By Jean Fitzpatrick
What a treat it’s been this summer to take my walks at Croton Landing, a brand-new park along the Hudson. Honeysuckle and beach plums there provide a foreground to sailboats and kayaks floating on sparkling waves. The river is tidal (the original inhabitants called it Mohicanituck, or “the river that flows both ways”) and on the brackish water you see gulls, cormorants and even great blue heron. It’s all part of what will one day be a 50-mile RiverWalk from the Bronx to Peekskill, where there used to be not much more than old factories, trash-littered industrial sites, and the Amtrak and Metro North railroad tracks, built a century ago to transport the robber barons from Wall Street to their palatial homes overlooking the Palisades. The place isn’t paradise: Trains still rumble by every so often, horn blaring. Jetskiers slap against the waves. Mosquitoes nosedive straight to my ankles. But our new park is a giant step toward reclaiming the river’s breathtaking natural beauty.
Actually, human nature may well be the most wonderful part of the scene. On a recent afternoon, flocks of ducks and geese paddled across a rocky inlet while kids on the path zoomed by on bikes, scooters, training wheels and skateboards. A middle-aged South Asian couple strolled along, deep in conversation. Teens sunbathed on the grass as poodles and terriers strutted past with their walkers. A small boy in a yellow T-shirt clutched a fishing line; a group of men talking in Spanish unloaded tackle-boxes and coolers from their car. Under a weeping willow a man in short sleeves and headphones played electric guitar. Near some girls playing with hula hoops, a woman I’d never seen before called me to the water’s edge and pointed to a hawk on the rocks who’d captured a small brown animal; neither of us could see his prey well enough to identify it. Everyone nodded or said hello. As we watched the sunset put on its show — purple-tufted clouds with undersides fiery pink — perfect strangers smiled at one another, saying, “Isn’t this park great?” It’s as though we were not only happy to have our stretch of the river back, but also grateful for the opportunity to experience it together.
Walking along, I found myself thinking about healthcare. With 45.7 million uninsured — roughly one out of 6 Americans — I tried to imagine who that one vulnerable person was: the kid on the scooter? The guy with the guitar? The woman watching the hawk? Strange to think how easy it is in a public park — and how hard, apparently, in a town hall meeting — to recognize that what benefits some of us benefits us all, that when we work for the common good we’re all better off. Discouraging to see how so little compassion can exist in a nation where some 80 percent identify themselves as Christian. Sad to realize that the all-too-widespread emphasis on personal salvation — the product of our individualistic age and not of the biblical vision that calls us into covenant with one another — must surely contribute to this sorry state of affairs. How important were the words of Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori’s opening address in Anaheim, when she spoke of individual salvation as “the great Western heresy.” “I am because we are,” she said, “and I can only become a whole person in relationship with others.”
We’re recognizing this every day at Croton Landing. Watching those flocks of ducks and geese paddling by is humbling, in a way. They’ve been smart enough to know it all along.
Jean Grasso Fitzpatrick, L.P., a New York-licensed psychoanalyst and a member of the American Association of Pastoral Counselors. A layreader in the Diocese of New York, she is the author of numerous books and articles, including Something More: Nurturing Your Child’s Spiritual Growth and has a website at www.pastoralcounseling.net.