Daily Practice 2- Walking in and out of containment

I find daily practices difficult. 

There, I have admitted it. I find the notion of doing something daily extremely difficult. However so far, somehow I have been doing this daily practice more often. Walking around my courtyard for ten minutes a day, every day to try to understand what it is like to walk within walls. Although I have the privilege of leaving.

The first four weeks were interesting. I kept forgetting to document what I was doing because I was too focused on the task at hand. Below I have documented what I remembered to and collected photographs so far.

I began to notice more things about my surrounding. A new flower seemed to appear every day. A new person in their window or a new crack on the floor. Arguably though, the most interesting thing to happen to me was the things I began to notice or observe about myself.

  1. I am terrified of bees. I did not know quite how terrified I am but anytime one came close, I walked faster or froze.
  2. My mind begins to make up stories roughly after 5 times circling the courtyard.
  3. I walk on the outsides of my feet rather than the centre. This leads to achey outsides of feet.
  4. I tend to ignore my immediate surroundings and focus more on what I can’t see.
  5. I feel insecure about other people looking out of their widows above me and seeing me. Im not sure whether this is nervousness of not knowing who is looking or where they are looking from, or if it is because they are above me.

Professor Dee Heddon, has made walking her practice. She has set up The Walking Library alongside Misha Myers which draws on their shared relationship between walking, reading and writing. Walking as a practice is interesting to me now in a way it has never been before. For starters, it helps me to think more clearly as I can focus on what the day may hold and take time before I begin my day to breathe the fresh air. However it has also unlocked for me a new way of thinking, particularly surrounding the prison system. Although I cannot experience what an incarcerated person does because I have my freedom, I can have a sense of what might run through my mind if the only sunlight I seen contained inside barbed wires or behind a wall. I can sense the insecurity that might occur when other people look at you unknowingly or from above. And I experience these things not in the same way of course, but because I am human. I am human just like prisoners are human.

Ultimately with a walking practice so far this is what I have discovered. I can connect because I am human.

 

Resources-

https://www.talkingwalking.net/about-talking-walking/5-year-walking-forecast/deirdre-heddon-walking-5-years-from-now/

 

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2 Responses

  1. Indra Wilson says:

    Hiya Holly,

    Thank you for this post! It is really nice to read about what you have got up to on your walks. I am sorry to hear about the number of bees you crossed paths with! I was left thinking about how important interacts with nature and plants are in everyday life that we have taken for granted. I thought you would enjoy reading this article about a prison in South Wales that make all their prisoners involved in a gardening scheme that makes prisoners interact with nature and wildlife on a daily basis. The article talks about the calming effect that walking in nature has on people. I wonder if you experienced something similar?

    https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/aug/27/prison-garden-inmates-mental-health-hmp-parc-royal-horticultural-society

    • Holly Worton says:

      It definitely had a calming effect on me! I was able to clear my mind and get prepared for the day! Thank you Indra for sharing this article. Ive definitely taken nature for granted so it felt important to include walking as my practice!

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