WALKING, NOT TALKING

A family member in his 70s, good at sports and working out in the gym, says he can’t see the point of walking.  Children straggling behind Mum and Dad on a winter’s day remind me of the misery of forced walks behind unaccountably enthusiastic adults.  Now in older age, I only feel truly at peace when I’ve walked for an hour each day.  

Different people, different ages, different needs.  I am no fitness freak, no mountaineer, but cool air in my lungs, warm hands in gloves, and legs that can still carry this ageing body around the fields let me know I am not just alive, but living.  

On the whole, I don’t want to talk while I’m walking, don’t want to listen to anyone else’s observations.  In fact, I prefer to walk alone.  Probably misanthropic.   Apparently the King likes walking alone too.  

The many exceptions to this are:

• Friends with dogs….I get it, the delight of watching a dog rushing through long grass or bounding after a ball.  They become an extension of their owner, an agile body alongside an ageing one.  More difficult to lift over stiles, though.

• Walking with loved ones when words flow easily between people who love each other and silences, equally easy, hum with the sound of treading in unison.

• The occasional moment when I want to say “Ooooh, look!”  - although actually I don’t want a response.  I am seeking a witness, not an interlocutor.   

• I do, of course, walk with others - but then I do it for the company, not the walk. A good example is the story stroll, a delightful version of walking with friends.  Each of us brings a short story, a poem, something we’ve written ourselves or others have written.  We walk until a view or a lull in the conversation makes it the right time to pause.  Then someone reads something. It is always moving, funny or interesting to hear what people bring to share with others.

• I used to do ‘walk & talk' during my time as a University Chaplain: it’s a good way to offer spoken intimacy without face-to-face confrontation. 

I notice sunrises more as I get older:  colours grey, blue, white, gold, silver.   I was out for a walk at 7.00 am last week and I have to say the sky took my breath away.  The kind of pink, blue and gold that artists talk about: a cliche, but there it was.

A walk in London:  geese flying in formation over the Thames.  Low mist hovering over rooftops and fields.   Ridiculously cheerful birdsong, despite denuded trees. You don’t need to be a twitcher to appreciate the flash of a jay’s wings or the hopping of a pied wagtail.  And clean air makes me forget the pollution of the planet.  I want to say that it’s moments like these that keep my soul alive.  

But it’s not just about the scenery or the fact that nature goes on being wonderful, despite human carelessness and cruelty.  

Walking alone is for moments of standing still in wide-open spaces seeing no-one else, marvelling at the smallness of human beings, and breathing in the air we share with everything, and everyone, else.  

It’s for gazing at the sky and connecting with those I love thousands of miles away under the same sky, or even those who’ve left the planet completely.   

It’s for a friendly moment passing another walker, smiling and murmuring: ‘Afternoon’, ‘Morning’.... a small connection that needs no greater acknowledgment.

It’s to feel back to myself, not distracted by too much stimuli, able to let my mind wander and remember things I’d have forgotten otherwise - including the answers to demonic crossword clues.   

It’s to have an imagined difficult conversation with another, clarity of thought only emerging when my mind is less focused. 

It’s to broaden horizons - the confines of the house, room, chair, screen at home all being too limiting. Walking into a wider horizon gives my thought processes the space they need to be creative.

I don’t usually have a goal when I walk, but have just completed the 166 mile Hertfordshire Way with friends (a 5 year labour of love).  The Chiltern Way I did in a week some decades ago.  It’s odd to have a straight line to walk ... makes the beginning, end and the measurement more important.  Traversing unknown tracks on a Long Distance Path is an obvious metaphor for life.  Long distances can also, on a wet, cold day, reduce me to the sullen trudging of persistence whilst not wanting to continue - again, sometimes like life.  

On a more mundane level, I’m so glad to find that hips, knees and feet still work. More careful where I put my feet on rough ground now (I’ve been known to turn an ankle in a rabbit hole), I frequently carry a walking stick to keep my balance and remove hazards. Sometimes an arthritic toe will make itself known, or a stiff back.  It’s all about getting older, of course.  But mostly, with fresh air in my lungs I hold my back straighter, feel the pounding of my feet on turf and tarmac as reassurance of health.  

Which brings me to those times when I don’t want to walk.  Sloth and desirelessness get in the way.  Bad weather is the perfect excuse for I-can’t-be-bothered.  Even then, if I push through, I am surprised at how nourishing the first gulp of air proves to be on a windy, grey, wet day.  Eating too much can also make me lethargic.  It takes a bit of determination and energy to walk each day, but the energy it returns, it does so in abundance.

Not-being-able-to-walk is right up there with my dread of going completely blind or completely deaf in older age.  I think a life without walking would, for me, quickly become terminal.