I have a love-hate relationship with the New York State Thruway nurtured over decades of traveling it, primarily to Central New York, as both driver and passenger. I appreciate its efficiency, the ease with which I can skirt densely populated areas at high speed, the straight shot that gets me from here to there almost effortlessly with my E-Z Pass, as long as I remember which exit to take. It's a highly engineered process.It's all process, though, and that's what I hate about it: I am neither here nor there, merely in transition, and while sometimes this in-between state can be conducive to thought, especially when driving alone, it's dangerous to fall too deeply into the rapture of the road. I rush lemming-like along a concrete conveyor in a kind of limbo where I slow down or stop at my peril, and the momentum seems to be out of my control. I have often made a conscious effort to be less lead-footed, to relax and enjoy the drive, but once I enter the slipstream of traffic, my good intentions fall by the wayside, and it becomes a point of honor to pass as many of the other lemmings as possible.
As the years go by, however, my definition of "making good time" has changed considerably, so almost every time I travel to my sister's house in Skaneateles these days, I pick up U.S. Route 20 at Darien Center and turn east with a peaceful sigh. Since Route 20 becomes Genesee Street, the main drag of Skaneateles, all I have to do is follow my nose.
Before the Thruway, which lies north and mostly parallel to it, was built, Route 20 was the main east-west highway across New York State, and in some places the past shows in derelict mom-and-pop motels and abandoned diners. In many others, though, Route 20 is alive and well and catering to the tractor-trailer drivers heading west from Interstate 390.
Although I meet a few of the semis heading toward Buffalo, for the first 20 miles or so out of Darien Center I can generally count on splendid solitude with no reason under the sun to go any faster than the posted limit. I have time to observe, to notice small things---signs along the road, circling redtail hawks, farmstands touting the season's first asparagus, white geese in a front yard which are not lawn ornaments.
When I first started taking Route 20 a couple of years ago, the place names rang only faint bells: Here is Alexander, which I know mainly because the volunteer fire department band always marches in our town's parades, and here is Pavilion Center, familiar from local deejays' lists of school closings.
Along this stretch in the Town of Bethany there's a large barn close to the road, on the door of which, in foot-high letters is the message, "DAVE'S NOT HERE." The letters are always freshly painted, the door always swung back to face the road, leaving me to speculate that "Dave" is NEVER there and making me wonder why he is so sought-after.
Just past Fox River Antiques (a big white barn that I have vowed one day to visit) Route 20 merges with Route 5, and the distinctive blue-and-gold highway markers of Livingston County appear, giving me the fleeting impression that I have strayed into foreign territory. The Village of Avon is the first settlement of size, home to a couple of pottery shops, a Dairy of Distinction, and a mini plaza with Tops Market. (I am holding out for the Wegmans in Canandaigua.) Next is the Village of Lima, a neat, pretty, and prosperous farming community, which recently succeeded in preserving its bucolic character against the onslaught of a proposed Wal-Mart Super Center. Having been there and done that as a resident of East Aurora, I give the denizens of "The Crossroads of Western New York" a drive-by high-five.
The Bloomfields, East and West, are the next points of interest. Settlements of quirky cottages behind picket fences, gracious stately homes, and country inns, they could have been transported in their entirety from New England and gently dropped among Upstate New York's rolling hills. East Bloomfield (birthplace of the Northern Spy apple) in particular shows its Yankee lineage with not one, but two simple white churches---one of them Congregational---facing each other across a genuine village green.
On the outskirts, so as not to distract from the charm of the village itself, there are strings of antique shops, of which my favorite is the by-appointment-only dealer in old and rare books, who periodically announces on his sign the availability of "literary kittens, free to good homes."
Canandaigua, the first city on the itinerary, welcomes me with all the amenities I might require in a series of strip malls, fast-food restaurants, gas stations, and chain drugstores along a widened, divided Route 20 with turning lanes, stop signs, and strategically placed traffic signals. No need to go through the city center (which is charming), no opportunity to see the lake. "Your money," Canandaigua seems to say, "can stay, but would you please leave? Here, we'll make it easy for you." I can take a hint; I make a quick pit stop at Wegmans, pick up some baked goods to take to my sister's and a Diet Pepsi, and get back on the road.
Contrast that atmosphere with the college town of Geneva, where a thriving business district abuts the fraternity houses and playing fields of the Hobart-William Smith campus with its enviable hilltop view of Seneca Lake. I sweep down the the hill and along the lakeshore, near the Finger Lakes at last.
Although I apparently leave the water behind as I continue toward Waterloo (birthplace of Memorial Day, and don't you forget it!), the most modest homes---even a trailer park---on the south side of the highway boast a dock or a boat slip. They are lucky enough to have frontage on a narrow canal connecting Seneca and Cayuga lakes, and I often weigh the dilapidation of the available real estate against the seasonal pleasures of sitting on my own dock at sunset... Nah!
