Jonathan C. Lewis
Author and Artist
Hill Hiking
A fictional travelogue; four minutes to read.
Meandering along a tree-shaded path in a public park near a church near a street fair, I am exploring Lisbon by not sightseeing. I am wandering in search of nothing. I don’t pay attention to either where I’ve been or where I’m not going.
Except for an entire city, I am alone.
The city is bejeweled, incandescent. A glowing, gleaming sunrise polishes the Tagus River to a lustrous patina.
My hand slides over rough-hewn stone balustrades older than Rome or Paris. Every street is a postcard memory. Bougainvillea trellises blossom. Sunlight ricochets and refracts off tiled buildings, looking for the next surface to warm.
Behind walls and windows, children are being dressed, breakfast dishes washed, lunches prepared and packed, conversations started, arguments ended, last night’s sex remembered. Here and there, drying laundry flapping like flags hangs on clothes lines tied to balconies.
The urban village unfurls. The city begins to vibrate.
Rounding a corner, the smell of baked goods and last night’s garbage reach my nostrils. The sound of opening storefronts is a symphony of commercial hope.
On the waterfront, sailboats outfitted with heavy weather riggings and furled white sails are berthed. The prevailing winds in my direction carry an unmusical composition performed by the nautical fittings as they clatter and clack against wood masts.
I navigate the city on pedestrian autopilot.
Strolling aimlessly, observing without obligation, I am liberated to be my own best friend. Mapping Lisbon by foot, I survey myself with the kind of indelicate, probing, awkward, annoying questions which life’s better friendships tolerate.
Walking uncovers the imperfect details of a place. Walking uncovers imperfect details about me.
With no one to impress with a make-believe persona, I’m freed of pretense. It’s the most honest part of my travel day. Urban renewal for the mind.
Walking, I am up close to one of Lisbon’s distinctive features. Black and white limestone sidewalks (calçada Portuguesa) laid out in swirls, circles, diamonds, rosettes, zigzagging patterns.
At the top of a stairway chiseled into a hillside, I pause to rest. Sweat stains my shirt. I’m not used to hill hiking. To catch my breath and wipe my brow without embarrassing myself, I impersonate a window shopper.
Panoramic views of Lisbon—and my life—come into view. I am on the terrain of things I wish I hadn’t said, things I wish I had said more often. Memories of people I’ve hurt, dismissed, disrespected. People I’ve touched, loved, benefited. Like a Portuguese mixed grill, a mashup.
Sailors aboard a Portuguese caravel in a turbulent Atlantic storm were probably safer at sea than they were braving Lisbon’s hills. Besides the slippery cobbles, gradients as extreme as twenty-three percent require funiculars—picturesque, pretty and distinctly practical.
From the uppermost endpoint of the Elevador da Bica funicular, I’m looking downhill, dizzy with vertigo. Unnerved, my mind unravels.
I want to look away, but I don’t. The shiny, straight, steeply-raked rails force my line of sight downwards. Spellbound, I stare until I see myself tumbling, hurtling, careening out-of-control until finally cannonballing into the harbor.
