esrosedotblog

OFF LIMITS

We live on a hill. Actually, a mesa.

They call our neighborhood 'the mesa'.

The mesa has two sides.

There is a connecting road from one side of the hill to the other.

You go up and you come down in a 'U' shape.

At the base of the 'U' at the very top, the road is actually on private property and is not a public right of way.

We have never observed this. The owner of most of the property never objected when we walked there.

But she has died and the property has been sold and we are no longer welcome to walk through the new man's property.

Now this is perfectly understandable.

If I lived up there I wouldn't want a parade of dog walkers and all going by 10 feet away from my front door either.

So I understand why he has closed the gates (and written a few terse notes to some people who went around them).

And yet, there is a feeling of loss; an entitlement (not) has been taken away.

It doesn't make sense and it will only last a few days.

If you get anything out of being 70, you get a handle on dealing with loss.

And I don't say that in a self-pitying way. Life is gain and loss. The loss is almost always replaced. Well, until the very end. Then you don't know that it happened anyway.

The costs of this one are few.

It will be a bit difficult explaining to Franklin why we can't make the U.

I will miss seeing the houses on the other side.

But there are solutions.

The magnificent view is not lost. There are many other vantage points. We will go there and stand and look and look and look.

And we can walk up the both sides separately and come back down again.

It is just that when we have a routine we don't want it to change even if it is the right thing.

Labels: neighborhood, routine