The Character of Landscape

I left my house early this morning to get to my chapter board meeting. Where I live is just east of downtown, which means I have to take one freeway and then go through an interchange to get to the mother of all messes - the Downtown Connector. Someone in an office somewhere in Atlanta decided it would be a GREAT idea to take two major north/south interstates and combine them as they went through downtown. Brilliant.

Traffic on the connector can range from terrible to horrendous at any given hour of the day. It's my only route north, however, so a girl has to do what a girl has to do. I have a trusty minivan and I know how to merge.

This morning, however, the connector was nearly empty. You see - the one thing guaranteed to empty the freeway in Atlanta is the threat of snow. Even though only a light mist drifted about the city everyone else must have been at home by the window (wringing their hands, I'm sure). Since I wasn't gritting my teeth and using my spare hand to flip off other rude drivers, I had the ability to enjoy the downtown landscape.

I love the city. The buildings stand in their rows like patrons at the bank on the day social security checks are deposited. Varied, resolute, stout, clean, dirty, ornate, prim., expansive. The mist obscures the tops on days with bad weather - making the tallest buildings appear to just disapear into the ether. The jumble and hodge podge is my kind of landscape. I prefer the mess and brilliance of man to the uniformity of nature. Each window on each building is a story waiting.

I suppose I'm not just a people-watcher. I'm a building observer. For me, landscape is perhaps the greatest and most important character study.