When I lived in Lynchburg, I knew nothing outside of my college campus, how to get to Wal-Mart, and where to go if I wanted a long, winding drive on a sunny afternoon. That’s the way I wanted it.
When I return to my hometown of Schroon Lake, I’m always surprised how little I know of the Adirondack region besides the roads I always traveled as a kid.
When I moved to Boston, I decided I would discover my city. I drove the streets of Cambridge (where I live) and walked the avenues of Boston (where I worked, went to school and enjoy my free time).
Now I can say that this all happened in my backyard.
Here’s a map that gives you an idea of how the manhunt that started Thursday night and continued through Friday connected to me. It’s purposefully understated.
MIT area: This is where the 26-year-old police officer was killed around 10:30 p.m. Thursday. I had dinner in that area of Cambridge at 6 p.m. Thursday. I then drove down Cambridge Street and looped back into the Kendall Square area as I tried to unwind from a long and stressful week. The shooting was at the corner of Vassar and Main streets. I walk there all the time and drove past it Thursday night. The police were searching on Cambridge Street. That’s the first street I drove down Thursday, around 8 p.m. I saw the restaurants and stores that were being shown on Friday morning’s TV coverage.
Cambridge Rindge and Latin: This is where the second suspect, the younger brother, graduated from high school and was a wrestler. It’s a 15-minute walk from my house and next to the main branch of Cambridge Public Library, which I frequent to read and check out books. Finding a parking spot is hard if you miss the afternoon window and get there after Cambridge Rindge and Latin lets out, because the street and big park-like area in front of the library are filled with teenagers. I walk past them all the time and think, “Man, they must think I’m old. These are high school kids.”
There’s also a Starbucks almost directly across from Cambridge Rindge and Latin that I basically live in. It’s right next to the Broadway Marketplace grocery store. If you get a nice seat next to the window, you can look to your left and see Harvard’s campus and to your right and see the beautiful architecture of Cambridge Rindge and Latin school.
A lot of kids from the high school play at the YMCA in Central Square where I go to play basketball after work. Some of them, innocently enough, asked if I went there, too. God bless those kids.
Shell station: This is at the corner of Memorial Drive and River Street. I pass this Shell station every single day on my way home from work — River Street is how you get from Boston (or Allston or Watertown) into Cambridge. It crosses the river, hence its name. It is parallel to Western Avenue, which is how you get out of Cambridge. I regularly stop at this gas station and buy milk, orange juice, candy or a New York Times. The shopkeeper and I are on friendly terms.
This station is where the suspects carjacked an SUV, or ditched the guy that they carjacked the SUV from. It has since been cordoned off with police tape. We saw photos of police searching the station Friday morning. It is a five-minute walk from my house — just a few blocks.
Western Avenue/Arsenal Street: Police reportedly chased the suspects in the carjacked SUV into Watertown. That means they drove down Western Avenue (how to get out of Boston) across the river. This road becomes Arsenal Street, which leads into Watertown. Along the way, the suspects were reportedly throwing explosive devices out the window. A four-mile stretch was shut down Friday morning, with police reportedly searching for more explosive devices.
That is the exact route I drive to work every morning. It’s a five-minute drive with no traffic, two minutes if you don’t hit the lights. It slows down considerably during morning rush hour, especially when tractor-trailers decide to park on half of the street. School buses have also made me late to work before. That’s the way you go to get to where I work, though — one straight route.
The shots that everyone saw on national TV on Friday morning — Arsenal Street, the surrounding areas, the lights, etc. — is as familiar to me as my bedroom.
Arsenal Street Mall: This area is where police gathered Thursday night and Friday morning after chasing the suspects into Watertown. This is where all the TV cameras congregated, and where most news gathering happened. They fanned out from here into the Watertown neighborhoods.
This is where I get coffee or lunch with my co-workers. We walk across Arsenal Street and down its sidewalks.
480 Arsenal St.: This is the address of NESN, my company. This is also the address that I woke up to Friday morning as the epicenter of the chase and manhunt.
There’s a lot I can’t say — just know that this is where all the cops and TV cameras were, and the street addresses given out later where they were reportedly looking for suspects — those are right behind NESN. That’s where my mind and heart was for most of the morning.
More people contacted me Monday asking me if I was OK than have on Friday. That’s likely because people don’t know the geography around here. Today has obviously been much, much scarier. We’re inside, with our doors locked. This is our backyard.
It’s more than my backyard, though — this is my neighborhood. This is where I work and live.
This is where I walk up and down the river, and this is where I drove last night to blow off some stress. This is where I buy my newspapers (I’ve dreamed of being able to walk down the street and buy anything since I was a little kid), and this is where every inch of my life happens every moribund day.
“Boston” has never referred to the land from the North End down to Jamaica Plain and Dorchester. You tell people you’re from Boston even if it’s the suburbs, because we’re all part of Boston – the city limits just can’t hold the amount of people who live and work around here. Watertown, Cambridge and Somerville are part of Boston’s transit system. We’re all in one town.
These are my neighbors and my friends. So today, of all days, pray for Boston.
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