Surprising Conversations

04 Feb Surprising Conversations

As you might remember, last time the topic was how conversing with a place can help ground us. It turns out that these conversations, even with old, familiar places, can also surprise us and re-orient us.

New Paltz’s Millbrook Preserve is a case in point. I always thought of it as long-abandoned swampy farmland, a forsaken place only lightly touched by human activity. Then, on one of my first walks through the newly opened Preserve, I came across the remains of the old dam you see pictured here. It required a reconsideration, similar to the Talking Heads line: “This used to be real estate, now its only fields and trees.”

The preserve’s name, Millbrook, seemed a generic placeholder. But, at one time, someone invested time, money and hope in this mill dam. And then it all disappeared, leaving the place to the beavers. Now, with the Preserve open to visitors, it provides us a scenic stroll and beckons to us to consider what it once meant to past generations. To flip a familiar concept, I suppose this is how places grow roots in us.