NAVIGATION
I’m often asked how I came up with “Feeling Our Way Around” as the name of this Blog-site, and what does it mean. Let me answer by going back a step. The idea for doing the blog came about in March 2011 when Joel and I were about to embark on a new collaboration. We had been commissioned by Barnes & Noble to do a follow-up book to our “Tuscany: Inside The Light.” This time the subject was to be Provence. I seem to remember that we groaned slightly, feeling it to be a clichéd over-worked subject. But the fact of it being a cliché became a challenge and so we accepted. I conceived of the blog as a vehicle for showing the creative and collaborative process from concept to final product.
Although we had both, independently, visited Provence, neither of us could be said to “know” it. Unlike Tuscany where, by the time we collaborated on that book, we had been running a writing and photography workshop for seven years. But we figured what the hell, we’d just feel our way around…hence the title. I liked the double meaning of it in that it implies both groping in the dark as well as responding to one’s feelings and navigating accordingly.
And so, from Tuscany 2002, to Provence 2011 to Pandemic 2020; a journey that we have all embarked upon. A journey we did not plan for. A journey we could never have imagined. But here we are, navigating a new territory for which we have no maps or GPS, no recommendations and no known destination. Unless you'd like to follow this suggestion:
Strangest of all, we are on this journey without leaving home. How unsettling it is to be in our familiar places at the same time as knowing that everything has changed.
Take walking down the street. Pre-pandemic most of us navigated city sidewalks like fish, making countless subtle adjustments every second without thinking. In the course of thirty minutes we might pass and be passed by hundreds of people, constantly shifting pace and direction in order to avoid colliding with each other. We did it much like we ride a bike; easily, without thought, unaware of the myriad miniscule movements it takes to stay upright and balanced and all the while hardly noticing each other.
Now when we go out, every single person we see is noticed. We are aware of every movement, constantly on the lookout. Where once we glided obliviously past each other, now we take stock, veering left and right in order to maintain that healthy distance, often crossing the road in avoidance, or facing away when a jogger comes huffing along. In our need to remain distant from each other we have become strangely intimate; paying attention as we come to a corner, peeking around it to see if someone else is nearing it, stepping back and waiting for them to pass. We scan each other from yards away, trying to ascertain who is going to veer first. Where once we walked on either side of a road now we’ve added the road itself as a central path to be taken when both sidewalks are occupied. It’s exhausting!!!
One dictionary defines navigation as: “The process or activity of accurately planning and following a route.” In our current situation accurate planning is non-existent. In my daily walks – actually they’re not daily because some days I just want to stay in the safety of my home – but on those walks that I do take I’m newly fascinated with the way nature navigates its course. Out on the heath it feels quite random: each tree and bush and vine making its own way on its singular journey. Yet we now know that underground there is a complex network of communication and support, with signals going out between the roots, sending nutrients to trees in distress.
In gardens nature gets a helping hand from the gardener who prunes the wisteria in such a way that it can continue it climb toward the stars.
During this terrible time of disease and suffering and fear we are each of us doing our best to stay on course and are jolted now and again by the realization that there is no course right now and in those moments feel that we are groping in the dark. It is in those moments that we need to reach out to each other to ask for help and to give it when we are able, thus becoming grounded again for a while.
We’re all trying to be so brave, doing our best to stay positive, to believe that we can change things for the better as a result of the lessons to be learned from this pandemic. And that’s a good thing. But part of navigating is being aware of the dangers, and acknowledging when we’re off course, allowing ourselves to be uncertain, helpless and afraid…and voicing it. In this way we can feel our way around together. So that those of us who survive, who reach the distant shore, will continue to be as aware of each other as we are in this hyper-vigilant state.
I leave you with another of my favourite poems, this one by Juan Ramon Jiminez.
I have a feeling that my boat
has struck, down there in the depths,
against a great thing.
And nothing
happens! Nothing...Silence...Waves...
--Nothing happens? Or has everything happened,
and are we standing now, quietly, in the new life?
Be well, stay strong,
with love,
Maggie