Waterloo itself would not be much of a change of environment; its sprucely kept mercantile center parallels East Aurora's in vintage, style, and aspiration. East Aurora's Main Street business district is not quite as large, but Waterloo has nothing like Vidler's. So there.
For character, I prefer Seneca Falls, and not merely for its history as the birthplace of the women's rights movement. "Gracious" is the word that leaps to mind as the route swings hard left from a string of one-of-a-kind shops meant for browsing onto a broad, tree-lined avenue of large, lovingly restored Victorian houses set well back on wide lawns. It is a town designed for strolling.
Veering temporarily away from the lakes, I skirt the Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge and am pleased to see that the bald eagle's nest, incongruously constructed atop an electrical pylon, is still there. Maybe there are new eaglets...
And now for a touch of Route 20 irony: Red, white, and blue signs surmounted by American flags dotted along both sides of the road, reading "No Sovereign Nation, No Reservation." They mark the boundaries of the Cayuga Indian Land Claim, which comes nearly to the tract dominated by BassPro, purveyor of metal-tipped arrows, nylon tents, and aluminum canoes, in Auburn's Finger Lakes Mall.
Auburn is where my sister goes to shop at Wegmans, Wal-Mart, or Office Max. It has all the big-box stores, fast-food franchises, and auto dealerships deemed necessary for suburban life but distasteful to suburban sensibilities. There are still attractive older neighborhoods in Auburn, though, that are markedly more affordable than the houses further east on Route 20 across the Onondaga County line, so the city is essentially an outer-ring suburb of Syracuse.
It's all downhill from there. Literally.
I slow as I approach the Skaneateles limits marked with the sign, "Gateway to the Eastern Finger Lakes." On the right is the cemetery where my husband's parents' remains are buried under a huge pine tree; on the left is the posh new Mirabeau spa, which purportedly draws beautiful people from Manhattan determined to become more beautiful. Then I pass The Krebs, West Lake Road, and the Sherwood Inn, which faces the lake and the mooring of the lake steamer Judge Ben E. Wiles.
An old hand at this after all these years, I keep to the right at the light beside the Blue Water Grill. Only tourists get stuck in the left lane, where they must turn onto Jordan Street whether they want to or not. I continue up Genesee Street past the ever-so-clever boutiques, an inviting old public library (where the children's room features murals by Skaneateles resident Patience Brewster), lakeside Thayer Park, and St. James Episcopal Church, where I was married on a Thanksgiving weekend 46 years ago. The good women of St. James operate a thrift shop closer to the village center that I never miss visiting, but I'd better not stop now or my sister will wonder what happened to me.
Before losing sight of the lake I say Hi to Pete, whose ashes are out there somewhere under the waves. He doesn't reply, and I don't expect him to because he never does. I have always assumed he is otherwise occupied. As one of his friends wrote me after his passing, "He's in a better place, where it's always a great day to go sailing."
With the Stella Maris retreat house on the right, I hang a left onto Onondaga Street, just the length of a track on the CD player away from my sister's driveway. Now that's what I call a good time!
As the years go by, however, my definition of "making good time" has changed considerably, so almost every time I travel to my sister's house in Skaneateles these days, I pick up U.S. Route 20 at Darien Center and turn east with a peaceful sigh. Since Route 20 becomes Genesee Street, the main drag of Skaneateles, all I have to do is follow my nose.
Before the Thruway, which lies north and mostly parallel to it, was built, Route 20 was the main east-west highway across New York State, and in some places the past shows in derelict mom-and-pop motels and abandoned diners. In many others, though, Route 20 is alive and well and catering to the tractor-trailer drivers heading west from Interstate 390.
Although I meet a few of the semis heading toward Buffalo, for the first 20 miles or so out of Darien Center I can generally count on splendid solitude with no reason under the sun to go any faster than the posted limit. I have time to observe, to notice small things---signs along the road, circling redtail hawks, farmstands touting the season's first asparagus, white geese in a front yard which are not lawn ornaments.
When I first started taking Route 20 a couple of years ago, the place names rang only faint bells: Here is Alexander, which I know mainly because the volunteer fire department band always marches in our town's parades, and here is Pavilion Center, familiar from local deejays' lists of school closings.
Along this stretch in the Town of Bethany there's a large barn close to the road, on the door of which, in foot-high letters is the message, "DAVE'S NOT HERE." The letters are always freshly painted, the door always swung back to face the road, leaving me to speculate that "Dave" is NEVER there and making me wonder why he is so sought-after.
Just past Fox River Antiques (a big white barn that I have vowed one day to visit) Route 20 merges with Route 5, and the distinctive blue-and-gold highway markers of Livingston County appear, giving me the fleeting impression that I have strayed into foreign territory. The Village of Avon is the first settlement of size, home to a couple of pottery shops, a Dairy of Distinction, and a mini plaza with Tops Market. (I am holding out for the Wegmans in Canandaigua.) Next is the Village of Lima, a neat, pretty, and prosperous farming community, which recently succeeded in preserving its bucolic character against the onslaught of a proposed Wal-Mart Super Center. Having been there and done that as a resident of East Aurora, I give the denizens of "The Crossroads of Western New York" a drive-by high-five.
