A Place to Walk and Think

Thoreau said he never found a companion that was more companionable than solitude.

He found it 150 years ago in the woods around Walden Pond in a corner of eastern Massachusetts far from the madding crowd.

There he acquired the tranquillity to think and to compose words that still hold value more than a century later.

In today’s L.A., solitude is a little more difficult to come by. The energy of population roars and clangs all around us as we labor in a crowd of millions to complete our daily chores.

And yet, if one searches, it is possible to find among the multitudes a place to think and walk alone, where the jangle of commerce is muted by distance and trees shade the quiet pathways.

One such place is Elyria Canyon.

It’s a 35-acre patch of land only three miles northeast of downtown L.A. on the slopes of Mt. Washington.

Black walnut trees, their leaves turning gold in the vivid autumn, flourish there and so do brilliant red toyon berries and feathery white coyote bushes.

This is a place where the Gabrielino Indians settled 1,500 years ago and where, more recently, builders campaigned to fill it with condos.

But the people who live on the flatlands and in the hills surrounding Elyria Canyon fought back and won the future.

It was purchased by the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy in 1993, creating yet one more sanctuary of nature in the booming metropolis.

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This month’s passage of Proposition A left no doubt in my mind that L.A. County wants and needs those kinds of retreats from the calamity of progress.

An amazing 65% of us said yes to a proposition that will increase our taxes in order to provide more open space for the tomorrows beyond tomorrow.

The vote runs contrary to a trend and represents a flash of wisdom one doesn’t always expect from the electorate.

It was both that mandate and a study by UCLA’s Landscape Architecture Extension Program that sent me to Elyria Canyon in the first place, because it represents the kind of urban oasis that makes solitude possible.

The study was commissioned by the Friends of Elyria Canyon and the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy to create a plan for the park “that will outlive any individual.”

It’s a 133-page document that considers every aspect of the canyon from soil depth to community outreach and ends up with a plan that attempts to improve on but not destroy that which nature initially provided.

What intrigues me about the 14-year fight to wrest the area away from those who would have turned it into a concrete jungle is that it was won by a cultural mix of warriors.

The area that surrounds the park is predominantly Latino, but ethnic origin wasn’t a question when an army formed to confront the builders. In crisis, we’re all nature’s children.

The existence of Elyria Canyon represents what’s possible when cross-cultural hostility is not a factor in an effort to improve the human condition.

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The park is a small square in the 28,000 acres owned by the Conservancy and the additional 50,000 acres of state parkland in L.A. County.

Its importance lies not only in its obvious symbolism but also in its location.

Walking trails that wind uphill through the chaparral, past bursts of white sage and yellow bush sunflowers, it is possible to imagine that you’re far from the calamity of urban existence.

Only when one reaches a hilltop overlooking the park’s center does the wonder of location become an element of the walk.

The Golden State Freeway, with its endless streams of traffic, is a black ribbon in the near distance. Equally close are the high-rises and sprawling areas of homes and businesses that constitute L.A.

I visited the park once with a guide and then again by myself, sitting on the hilltop and savoring the companionship of solitude that Thoreau valued so highly. I understand it.

I was born in a city, raised in a city and have spent all of my professional life in the midst of the chaos that is fodder for my work and for my words. I could never live on a farm.

But we all need those areas of serenity where we are reflected back at ourselves through a mirror provided by nature’s neutrality.

It allows us a moment to define our individuality in a world where oneness is too easily lost and sameness too harshly triumphant.

Al Martinez can be reached online at al.martinez@latimes.com.