LANSING, Mich. — One local woman took the saying of "walking a mile in their shoes" a step further, when she decided to walk every street in Lansing in order to understand the Capitol City.
After traveling to every street throughout the city, it's clear that Ariniko O'Mearo can not only walk the walk, but can talk the talk about Lansing.
"I was trying to meander my way through the city in a determined way to really see what I was seeing."
One step at a time, over the course of three years, the now 49 year-old mother walked every street in Lansing, racking up 540 miles.
"There were quite a few dirt roads, cul de sacs, dead end streets" said O'Meara.
her crusade as she calls it, all started in 2010 when a love of Lansing was need more than ever.
"We worked really hard to keep Lansing from a really bad place during the great recession, we had layoffs, houses in foreclosure."
O'Meara walked through every season for three years, and admits there were some bumps along the way.
"The GM plant had just shut down and nobody had plowed their sidewalks so there were piles of snow and the only place you could walk was in the road and it was really scary. I ended up calling that one into the city."
But every bump and seven pairs of shoes later, came new discoveries about Lansing where O'Meara's lived her whole life.
"Even in places where I had been before, I was like oh that's a church right there, or hand-prints in the cement or there were some quirky homeowner things."
O'Meara is now sharing her journey in a 198 page memoir and 109 page photo-book so others can learn from her experience.
"There's kind of a new idea that Lansing is almost ready to be a great place to be and I hope that going back and reading my books that people understand there's been a long process of getting Lansing to where it is today and been on the backs of people who don't have credit anymore."
Both of O'Meara's books can be pre-ordered right now by clicking here.
O'Meara hopes to have her book available in bookstores nationwide by Christmas so readers throughout the country can get a taste of Lansing.
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