The Bloomfields, East and West, are the next points of interest. Settlements of quirky cottages behind picket fences, gracious stately homes, and country inns, they could have been transported in their entirety from New England and gently dropped among Upstate New York's rolling hills. East Bloomfield (birthplace of the Northern Spy apple) in particular shows its Yankee lineage with not one, but two simple white churches---one of them Congregational---facing each other across a genuine village green.
On the outskirts, so as not to distract from the charm of the village itself, there are strings of antique shops, of which my favorite is the by-appointment-only dealer in old and rare books, who periodically announces on his sign the availability of "literary kittens, free to good homes."
Canandaigua, the first city on the itinerary, welcomes me with all the amenities I might require in a series of strip malls, fast-food restaurants, gas stations, and chain drugstores along a widened, divided Route 20 with turning lanes, stop signs, and strategically placed traffic signals. No need to go through the city center (which is charming), no opportunity to see the lake. "Your money," Canandaigua seems to say, "can stay, but would you please leave? Here, we'll make it easy for you." I can take a hint; I make a quick pit stop at Wegmans, pick up some baked goods to take to my sister's and a Diet Pepsi, and get back on the road.
Contrast that atmosphere with the college town of Geneva, where a thriving business district abuts the fraternity houses and playing fields of the Hobart-William Smith campus with its enviable hilltop view of Seneca Lake. I sweep down the the hill and along the lakeshore, near the Finger Lakes at last.
Although I apparently leave the water behind as I continue toward Waterloo (birthplace of Memorial Day, and don't you forget it!), the most modest homes---even a trailer park---on the south side of the highway boast a dock or a boat slip. They are lucky enough to have frontage on a narrow canal connecting Seneca and Cayuga lakes, and I often weigh the dilapidation of the available real estate against the seasonal pleasures of sitting on my own dock at sunset... Nah!
Waterloo itself would not be much of a change of environment; its sprucely kept mercantile center parallels East Aurora's in vintage, style, and aspiration. East Aurora's Main Street business district is not quite as large, but Waterloo has nothing like Vidler's. So there.
For character, I prefer Seneca Falls, and not merely for its history as the birthplace of the women's rights movement. "Gracious" is the word that leaps to mind as the route swings hard left from a string of one-of-a-kind shops meant for browsing onto a broad, tree-lined avenue of large, lovingly restored Victorian houses set well back on wide lawns. It is a town designed for strolling.
Veering temporarily away from the lakes, I skirt the Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge and am pleased to see that the bald eagle's nest, incongruously constructed atop an electrical pylon, is still there. Maybe there are new eaglets...
And now for a touch of Route 20 irony: Red, white, and blue signs surmounted by American flags dotted along both sides of the road, reading "No Sovereign Nation, No Reservation." They mark the boundaries of the Cayuga Indian Land Claim, which comes nearly to the tract dominated by BassPro, purveyor of metal-tipped arrows, nylon tents, and aluminum canoes, in Auburn's Finger Lakes Mall.
Auburn is where my sister goes to shop at Wegmans, Wal-Mart, or Office Max. It has all the big-box stores, fast-food franchises, and auto dealerships deemed necessary for suburban life but distasteful to suburban sensibilities. There are still attractive older neighborhoods in Auburn, though, that are markedly more affordable than the houses further east on Route 20 across the Onondaga County line, so the city is essentially an outer-ring suburb of Syracuse.
It's all downhill from there. Literally.
I slow as I approach the Skaneateles limits marked with the sign, "Gateway to the Eastern Finger Lakes." On the right is the cemetery where my husband's parents' remains are buried under a huge pine tree; on the left is the posh new Mirabeau spa, which purportedly draws beautiful people from Manhattan determined to become more beautiful. Then I pass The Krebs, West Lake Road, and the Sherwood Inn, which faces the lake and the mooring of the lake steamer Judge Ben E. Wiles.
An old hand at this after all these years, I keep to the right at the light beside the Blue Water Grill. Only tourists get stuck in the left lane, where they must turn onto Jordan Street whether they want to or not. I continue up Genesee Street past the ever-so-clever boutiques, an inviting old public library (where the children's room features murals by Skaneateles resident Patience Brewster), lakeside Thayer Park, and St. James Episcopal Church, where I was married on a Thanksgiving weekend 46 years ago. The good women of St. James operate a thrift shop closer to the village center that I never miss visiting, but I'd better not stop now or my sister will wonder what happened to me.
Before losing sight of the lake I say Hi to Pete, whose ashes are out there somewhere under the waves. He doesn't reply, and I don't expect him to because he never does. I have always assumed he is otherwise occupied. As one of his friends wrote me after his passing, "He's in a better place, where it's always a great day to go sailing."
With the Stella Maris retreat house on the right, I hang a left onto Onondaga Street, just the length of a track on the CD player away from my sister's driveway. Now that's what I call a good time!
No comments:
Post a Comment