My introduction to the Madonna Inn came as a young boy when we would take summer vacations to a nearby town. My dad would take us into their gift shop bathroom, which was a huge waterfall that functioned as the men's urinal. So as a kid, this was the most amazing thing I had ever seen.
Modern elites live in bubbles of liberal affluence like Ann Arbor, Brookline, the Upper West Side, Palo Alto, or Chevy Chase. These places used to have impoverished neighborhoods nearby, but the poor people got chased out by young singles living in group homes, hipsters, and urban homesteading gay couples.
If parents are the fixed stars in the child's universe, the vaguely understood, distant but constant celestial spheres, siblings are the dazzling, sometimes scorching comets whizzing nearby.
I can stay in the bath for, well, the longest has been seven or eight hours. I get completely set up with my laptop so I can watch 'The Sopranos,' put out some scented candles, music. I have a towel nearby so I can dry my hand to change the music or the TV. I make a little heaven for myself. And then I just refill and refill.
As long as there's a body of water nearby, I'm happy. Pools don't count. I like diving into the ocean and coming out refreshed.
I went to the University of Vermont because I had a kind of unrequited love for this high school girlfriend. She wasn't even at the University but at another school nearby. But I thought if went to a school near her, just maybe... I was really remedial about girls in so many ways.
He who lives in our mind is near though he may actually be far away; but he who is not in our heart is far though he may really be nearby.
I knew that my niece was working nearby with some bank, so my wife rang up the mother and the mother called back to say that shes just called up to say she was alright.
When I'm on the couch, I usually have the TV on and my MacBook Air nearby. And sometimes, when my ADD is really kicking in, I have my iPad too. And my iPhone. And a magazine that I haven't gotten to. And a book under the pillow to my left.
I've lived nearby since 1981 and probably have averaged one run a week there. That's more than 1,000 repetitions, and I have yet to tire of this course.