptive […]
Lists: Ten Actions for Sustainable Cities
February 20th, 2009 · 2 Comments · Be a Mindful Activist, Beyond Gotham
Gas prices are at an average of $1.96 per gallon, far below the $4-plus they hit last year. The price of oil amid a global recession that has sharply curtailed demand declines to $35 per barrel on Feb. 20. People are fearful as many lose jobs and others go through foreclosures. In such an environment, […]
A Winter Walk at the Ashokan Reservoir
February 9th, 2009 · 8 Comments · Beyond Gotham
Seasons come to our bodies much like they do to trees and mountains, lakes and bays. Each individually has its own rhythm and signs of changing, adapting, and flowing from one season to the next, until the momentum of so many heralds the new season en masse. Beckoned by the brilliant sunshine, predictions of temperatures […]
Tags: Catskills·Hudson Valley·nature
Wal-Mart’s Threat to a Historic Battlefield
December 23rd, 2008 · 2 Comments · Beyond Gotham
Recently, a bankruptcy expert told a Bloomberg Radio interviewer that the United States is “over-stored” – it has far too much retail space than is needed to serve American consumers. Amidst the holiday shopping blitz, I thought of this observation as I read this week of the plans by Wal-Mart to construct a new 141,000-square […]
A Walk: The Purple Heart Hall of Honor
November 17th, 2008 · 9 Comments · Beyond Gotham
Frank Emberson was wounded on Dec. 21, 1944, while fighting in Luxembourg during World War II. But when the bullet passed through his arm, a packet of family photos in Emberson’s breast pocket deflected it from hitting the Army soldier’s chest, thus saving his life. The story itself is moving, but seeing the small envelope […]
Tags: Hudson Valley·museums
Pittsburgh’s Streets and Burbs
October 29th, 2008 · 15 Comments · Beyond Gotham
Talk about a starkly different experience of walking. I love to take walks wherever I go – to explore, relax, exercise, and take in the surroundings. While visiting my family in Western Pennsylvania this year — or “Western PA” as we natives call it — I could hardly have had a more different experience of […]
Tags: cities·Pittsburgh·suburbs·trails
