While reading the first chapter of Rebecca Solnit’s Wanderlust, I couldn’t help but picture her exact path. I’ve been to those Marin Headlands many times. I spent a week there as a 6th grader on a sleep away school trip. And I spent another week there as a counselor when my younger sister was a 6th grader on her sleepaway camp. I’ve gone back to those military bunkers and coastal bluffs many times over the years. There is a sense of peace that comes from walking through the area.
The peace of the Marin Headlands resonate so deeply with me that after three months of stay-at-home orders, cancelled travel plans, and no days off work, I decided I needed to visit those bluffs. I took time off work and took a day trip to drive to the area. I spent the morning wandering and listening. I paused on the roof of a bunker to eat a snack and just be. I sketched and I journaled. I walked the beach and collected a jar of ocean water to help me remember when I was once again landlocked. I got sunburned because I forgot how brutal the sun can be even when hidden by the marine layer of fog. And after several hours walking in solitude throughout the region, I took the long drive back home feeling lighter and more clear-headed than I had in months.
And so it was easy for me to truly understand Rebecca Solnit’s words as I walked her path within my mind. I know those stairs and that lagoon. Just reading about her walk gave me a semblance of the calm I feel when I am actually there. And it made me hope that as I travel through the Walking as Creative Practice course through the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), I can produce work that will allow me to return to the feelings I had while walking even when I am unable to do so.
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