On walking.

About a month ago Che-Wei picked up the book A Philosophy of Walking by Frédéric Gros, so the subject of walking has been on our minds. In this Unresolved, we both share some thoughts on walking, or ideas related to moving through space and making.

Sampo.

Of all the forms of walking; pilgrimages, protests, walking to reach a destination, wandering, walking to get lost, walking in circles, pacing back and forth, in nature, in cities… my favorite is solo walking to wander aimlessly in cities, especially cities that are new to me. There’s a visceral difference between walking to get somewhere vs walking to wander. Walking as a form of transportation is inefficient and often mixed with anxiety as we try to adjust our speed to arrive on time.

In Tokyo, where I grew up, the idea of going on a slow stroll just for the sake of walking (sampo) was part of daily life. Walking in New York, for whatever reason, feels different. Most of the time our strolls turn into a mission, even if we start walking without one. Walking just to wander aimlessly and think freely feels difficult.

In A Philosophy of Walking, Frédéric Gros expands the simple act of walking into a way of life, a way to think, an attitude, a philosophy. The walk is simply putting one foot in front of the other. Humans can do it for days. Our ability to think and be creative is more closely tied to walking than sitting at a desk squinting at a piece of paper. Knowing all of this, I still find myself spending more time at a desk than walking. Henry David Thoreau spent 4+ hours a day walking as part of his daily routine! Should I be walking 4 hours a day?

This reminds me of Perfect Days. A film of how a simple life could be a beautiful life. We aspire to have a simple life and at the same time have aspirations to have nice things. Do we drop everything to sail around the world like Olive Widger? Can we have nice things and have a simple life?

As part of our session that we’re hosting for the Steve Jobs Archive Fellows next week, we get to run one of my favorite design studio assignments.

Walk around the city blindfolded (with a friend as a guide) for 15 minutes.

I find it to be a great way to reset expectations of how we view our environment and observe things that normally go unnoticed. I highly encourage you all to try it! Please report back if you do. (A couple tips if you plan on trying… Of course safety first. Wear a blindfold. If possible, time it around sunset. Don’t walk in circles)

All of this comes from my firm belief that the path to new ideas is to… Wander. Notice things. Make observations. Let ideas bubble up. Make things.

Andante.

For mother's day this past Sunday morning, the thing I wanted most was to take a long walk through Brooklyn with our 10 year old. Me and CW both love taking walks. Together is good. Solo is magic. There is something about walking, about moving through space that stretches open, creates space for imagination and focus.

On Wednesday I was listening to a youtube interview with Pianist Andreas Schiff discussing Bach. There's an excerpt where Schiff talks about Andante, a marking used to indicate tempo in sheet music. To be honest, I had never given tempo markings much thought, until hearing Schiff explain that the word Andante is a form of the Italian verb Andare, which means “to go” or “to walk”.

Interested, I googled common tempo markings and their meanings. Most of them indicate speed in modified degrees of fast or slow. Some use words like bright or broad, which quite beautifully conjure feelings of space contracting or stretching. Andante relates to tempo in terms of the universally shared, rhythmic cadence of humans moving through space.

Tempo markings are just one of a variety of imperfect notational tools a composer may use to capture something as emotional and fleeting as music. When playing, there is an opportunity to draw from anywhere in your imagination. What you imagine, feel or understand about a piece of music makes a difference to how it comes across when played. I would also argue that what you are thinking or feeling matters and shows up in anything you create, irrespective of media. Andante, or walking, is a seed for your imagination.