City Walking

One of the things Bryan and I promised each other wouldn't end when my sabbatical ended was walking together. We got City Walks: LA and in three weeks we have been on three walks. Our first walk was through the Hollywood Forever Cemetery. We saw the headstones of Mel Blanc, Cecil B. DeMille, Tyrone Powers, Jayne Mansfield, Johnny Ramone and others. We experienced the mausoleum and got a good walk in. My grandfather was a sociologist and anthropologist. He believed that if you visited a cemetery you learned quite a bit about a culture. I have been visiting cemeteries since I was a little girl. My mother even brought along butcher paper and charcoal so we could make rubbings of the most interesting things we found.

The second week we went to Echo Park and Angelino Heights. What an interesting part of the city. In Echo Park we enjoyed watching a painting class depict the beauty around them. In Angelino Heights we saw Victorian homes, decorated for Halloween, with the city skyscrapers in the background. As we left the area we drove past the Angelus Temple where Aimee Semple McPherson planted her Foursquare Gospel Church. When we got home I read about the colorful life of McPherson!

Then today, after Commission Chair and Staff Liaison training we headed for Marina Del Rey. What a gorgeous place. It was a good walk...but I would rather have been out on a sailboat.