I pulled up to a random parking lot and began my route. I'd ride my bike, but honestly I'm never quite sure of where to lock it up. There's also the fear, perhaps irrational, that my well-loved bike will get stolen if I were to leave it in so many of the areas I explore. So, I drove.
It felt nice out tonight. Hot, sure, but nice. There was a gentleman who was walking out of a retirement home who made the same comment to me as we passed one another. This retirement community, along with a huge church and several small apartment complexes are among the numerous places I've driven past hundreds of times and have never noticed. Not having seen the church before was surprising, solely due to its size.
You can't truly know a place until you immerse yourself in it. And you can't do that without exploring slowly. Probably on foot.
My objective for the evening was to finish the neighborhood I started two evenings ago. While walking past a seemingly endless number of crepe myrtles and piles of bulk trash still on the curb, I thought — you know, maybe I don't need to traverse every stretch of pavement and trail through Dallas. Maybe 80% or so is enough? Or maybe 50% with the addition of surrounding cities?
So for now anyway, on this momentous second route through Dallas, the final goal is this — 10,000 miles through the Dallas-Fort Worth area of Texas, with 10,000 photos to accompany the miles. One photo per mile, each photo available for purchase as an NFT on the Chia blockchain.
I began the route listening to Leon Bridges and Khruangbin’s Texas Sun album and continued with whatever Apple Music decided to serve up afterwards ... Toro y Moi, Tame Impala, even a bit of Fleetwood Mac ... with the sounds of cicadas in the Texas summer and cars rolling across hot pavement that acts as a nice heatsink to keep things warm in the night.
I spent some time along major streets, Forest and Marsh, with some stretches providing an ample buffer between the sidewalk and the street, and others with none at all.
But the most important thing ... once again ... was the interactions with random people along the way. 3.5 miles and an hour of my time smiling and waving and saying hi to random people along the way. It did feel pretty nice out there. What a wonderful way to spend an hour on a random summer evening in Dallas.
