Dichotomies - Weeks 10 and 11: Holms on the Potomac

We are surrounded by "The Forest Primeval"--in the city!

I seldom have time to write all I’m observing, but something is pressing on my mind: the dichotomies of Maryland. (I looked it up. It means: “a division or contrast between two things that are or are represented as being opposed or entirely different.”) Here are a few:

“The Forest Primeval”/ Huge Population Density:

Woodlands and small streams are situated among thousands of people. In springtime hundreds of beautiful white dogwood blossoms lift their faces to the sky. The woods next to our apartment are full of tangled vines, grasses, and tall trees where birds—including cardinals, blue jays, and crows that have a softer “caw!” than Western crows—live and sing. We’ve seen a deer and a coyote there, and we saw a fox in a different residential area. Blue heron and geese in our nearby pond have little fear of people, and we pass a beaver dam on the busy road to the mission office.

The only thing that surprises me about these woodlands is that there aren’t any teepees, huts, or other evidence of “kid-construction” amid the bounty of sticks and logs. Of course, later in the summer there will be thorn bushes and poison ivy, and there are always annoying private property laws. Not to mention parents who don’t want their kids to get dirty. We haven’t seen many kids, though about 300 people, plus their pets, live in the six buildings in our complex, whose footprint is smaller than a city block back home. There’s another complex through the narrow woodland, housing a similar amount of people. Amazingly, there’s not a lot of noise or traffic. Which leads me to. . .

Notorious Freeways/ Narrow Country Roads:

My new hairdresser said she never drives the freeways and she’s lived here all her life. The Capital Beltway / I 95 outer loop was rated by Infoplease as the 8^th worst bottlenecked road in the United States, and its neighboring 270 (near us) is part of the system. A road might have ten lanes or more in both directions, full of cars, trucks, vans and semis driven by people—yes, that’s where we find people—intent on getting where they are going even if they drive over us. (Our bishop says this was worse before the pandemic—many people now work at home instead of being on the road.) If we “run to a store” on the way home from the mission office, it takes an extra hour due to traffic.

Cue John Denver’s “Country Roads”—a different , much quieter route home takes us down extremely narrow roads that wind through beautiful woodlands and over a one-lane bridge. Gorgeous mansions are tucked among the trees, and it’s plain that their owners don’t want traffic—these roads are not improved, and not widened.

You can guess which roads I prefer.

Maryland Drivers:

We’ve been honked at, yelled at, and frightened by the actions of many drivers. We’ve also been waved at, allowed to merge, and well-treated by others: another dichotomy of beautiful Maryland.