They paved paradise, and put up a parking lot

Rumor has it that the diggers and backhoes that wake me up every morning at 6 a.m. (but are now conspicuously silent at 4:21) are tearing down what once was a rolling, beautifully landscaped hill in back of the art museum and are putting up a parking lot. I certainly hope not, but all signs point to it. There have taken out the grey granite boulders, torn off all the grass and flowers, covered all the statues with goldish garbage bags and left a once lovely hill naked, brown and ugly.

Maybe its a sign that its time to leave Philly.

I find that when I am approaching the end of an era, my dual tendencies are to 1. Relish all the lasts and memorialize the present, i.e. eat another cheese steak and actually believe that I enjoy what I am eating or 2. Find fault everywhere and emotionally prepare to distant myself into a clean break off or 3. Not think about it. If it was a warm sunny day instead of a overcast dreary one, I might not be so inclined to be disgruntled with the stripped hill and whoever approved it at City Hall. I would probably be out and about getting in once last trip to the Waterworks museum and taking one last walk to the used bookstore on the corner. Or eating one last water ice, getting one last parking ticket, taking one last stroll through a dilapidated street in North Philly, hearing one last blast of obscene rap music pouring out the windows of a 1984 Lincoln and turning up my classical 90.1 in retaliation...

Instead I am in writing a blog and Madeline is still sleeping (she's been taking a nap for three hours!) but I think I might just go wake her up and go to the local produce stand one last time....we're out of carrots.