Loving Boston and Prices to Be Paid

 

I lived in Boston for many years at 15 Wigglesworth Sreet named for Dr. Wigglesworth, who taught at Harvard Medical a century plus ago, and on The Riverway, the last apartment building before Brookline.

 

I loved both locations: the townhouses on Wigglesworth with their miniature gardens in front and fenced-in tiny backyards and later the apartment building where I knew all my neighbors, students and permanent owners. 

I learned to believe in coincidence on The Riverway. When my uncle and aunt visited me there, they discovered they had lived in my flat when they were newlyweds. Then when my daughter at 16 participated in an exchange with the Goethe institute, one of the German girls, told me her parents had lived there when her father was at Harvard Medical. She had seen a photo with the exact same view as from my living room window to prove it.

But it wasn't just the housing I loved. There was something about being surrounded by universities: Harvard Medical, Dental, Simmons, Emmanuel, Northeastern, Boston College of Art, Wentworth and 30+ more. Perhaps a little less fun when streets were clogged with moving vans as students descended for the school year.

I loved being in walking distance of the Fenway and having an allotment to produce less than bountiful crops.

There was a good choice of theater and music, greater than my budget, but we did have season tickets to the Boston Ballet. 

Shear Madness closed after 40 years. I usually took out-of-town guests to see it.

 

There was the Revels celebrating the winter solstice on years when we could get tickets. 

Likewise special Boston Symphony performances, Boston Pops and just plain street music made my ears happy. I saw most of the stage musicals over the years in the Theater District.

Across the Charles River was Harvard Square where we went many Friday nights to renew our book collections, eat at one of the many restaurants and listen to street musicians.

There was the Boston Museum of Art. I could get off at the T-stop and drop into a gallery or two. 

And there was the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum where I sometimes studied on a Sunday afternoon while I was doing a masters at Boston University.

The T was outside our door and down the block to take us anywhere in the city. 

I loved the ducks from the book Make Way for Ducklings first read to me at four. Someone dresses them depending on what is going on in the city. It didn't surprise me to find them  in pussy hats. Naturally the mother duck would be a feminist.

In the background was the golden State House dome that my grandfather had worked on as an engineer when repairs were being made.

Boston Common had the swan boats and the Frog Pond where one hot summer day, my four-year-old daughter waded even though she had on a pretty dress. Most blades of grass in Boston have memories.

I even loved Boston in snow. I remember a neighbor, an eccentric man who taught decoupage saying, "Kevin (the mayor) is running again." "How do you know," I asked. "Our street has been plowed twice," he said.

If I had not sold my condo, it would be paid for today and I still could do the things I loved doing. However, I would not have moved to Europe and had incredible other experiences.

Giving up my nationality so I could have a bank account meant I could never live in the U.S. again. At the time I renounced, there was a bill before Congress that expats who renounced could never enter the U.S. again. Fortunately, it went nowhere. Not that I would change my new life for the old.

Choices and change can expand life's experiences. It can also bury memories in one's heart and soul to take out and enjoy at will. There are always prices to be paid, but I've happily paid these prices on my living choices. They have been so enriching.