Near my house, they opened one of those trails that used to be railroad tracks. I went for a walk on the trail the other morning and I liked it.

I think a big reason people like these trails is that they're flat. Trains are not good at climbing hills, that's why the transcontinental railroad took so long to complete (okay, that one's long too). I remember reading somewhere that a train can only climb a 3% grade, which means for each hundred feet it goes forward if you can only go 3 feet up. This makes train rights of way pleasant for bicycling and walking, provided there are no trains there of course.

There's another reason I like it though. Nobody does anything to make their house or business look good from the train tracks. Usually it's an area that's at best neglected and at worst trashed. In the case of people's houses, your looking at their backyards from a perspective you never get if you're walking out back of your house. There are no Corinthian columns, Restoration Hardware wooden benches or porch swings or interesting stonework. Instead, you have screen doors, plastic chairs and stucco.

Not that there's anything wrong with or unusual about that. New York's City Hall was built with an impressive marble facade but a plain brownstone back because it sat on the northernmost point of the city and the time and the city fathers were sure nobody would ever have the opportunity to see the back because it was all wilderness back there. Kind of like now but with Starbucks.

Walking along the trail, it almost feels like I'm peeking into someone's private life. This was at 7AM on a cold weekend day so there was nobody in back of anyone's home, but it all seemed terribly exposed to me- no fence or anything separating the likes of me from someone else's backyard. Does that mean if I want to bail out I can just walk down someone's driveway? I think not, but there's nothing saying so. I kept looking for No Trespassing signs, but there were none to be found.

After about 20 minutes I arrived at a legit way to leave the path, at a town park. I decided to exit there and walk back home, but as soon as I started I realized that my house is up a fairly steep hill from the park. How did I get down there? I didn't notice walking downhill. I will have to try it in the other direction because if I can walk down to the park and then return without having to walk uphill, we have some serious magic going on.