“Have you ever found yourself wandering, truly lost in the moment, seeing everything as if for the first time? Or coming across a discovery that you never would have found, had you stuck to the beaten track?
Wandering, as opposed to destination based walking, is a lost art form in modern culture. Dropping agendas and plans, slowing down, we become like a moving ‘sit spot’, following instincts and curiosity, open to the cues presented by the wild other. Wandering allows us to become porous to the landscape, to enter into a conversation with the land through the weaving path we take, to enquire, to wonder in awe, to discover what’s right there beyond the usual tunnel vision of the modern walker.”
Clare Dunn


Last night as I was going to bed I wrote a great article in my head on my experiences of wandering by not actually moving. By dismorning I had forgotten most of it, even the name of the article and I was thinking that no one was going to be interested in reading it anyway and must have started it three times before closing the computer. It wasn’t till I mentioned my idea to the girls on the Wandering and Holistic Tracking course in the break room chat that i decided to give it another go. I don’t usually like writing about myself unless Ive had several pain killers of which I did have last night.


In the early 2000’s my first transplant started to fail and I ended up back on an oxygen bottle with 25% lung capacity and 2 litres of 02. At this point you can still get around and drive etc but everything takes longer and wears you out faster.
Theres still the ability to take the dog down to the local park on a mobility scooter for a walk for example. However as you start to decline and end up on 4 litres of oxygen that all stops. You cant risk loosing battery power to the 02 conserver. Even on the lower amount you start shaking with lack of oxygen trying to swap bottles.


On 4 litres it takes all your time to simply walk out the front door and sit on the couch on the decking to look at the garden. Walking 8 meters to the letter box becomes an impossibility.


It was at this time I developed what they’re calling in the above course as a Wandering Mind. When your body declines that much its like loosing one of your senses that another becomes more dominant. Pain and meds make you present in the moment.


I would manage to make a coffee which was a signal to the cat and dog to run outside and I would sit with the cat on one side and the dog on the other and spend the day watching everything in the garden from the smallest bug to birds feeding, to the wind moving the plants. I like the term used in today’s course session of Dynamic Meditation.


I now find myself in a similar situation of being limited in my movements. I found out yesterday that after two months in a leg brace and walking frame that it would be another month before i could even think of removing the brace and the day before that they made a second attempt at removing a chunk of meat the size of my thumb from my shoulder to hopefully get all the cancer this time. I’m now taking lots of pain killers once again.


So I’m back to finding myself wandering without traveling or movement to do so. It has become more of a State of Mind. My wandering this week consists of;
I sit with the door of my caravan open and am chastised by a butcher bird sitting in my doorway for not feeding her bread as I wait for the Eastern Rosella Parrots to arrive. It sounds like the inside a hamsters cage with the chattering they make.I sit there with my staffy and we watch and listen to every noise and movement they make.


I’m awake at 630am. I refuse to give up the discipline of an early morning, even though i no longer work.To walk the staffy and try and have a glimpse of the morning light to see what colours Im brought today to try and silhouette them against the tree line.


“Not all those who wander are lost” J.R.R Tolkien