Walking the long way around

For a while, I've been trying to psych myself up to cycling to work. It ticks so many boxes - being physically active, reducing emissions, saving money. But cycling in London is TERRIFYING. There are loads more bikes than a couple of years ago, but I'm a wuss.

After a while of feeling bad for lazily resorting to the bus, it finally occurred to me that there's another way for me to get to work under my own steam - walking.

It's about an hour's walk each way. It's a walk that takes me across and along the River Thames for part of my walk, and I feel connected with this city in a totally new way. Yes, it's a longer travel time than the bus - but I arrive at work feeling energised and fully awake, ready to start the day. I've already achieved something and I haven't even switched on my laptop. 

It's a really good feeling, and it's kind of surprised me. I thought the long walks would feel like a chore, but they are a real joy, especially compared to the bus. It's time to think, time to listen to music or to podcasts, time to breathe and look around me. I pass through different faces of this city - through areas of great wealth and areas of social housing, through areas of business and areas of luxury residence, through parks and along busy roads.

I'm trying to walk more travelling to other parts of the city too - a hospital appointment this week became an unexpected joy when I realised I could take a train part of the way, and then have a 45-minute walk along the Southbank - possibly the best walk in London. Shakespeare's Globe, St Paul's Cathedral, the Golden Hines ship, the Tate Modern, Southwark Cathedral...

But my favourite bit is definitely the river. I always knew the Thames was tidal, but never quite realised that meant you can hear the wash of the tides lapping against sand, the croak of seagulls... Guys, it's like walking by the beach. But, y'know, not.

Not the to-do list, or past and future challenges

We all have a to do list. I don't know about you, but mine is epic, vague, scattered across my computer, my phone and my memory, and nothing ever gets done. This is something I do intend to address.

However, today's post is not about the to do list, but the want to try list. I don't know if this happens to other people who start to build a more deliberate, individually crafted life, but the list of things I want to try keeps getting longer and longer and longer. I really want to render lard. Why? I don't use lard in anything, but maybe I could or should. And it's another skill, a historical one linking me with generations past, and one which would come in very handy should we ever raise and butcher our own animals (in another lifetime). Plus it looks so white and fluffy in blog posts. Want.

It's not a ripple when you drop a pebble in a pond - smooth, even circles gradually spreading. The process is more akin to simulations of how pandemic diseases spread (there's an example here if you don't know what I'm talking about). One dot glows. Then several close by. These fade as glowing dots appear, covering ground but seemingly hapharzadly, faster in some directions than others. It always looks a very wild kind of spread, unlike the orderliness of the ripples. (Hope I haven't freaked anyone out with the pandemic simulation!)

That's how simple living is evolving for me. Not a steady, orderly, progressive interest, but surges of interest in certain areas, drawing me into related fields, before another surge draws my attention elsewhere but the prior interest draws me back and soon, before I know where I am, I've covered the globe. 

Yoghurt making leads to cheese making and sourdough and beer and fermented foods. Homemade beauty proucts lead to homemade cleaning products, no-poo and growing my hair out, which leads me to begin to develop confidence in my own unconventional fashion choices prompting me to try Project 333 and ultimately set out to customise and handmake my wardrobe. Setting out to grow a few herbs introduces me to permaculture and soon I've put my name on an allotment waiting list and started looking into heirloom seeds, green manures and polytunnels. Now I find myself reading about rendering lard, building a garden smoker to smoke bacon at home, and goats' milk vs cows' milk.

I'm just taking a moment to step and think 'woah!' It's great that I've read loads on keeping chickens and am already aware that, for example, chickens are not naturally vegetarian, they like taking dust baths, they need grit in their diet and fresh eggs do not need refridgerating. However, given that keeping chickens is a long way off, maybe I should focus on things I can do now? So I can add to the progress I've made which, when I get caught up chatting with a colleague, seems to be rather a lot by 'normal Western life' standards. To be entirely honest with myself, reading about chicken-keeping is another form of escapism, a distraction from the life I'm trying to build here, today, and which requires me to step away from the computer screen.

It's very easy to get so caught up in the idea of the simple life that we put less energy into actually living it. Perhaps it's better to log off and just be present here.

Background music

I'm back! Sorry for my brief absence. Two reasons for this - firstly, work has been incredibly busy and stressful. I have been repeatedly reminded that rushing work just means I make more mistakes and have to go back and do it again.

Secondly, last night my lovely boyfriend took me for a rare treat, a classical music concert, for my birthday. We saw Bryn Terfel singing various operatic exceprts and it was brilliant - he's not only a good singer, he's a brilliant performer and entertainer. He thoroughly deserved the standing ovation and the riotous applause at the end.

Image from bozar.be

I was thinking on the way home about music, and how I listen.

When you're at a live music event, you're fully there. (Or at least you should be - anyone checking emails when Bryn Terfel is singing needs their head examined). I turned off my phone and focused totally on enjoying where I was, and it's very rare that I'm so present, so switched off from distractions and worries and a constant stream of reminders. I enjoyed it so much, it made me wonder why I wait for such rare and special occasions to be totally present in one experience. Why do I allow experiences and pleasures to be diluted by allowing interruptions in?

It's been quite a while since I sat and fully listened to a piece of music. I often listen to music, but it's normally background music. It's a kind of escapism really - by listening to music or the radio while I'm at work, I'm trying to half-pretend that I'm not there. That's not a very good practice, and to be honest it probably reduces my focus and my productivity. I'm thinking I might challenge myself to a week of no headphones and see how that changes the time of day I leave.

Using music as background noise also means I don't get to think about the music itself - to learn to understand or appreciate it, to develop preferences and favourites. I haven't 'discovered' a new piece or a new artist for quite some years. As you may be able to tell, my music tastes tend towards the classical, and the pieces I love most are those I know well, so that each note is a memory of another listening experience, and a reminder of the person I shared it with. With the first note of Die Walkure last night, I was standing with my dad in our old living room, bums resting on the radiator, listening together, while my Dad identified the different themes and marvelled at the precision of the brass section. It also reminded me that we haven't done anything like this together for far too long.

Many longer pieces of music take you on a journey, and I loose out on that when I instead have fragments beamed into my ear while I'm also having a conversation. I can vividly remember when I was given a CD of Karl Jenkin's 'The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace' for Christmas - when I arrived home I flopped on my bed with the liner notes and listened to the whole thing from beginning to end. I have a far better sense of what that is about, and how the different segments fit together, than many pieces I know snippets of nowadays.

So four lessons from a wonderful evening - be present, turn off distractions, make new memories, and follow the journey from beginning to end.