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 Julie's Jolly Tour of Boston Early the next morning, Julie and I walked to the nearby subway station in Somerville and hopped on the "T" for a ride into Boston. Folks in Massachusetts, as Julie told me, abbreviate just about everything, like cutting the "Massachusetts Turnpike," which I'd driven the day before, down to just "Mass Pike." People here are in a hurry, dammit, and don't have time to utter non-essential syllables.
They've also pared down the subway transit agency, officially known as the Metropolitan Transportation Authority – not to M.T.A., as you might suspect, but all the way down to the T. That's it: just the T. Back in 1773, Bostonians rejected tea (from England at the Boston Tea Party) but now they love the T and many of them use it every day.
For the rest of Sunday, Julie and I rode the T all around Boston as she showed me her wonderful city. She even showed me the largest construction project in U.S. history, a massive freeway tunnel complex known as the "Big Dig" that's being built under the Boston Harbor. I had heard a lot about the Big Dig, especially since my company, Parsons Brinckerhoff, is one of the prime contractors for it. Mike Wallace and 60 Minutes broadcast an expose on the Big Dig a few years ago, but in fairness to PB, the project has been one headache after another, similar to the kinds of projects I worked on at PB in Portland but on a much larger scale.
It was good to see that, despite the Big Dig, Boston hadn't changed much since the last time I visited back in '76. With enough historical sites to satisfy even the most fanatical history buff (like me), the city has one foot in the past. However, with 60 colleges and universities located here, the city is youthful and energetic, and it's clear that Boston has the other foot planted firmly in the future. Boston has a reputation for being a little snooty, which may be true, but in the two days that I spent there it seemed like a pretty terrific place.
One of the lighter moments of the day occurred as Julie and I sat outside historic Faneuil Hall and I read aloud from a Boston tour book about the correct way to pronounce the name "Faneuil." Quoting from the book, I said, "The hall should never be pronounced 'Funnel' or – horrors – 'Fennel'."
Julie looked puzzled and said, "Whores?" I laughed, then I said, "No, not whores. Horrors." As we talked loudly about "horrors" and "whores," several passersby stared at us, causing us both to bust up with laughter.
Late in the afternoon we visited the Bull & Finch pub, better known as the setting for the T.V. show, "Cheers" and I took a peek inside. I found it dark, noisy, and packed, so I didn't linger there too long. Before I left, though, I struck up a conversation with the pub's doorman, a nice guy named Justin. After I told Justin that I was heading to Australia soon, he said that he'd been there a few months earlier. He gave me a few tips, then said, "And by the way, Australian women are less, um, reserved than American women." That piqued my curiosity and I wanted to pursue it, but Julie was waiting for me outside.
After my requisite pose and photo in front of the Cheers pub, Julie and I found a hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant in Beacon Hill and had a delicious dinner, then we rode the T back to her place. It was a terrific day, certainly one of the best of my trip so far, and it was nice to know that, 25 years after my first visit, Boston was still a great city.
But I guess coin flips or not, there could be only one Boston.
Above left: Julie's house in Boston. That's her multi-colored Equal Exchange coffee van in the background with its solar-powered electric coffee brewer. My truck is in the foreground. Above right: Riding the M.T.A. subway (or just the T) into downtown Boston. The subway system in Boston works great. If you come to Boston, don't drive and deal with those – and I'm quoting here from my AAA book – "aggressive" Boston drivers. Just take the T.
Above left: The new and the old. Above center: Downtown Boston from the top of the John Hancock Building. Above right: Commonwealth Avenue, known as "Comm Ave." (they shorten everything in Boston). This is a snooty section of the city, according to Julie, and a place where I could never afford to live. There were lots of beautiful women on Comm Ave but they weren't my type.
Above left: Here's what Boston looked like in the 1700s. The city used to be connected to the mainland by a narrow causeway. Modern Boston is shown in the light blue shade. Above center: There are lots of interesting old gravestones in the Granary Burying Ground in the middle of downtown Boston, including those of Paul Revere, John Hancock, and the victims of the 1770 Boston Massacre. To make mowing easier, though, they moved the gravestones several years ago and no one knows where anyone is actually buried anymore. Above right: Here's the gravestone of Mother Goose (a.k.a. Mary Goose, wife of Isaac Goose) who died in 1690. Until I saw this gravestone, I didn't realize that there really was a Mother Goose.
Above left: Old glories. Above right: Boston is a photographer's paradise. I shot over 250 pictures here in just a few hours.
Above left: South Market near Fanueil Hall is lively on a Sunday afternoon. Julie and I had a animated discussion here about "whores" and "horrors." Above right: The Union Oyster House opened in 1828 and is the oldest continuously operating restaurant in America.
Above left: The Bull and Finch pub in Beacon Hill inspired the television show, "Cheers," which ran for 11 years starting in 1982. Of course, this is the place "where everyone knows your name" (as long as your name is Norm). Above center: A dorky tourist outside Cheers. Above right: I went downstairs to the bar but nobody knew my name. They shot the opening scene of "Cheers" here, but the inside is very different – much darker, for one thing.
Above left: This is the Central Artery Project, known locally as "The Big Dig" and the largest construction project in American history. It's a huge hole that sucks up taxpayer dollars. Above center: Here's our Big Dig (into the fried rice) at a Chinese restaurant in Beacon Hill. Above right: The State House, where the "Boston Massacre" occurred in 1770, is dwarfed today by modern skyscrapers.
Above left: Waiting for the T to head to Cambridge. Above right: A tower at Harvard University. Established in 1636, a few years after my ancestors settled in this area, Harvard is the oldest university in America.
Above left: A memorable sign in a Harvard Square shop. And not just any pooping cow, but the FAMOUS pooping cow. Above right: Julie and I taking the subway back home. Thanks for the great tour, Jules!
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