A bit of Balboa Park

I’ll just say it. I want a park just like the park in dear ol’ San Diego. I want it surrounding the Three Notch Player Theatre.

Now Balboa Park is spectacular. It’s huge and holds great museums including a world-class zoo and open botanical garden. It’s hard to beat the verdant climate. Perhaps the zoo is over the top here in Lexington Park, but, already, the urban festivals have launched.

We could have a lot more urban festivals like this month’s Juneteenth. Throw up a couple of crafting kiosks every few weeks, grab a bite at Linda’s and do a quick antiquing stroll through the Grapevine and my funky fave Vintage Values.

And there is already the theater and its players. A replica of the Globe Theatre, built by Shakespeare’s playing company, was built in 1935 in Balboa Park as a temporary exhibition but despite fires and rebuilding campaigns has proven a permanent and enduring piece of the grand park.

Perhaps because its original intent was temporary, when I happen to hit upon that memory, I’m always next reminded of St. Mary’s City’s temporary exhibition in 1984.  New York artist (and Lexington Park native) Charlie Hewitt designed something akin to a huge theater set design spread across what was  vast and empty farm fields without any structures whatsoever. The set told the story of Historic St. Mary’s City, birthplace of religious freedom in the New World.

That always seemed to me a Balboa-park kind of thing. And to carry that flight of fantasy a bit further, it even seems like something that could be pulled off every now and again without getting into too much trouble with the restrictive overflight zone shadowing that portion of Lexington Park.

Of course fountains and statues and shaded benches and level walking paths appeal to me-of-the-aging-knees. Maybe fountains are a bit much right at the start, but surely there are some swales someplace  on that publicly owned acreage. There are swales everywhere else in Southern Maryland.

I also like to toy around with the idea of horses. Clearly the need for an impressive safety presence is inherent in every public park in our brave new millennium. That seems, however, another good  reason for a Lexington Park in historic downtown Tulagi Place. That seems a super place to base a safety presence.

But, if the zoo is out — and I conceded that some paragraphs ago — then probably mounted police officers are out as well. But what if there were a couple electric scooters and a small garage  (but attractive, maybe looking a bit like upscale horse stables) in the park. A small government garage with a small safety office attached. Some benches for old knees and an occasional wave from a patrolling scooter.

And there it is: I want a park, just like the park, that stays within my head.

Said.

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