4,680 Miles Walked
I first wandered the boardwalk out to the Fire Island National Seashore and Lighthouse in January 2010. Since then, that stretch from Robert Moses to the docks by the Ranger Station has become a kind of moving meditation for me. A near-daily ritual. The round trip is just under two miles, and if I’m conservative—three walks a week, fifty-two weeks a year—the mileage adds up:
3 walks/week × 52 weeks = 156 visits
156 visits × ~2 miles = 312 miles/year
312 miles/year × 15 years = 4,680 miles walked
on the same ribbon of boardwalk.
I rarely step onto it without a camera of some kind—sometimes a smartphone (which never feels like a real camera), sometimes a full digital setup, sometimes film. Most of the images never leave the camera roll; many get deleted before they’ve had a chance to breathe.
People sometimes ask if I ever get bored: the same walk, the same views, the same dunes, the same lighthouse. The truth is, I don’t. Every day arrives with its own light, its own wind, its own season. But more than that, I’m not the same person I was the day before. The boardwalk doesn’t change much, but I do—and that’s why the walk, and the photographs, never get old.
