I took a really nice walk on the Cliff Walk recently. The best part was the second half. People often think of the earlier stuff (
Forty Steps, even
Ruggles) as the highlights. They are highlights. They're terrific (!). But the best stuff most definitely comes later: that little beach at Marine Avenue, the
funky tea house at Marble House, the dark corrugated (creepy?) tunnel shaped somewhat like an Easter Egg that socks you in, in blinding darkness, while promising a return to light at the other end ...
But before I got there — to the tunnel & beyond — as I was just about to pass
Rosecliff, I spied some kids. It's all relative, of course; anyone younger than oneself is a kid. Or that's how it seems after a certain age ...
Anyway, these kids — who may have been 20-somethings, though I've really lost all ability to judge — were engaged in assorted harmless if dubious activities such as skateboarding (on the Cliff Walk?) and climbing up for a peek over the Rosecliff wall.
I felt such pleasure at their pleasure ... then I got on my way. Past the tea house, through the tunnels, on toward
Rough Point, all the way to Ledge Road, where I turned around. On the way back I saw other things — that's always the way — including any number of numbers I'd never noticed before and a weird T-shaped bar driven into a rock.
Then I saw the "kids" again ... and they saw me looking at the T-shaped bar.
"Did you get some good pictures?" the leader of the kids asked, with amused (cynical?) innocence.
Kids. They think they're the only ones who do stuff, who try stuff, who break the rules (a little), who know how to have fun ...
