North Station

"The 12:20 p.m. train to Andover is now boarding at Track 8," announces the woman with a thick Boston r-less accent over the station intercom. Everything at North Station is in slow motion until the time comes to board a train, and then there is a flurry of movement and a mad rush for the sliding glass doors to the track.

My first time in North Station, the race to the trains left me bewildered and lost in the bustle of big city life. I was with my parents trying to navigate the Boston subway system for the first time, and I felt overwhelmed by the fast paced foot traffic whirring around me.

But a year later, I know I can keep up with the pace even if I get lost along the way. I walk up to the train schedules looking for the Lowell departure times. At the ticket counter, I wait in line behind five other people to buy a one way ticket to Lowell.

The elderly man ahead of is talking to the man behind the glass. "I get confused with the new system. It was so much easier when it was just a token in a box. I've been around too long," he says. So I'm not the only one who still gets lost in the maze that is the MBTA.

When I get up to the counter, I ask the man how long it takes to get to Lowell. "About 50 minutes," he says, and hands me the schedule. The one way ticket costs $6.75.

People waiting on trains are usually in their own worlds: listening to their mp3 players, reading newspapers, eating, or talking to traveling companions. It isn't until you look them square in the eyes that you get an acknowledgement of an outside world and a response such as a smile. Everyone I look at smiles down at me as they walk by.

But I don't look at people's faces often. Instead, I watch their feet. One girl sitting across from me when I sit down has on a pair of flat silver Maryjanes. Others that walk by have on high heels that clack across the cement floor as they half skip and half dosie-doe to the track in an uncomfortable gait. Still others have winter boots to cover their feet. One older man with narrow glasses and a black beret is wearing a pair of Uggs, popular name brand boots. I chuckle because when I think of Uggs, I think of the multitude of young girls that sport them around the city.

I am sitting on one of several wooden benches scattered around the station. I have my green notebook on my lap and a chicken and feta sandwich to my right that I bought from a bartender with a tattoo of a fish on his left hand working at the station bar. Beside me is a young red headed girl with a pair of Air Jordans on eating a bagel from Dunkin Donut's.

She says her name is Kate, and that I wouldn't remember her last name. Kate is an undergraduate student at the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences. She is a daily commuter and is living in Haverhill with her parents while she is going to school in Boston because she didn't feel like getting an extra loan so she could live in the city. Kate is a veteran of using the MBTA. She knows all about the colored subway system.

Kate says that the orange line is often dubbed the gold line at night because if you are wearing any flashy jewelry, it's likely it will get stolen right off your body.

Kate is also an experimental photographer. She says she takes pictures of things rather than people, but she would like to take pictures of people one day. "Behind every story there's a picture, and behind every picture, there's a story," she says. I look around at the people waiting in North Station, and picture their feet through the lens of a camera. Each scuff mark on their shoes tells a story about where they've been and where they are going.

Kate gets up to run to the track of the train leaving for Haverhill at 1:10 with the rest of the crowd hustling toward the doors.

Every person in North Station is waiting to go somewhere, and most are in a hurry to get there.

The Frog Pond

I've always thought of ice skating as one of the most enjoyable and exhilarating activities I've ever done; gliding around on the ice with friends who will laugh at you when you stumble and fall, but who will help pick you back up every time. It's a time when adults can reminisce about their childhood, and children can laugh and feel free to go as fast as they can.

My mother gave me my first pair of ice skates when I was seven. She told me it was something she loved doing at home in New Hampshire and she wanted to pass it down to me. We have ice skating rinks in North Carolina, and I would go every winter. But none of them were outdoor rinks.

On President's day, my friend Colby and I ventured to the Frog Pond at 84 Beacon St. with the rest of the school kids out to play. We waited in line with families and groups of friends. We paid $4 to get in, $8 dollars to rent skates, and $1 to rent a locker.

When we got past the gate, we went up to the skate rental desk. I asked for figure skates, and Colby asked for "whatever is easiest to skate on," so she got hockey skates. I had never skated on hockey skates.

When I put the skates on, I was surprised to see that they only came up to my ankle. My mother later told me they were foot skates. They were old foot skates. The leather uppers were worn down to the lining. The grommets were rusted. Only the blades seemed to be less than 20 years old. When I inched out onto the ice for the first time, it hurt. My ankles turned out. I wobbled around the rink, staying close to the edge.

I decided I needed to exchange my skates for hockey skates. Colby continued to skate. I waited in line again in my socks, trying to discreetly hop around in a feeble attempt to keep my feet warm. When I got my hockey skates, I sat down and started to lace them up. While I was working on my laces, a woman next to me lacing her child's skates was talking to a friend. "I just wanted to get the kids out of the house, so I thought, why not the Frog Pond?" As I gazed around at all the parents with young children at the rink, I had a feeling that she was not alone.

With new found confidence, I slid back onto the ice in my hockey skates. It was easy to find Colby in her bright blue coat. I glided as gracefully as I could manage up to her. Even though the sun shown down on the gleaming ice, it was cold while we skated.

Colby was struggling to keep her balance just as much as I was. "Aren't all New Englanders supposed to be poised on the ice," I chuckled as I watched her slip and slide. "Hey now, I moved to California, remember," she laughed back, and then almost lost her balance again.

The ice was pocked with holes from other people's toe picks and scratched from other people's blades. Every ten seconds I felt like my feet were going to fly out from under me.

We had to dodge kids coming at us from every direction. Colby explained it was the first day of winter break. The kids were faster than we were. They kept darting in front of us like little lizards. "I think these kids are falling on purpose," I said, narrowly missing one who had just tumbled. "I think they are trying to make me fall on purpose," Colby yelled back as she clumsily bypassed another fallen youngster with a huge grin on his face. As we rounded the next turn, she cried out with her hands above her head, "Danger averted! Super skaters!"

We noticed the sun sinking down past the trees. After two hours on the ice, my hands were red and numb. We returned our skates and retrieved our belongings from the locker. As we walked away from the Frog Pond, I laughed at how shaky I was on my own two feet. The last thing I heard was the sound of children's laughter and the friction of blades and ice.