Today's Local News: Mission Accomplished

My well-worn map of Bed-Stuy, with each street we covered crossed out in brown marker. In hindsight, I should have used a highlighter so we could read the street names better, but oh well.

So here it is, 63 weeks later, we walked roughly 174 miles (the sum of the length of each street equals approximately 87 miles, but we had to walk to an area from our house then walk back again, so double that figure) to achieve my goal of walking and documenting every single street in Bedford-Stuyvesant. Big Joe and I took our walks around our neighbourhood about three times a month, for three to four hours, pushing Little Joe in a stroller and stopping at every playground, which is why it took as long as it did. But I still feel a great sense of accomplishment, not to mention, wonder and awe at the complexity of it all.

Have I gotten a greater insight into what makes Bed-Stuy tick? Possibly. I do know that it is a neighbourhood of extremes, rough blocks with deserted buildings and trash and dog crap filled empty lots and a negative vibe that we speed-walked through - although there weren't many of those. Well-maintained blocks with gorgeous architecture and abundant greenery and flowers, mostly in the southern end. The Hassidic area that looks like another era and world - a world it's hard to believe is part of Bed-Stuy. Deserted industrial areas full of both hipster and gang graffiti. Mosques and a thousand and one churches of every shape and size and denomination, from an unmarked unassuming door, to impressive spires and towers that reach to the skies. Fast food restaurants, mom and pop cafes, black owned hipster restaurants, bodegas and Chinese food restaurants with bullet proof glass. Flourishing community gardens. Depressing uninspired clusters of buildings that form the projects. Storefronts with an impressive array of Obama memorabilia, chic boutiques with African art, junk shops, dollar stores. Detailed memorial murals and scribbled graffiti honouring everyone from gang members to children hit by cars.

Groups of tough-looking teenagers giving us dirty looks, laughing pre-schoolers, smiling welcoming working-class neighbours, dirty white people on bikes, skinny white hipsters at the laundromat, Mexicans in a block long wedding procession with a live band, black hipsters at recently opened cafes, church ladies selling red velvet cake at outdoor fundraisers. Joyful block parties, smoking barbeques in front yards with families spilling out on to the streets, pre-teens throwing eggs and water balloons at cars and bikes, pit bulls and their owners, Chinese people hanging clean laundry out to dry next to their cars.

It's a colourful, lively, dirty, ugly, beautiful mix - a microcosm of New York City. It's our neighbourhood. It's our home. And now we're going to do it again. Walk every street, take pictures, talk to strangers, make new friends.

Brooklyn weather: Sporadic thundershowers with spots of sunshine.