A walk to the station #13
by Steve
It is still dark outside and we, the commuters trudging towards our daily destiny are lit only by the eerie glow of the streetlights, each light leading us closer to the monotony of our work, lamp by lamp, step by step, and it is so easy to write terrible clichéd stuff about place, isn’t it?
I enjoy reading about place and I enjoy writing about place but it is easy to fall into bad habits. So much writing about place is less about the actual space and more about the writer projecting their own preferences or prejudices upon it. I’m not sure this is avoidable. Or if it is, do you end up with something more akin to a manual than a meaningful piece of writing? Should writing about place be just that, or should it also be a means of understanding the author?
There is also the risk of falling into a formula. So much psychogeographic writing seems to follow a pattern. Writer goes for aimless walk. It is probably raining. They see an electricity pylon in a field and note the juxtaposition between technology and nature. They muse on graffiti, or a broken fence. Something about concrete. Then something alluding to the occult, suggesting their walk has this timeless, otherworldly depth and meaning. Then they go a pub and drink out of a dimpled jug.
I’m being a bit daft, and to be honest I don’t mind most of that kind of writing, I just think it is perpetually at risk of disappearing up its own backside. But isn’t most writing? And isn’t getting that balance right, or wrong, part of the fun?
Walking the same route and trying to write about the same route every day does make me think a little deeper about how to write about place generally. I think I better understand my weaknesses and my limitations. This morning I just couldn’t see the road. I was just stuck inside my own head, which probably isn’t all that helpful for a project like this.
Wait until next year 
In your other post today, you mention the ultimate psychogeographic band…based on the two albums of theirs I’ve heard, I always imagine Real Estate doing a lot of walking around New England in the fall. I imagine they’d be really good to listen to while riding a bike through the fallen leaves, or walking along an empty beach on a drizzly day.
I think you hit on some elemental aspects of writing this morning! Navel-gazing is inevitable, especially when writing in the present tense. Writing about walking is especially tough, because the act of walking doesn’t release as much dopamine as running does. When the dopamine comes surging, you get that feeling of euphoria and a general sense of connection with everything around you. I feel like with a long walk, I’m searching for that meaning, but it’s hard to come by. Like going to church with a hangover, maybe. Or listening to Real Estate through headphones on a cold, cloudy day.
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That is a really interesting comparison between walking and running. In my short-lived running days I was unable to think about anything beyond keeping breathing and not being sick. I suppose that goes away when you get fitter. I think walking allows more reflection and you can notice more, but running provides a different sort of connection, perhaps you feel more part of things.
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