I have three sons, and getting them interested in my little walking project, I thought, would be a challenge. But my son Nathaniel joined me today and we had a blast. We started the day, picking up a little Subway lunch so we could eat at Nichols Arboretum before starting our trek, and also to further document my favorite tree project.
The amazing thing about that place is that no matter how often you visit, no matter when you visit, it is ever-changing and I almost always see something new. And you need to be observant. What just looks like a couple cut-down tree trunks:
Can turn out to be a really cool park bench!
After enjoying our tasty subs, we started our little adventure. I'd parked on Oxford, because it is close to the entrance that is closest to my tree. There is a complex of student housing on the street, but what I didn't know is that Oxford is apparently the address for a good number of fraternity and sorority houses:
Ladies, rumor has it if you want to join Delta Gamma, you must weigh less than the anchor in the front lawn...
I was pleasantly surprised at how nice the houses were along this street. We walked all the way down to Washtenaw, dodged traffic and crossed to Ferdon. There are many nice houses along here as well,
Window planters, ivy, and that center window which was a special, diamond-pattern glass. A house just a little down the street had done some amazing things with stucco, a building material I don't particularly like:
And their garden was also incredible as well. Bonsai on a large scale...
Turning onto Norway, we were beginning to realize that this area had nothing but nice houses. If someone from Ann Arbor ever gets elected President of the United States, he or she probably lives in this house:
This time of year, the trees and gardens are nothing but stunning in this neighborhood. Even if a tree could probably be nicknamed, Droopy, it probably was meant to look like this:
While I'm a big fan of the front porch, size of a living room, with couch and TV on a rolling cart included so you can watch the ball game in style, such things would never be tolerated amongst the tea-and-crumpets crowd, so a nice, under-stated screen porch fills the need nicely. My son and I both admired this one:
We made a short turn onto Scotwood, which immediately ended a block later at Woodside. This being a Sunday afternoon, the local realtors are busy hosting open houses, trying to move some houses off the market. This one was available for viewing:
The lattice on the right is another screen porch. I'm becoming aware that maybe I need to include more people in my blog. If local realtors want to advertise, maybe I can be enticed to visit their open houses as part of my walks and include a little plug. I'll plug this house because I'm new to this and I think no one in their right mind would pay this much for this house. Good luck selling! The link does have a picture of the porch from the inside, and it doesn't look all that great.
You know how some houses just look like they're trying really hard to be huge without looking huge? As we turned onto Copley, we saw one like that. From the front it doesn't look massive, but it goes waay back! Lovely to look at as well:
One of my other sons was asking me to return home, so we started trying to figure out how to return. It wasn't an emergency, and I was truly enjoying the one-on-one time with Nathaniel. I like being around all three, but nothing beats just having some of that individual time with each of them. We turned onto Brockman, looking to go back without going directly back, and got onto Washtenaw again. Washtenaw is, of course a main thoroughfare through town, and so we tried to flee for the backstreets ASAP, but not before running into this monstrosity:
This sucker is so pretentious, it has a sign and a sponsor!
It's not a mansion, it is The Mansion! All hail The Mansion! Genuflect, you serf!
If you live on Washtenaw and list polo as one of your hobbies, you need to keep the riff-raff off your lawn. Roving patrols of Dobermans and razor wire are so Kid Rock, so you try and show a little class. And it doesn't get much classier than stone fence posts topped with slate:
The fence was nicer than the house it surrounded. This house sat on the corner of Devonshire, which we turned down so we could talk without shouting over speeding Beemers with pizza delivery signs on their roofs. Last week, I encountered The Vines That Ate a Buick. This week, we found The Flesh-Eating Ivy! It got the slowest and smallest one:
Good thing I keep a canister of Roundup in a holster. I saved him before he disappeared. Well, even on a hoidy-toidy street like Devonshire, there's always that one house, that house that must've been bought by the lottery winner who thought he'd like to move to the big city after a lifetime selling bait in White Pigeon. Well, guess what? I know where that guy lives:
Across the street, some poor sucker was trying to sell his house. The realtor's sign had a Take One box (henceforth to be known as a takeone box). I know that this is the kind of neighborhood where, if you have to ask, you can't afford it, but damn let us nosey commoners know:
For the record, it is too much! In the 'hood, you have to beware of the roving packs of wild dogs on the streets. On Devonshire, beware the herds of apparently rabid squirrels. I only got a few in this picture, but there were like ten here, all grunting at us like they knew us for the interlopers we were:
As Devonshire sloped downhill, I knew it was curving away from where we wanted to be, so we turned onto Avon. Surprisingly, no house wives here tried to sell me any soap-on-a-rope or even cheap colgne in green glass decanters shaped like antique cars! It was a very nice street. We walked the 40-yard length of Belfield Court, one of the home-owners looked at us like we were loonies, but she didn't call the cops. I saw this one on Avon:
The rhododendrons were in full bloom, and the greenery almost covered the silly green donkey pulling the cart.
Of course if you are on Avon, you must come upon Stratford. Sorry, no wandering bards showed up, but this house makes yellow seem like a really nice color for a house:
Stratford was also a dead-ender, so we got back onto Avon, then immediately onto Hill Street. I saw this window, and while I wouldn't want to clean it, the light it sheds inside must be absolutely wonderful in the morning:
I'd say that sucker is 12 feet tall, if it is an inch. Hill dead-ends into Geddes, which is where we wanted to be to get back to my car. This terraced garden was quite a sight to behold. I just wanted to go lay down in the grass and look up, admiring it:
I worry about where my brain goes some days. Apparently, a long time ago, a guy named Rudolf Steiner started something called the American Anthroposophical Society. I haven't done a lot of research into exactly what that is, I just know back in the '80s, there were two professional wrestlers who called themselves the Steiner Brothers who proudly wore maize 'n blue wrestling singlets while everyone else wore shorty shorts and leather boots. I wonder if the Anthroposophical Society is a group dedicated to fooling people into thinking professional wrestling is a sport:
Oddly, I saw no 'roided giants roving the grounds. The day was wearing on, and we got back to our car. Hope you've enjoyed our little tour of Ann Arbor's finest homes today!
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