My Walks
My walks have an element of Forest Bathing it is true, I have grown to need the whole woodland experience. The feeling of walking through the forest is very important. Not walking around it, looking at it from the fringes. Passing through different sections or characteristic passages of tree species combinations I find a very healthy experience even though this may be happening often on a subliminal level. I usually use these walks as a time for evaluation or reflection. I prepare my work and clarify my thinking about what might be required or modified, I analyse situations or conversations helping me to understand and plan next steps, this time is planning time, evaluation time, having ideas time, problem solving time and a creative time. It is part of my daily routine rain or shine and I have come to need the experience. We leave together just after it has become light, as soon as I can after 7am. The early morning sun has a tremendous effect on the woodland colours, as does the rain. Hundertwasser is one of my long-standing influences and he describes the rain making colours richer and stronger, this is undoubtedly true. Misty, rainy, sunny or cloudy the woods are always different every morning.
We are walking through one of my favourite sections of the woods this morning and I notice that the tallest trees in this section are pretty much bare, with few leaves remaining and I notice these are Oak Trees. There are many other trees whose leaves change colour in a much more attractive way. Oak leaves turn to an unremarkable brown but with the majority of them on the ground, it gives things a rich ground colour. Their black silhouetted shapes stand strongly against everything else. But the thing I had not noticed before was that Hazel tree leaves are still a strong yellowy green a very light colour against the browns/blacks of the oak trees. They still have their leaves and they form an under storey of bright green something like half the height of the oaks. It is an immersive colour experience made stronger by week sunshine. My phone can’t capture it today with photos always on the dark side and the greens not making their presence in the way I see it. I did try to draw it.
Fred’s Walk
For Fred walks are adventures and he tries to get as much as he can out of them. Fred lives in the moment and he is constantly exploring, looking and following. Every minute is spent investigating something. Anything fury is very exciting with attention absolutely focused. So much so that he excludes all other influences, sometimes becoming fixated. This switch goes ‘on’ to the exclusion of everything else. Generally, he can turn the switch off after a few minutes but now and again it gets stuck on. Fred is always on the move covering ground left and right constantly searching. Now and again, he runs up to me exhausted and lays down in front of me panting, as if to say ‘I need to rest a bit I’ve over done it’. Fred’s walks are intense experiences full of action.
