Walking with the Walktoberists

A map, to help us find the way. (A sandy topographic map in the Nature Center at Blackwater Falls State Park.)

Beware, O wanderer, the road is walking too.

~ Jim Harrison, from After Ikkyū and Other Poems (Shambhala, 1996)

Walktober 2020

A little earthiness.  (This is one of the biggest mushrooms I’ve ever seen around here.  I though it was fake at first.  There were several more scattered throughout the woods.)

SOLVITUR AMBULANDO.

This ancient Latin phrase loosely translates as “It is solved by walking.”  A walk is a journey that requires very little — neither planning nor passport, neither ticket nor equipment.  Nearly always at our disposal, a walk provides so much more than just a change of scenery.  Walking has helped me decide what is wise and what is foolhardy, has made me fall in love with a place, has batted away my melancholy.  Walking has helped me loosen the grip technology has on my life, giving me space and permission to disconnect from my devices that beg for my attention and feed my anxiety.  Most of all, walking has nurtured my creativity as I struggle to give tangible form to abstract ideas.

~ Bonnie Smith Whitehouse, in the introduction to Afoot and Lighthearted: A Journal for Mindful Walking

This is it: Walktober!

Little changes, here and there.

For so many people throughout space and time, a walk has been a productive, vibrant way to step away from everyday life and gain a refreshed perspective.  Aristotle and the peripatetic philosophers walked as a way to inquire philosophically and to educate others.  In preparation for his ministry, Jesus walked through the desert for forty days.  The Buddha walked for years before he found enlightenment.  Indigenous Australians memorized and passed down songlines to trace and communicate invisible pathways across the continent, marking their ancestors’ routes and guiding them across a vast continent.  Walkers have walked to gain a sense of place, to improve well-being, to harness attention, to cultivate awareness, to gain new experiences, to explore new territories, to march for freedom, and to express care and devotion for others.

[…]

… May we all show up for this magnificent world and its inhabitants as we walk, kissing the very earth with our footsteps.

~ Bonnie Smith Whitehouse, Afoot and Lighthearted: A Journal for Mindful Walking

Walktober 2018

Flipping the reflection. (Reflections on the pond at Pocomoke River State Park.)

The walks are the unobtrusive connecting thread of other memories, and yet each walk is a little drama in itself, with a definite plot with episodes and catastrophes … and it is naturally interwoven with all the thoughts, the friendships, and the interests that form the staple of ordinary life.

~ Leslie Stephen

(Not quite) Wordless Wednesday

The Walktober reminders:  This year’s dates are October 14th through the 28th.  I hope you’ll find the time to walk and participate.  (If you need more time, all you have to do is let me know.  If you’re unfamiliar with Walktober, you’ll find a link to a post about it in the sidebar, over there to the right.  Or, if you’re using your phone, maybe it’s at the bottom somewhere.)  I will probably do the round-up of the posts/walks on November 1.  That date depends on whether or not anyone needs and asks for more time.

The Official Walktober Post, the one that you should link to for pingbacks (or you can leave a link in the comments), is this one:  A Monday meander: The Walktober Post.  No worries if you leave your link on one of my other posts.  I’ll be on the lookout for them.

Walktober wanderings

A walk in the woods here on the Wabi-Sabi Ranch.

We are adept, if occasionally embarrassed, at saying what we make of places – but we are far less good at saying what places make of us…

~ Robert Macfarlane, The Old Ways: A Journey on Foot

A Monday meander: Walktober

Autumn light.

Lift is created by the onwards rush of life over the curved wing of the soul.

~ Robert Macfarlane, The Old Ways: A Journey on Foot