Family Walks

“Who wants to take a family walk?” I say as the boys finish their popsicles. Treats after dinner.

“Me!” my son Solomon says with enthusiasm.

“Ugh!” my son Samson says with anger.

“Okay,” my wife Katie says.

Samson’s anger turns to acceptance and then, after that, carefully disguised enthusiasm.

On with socks and shoes. Out into the street. Around the block and into Hickory Hill Park for a peaceful, family walk.

***

We’ve been taking peaceful, family walks after dinner the past few weeks. Something to pass the time. Something to get away from the magnetic pull of screens.

I’m fortunate to live behind the best park in Iowa City. Hickory Hill has miles of trails that wind through the prairie. It’s a wild place in summer. Teeming with deer. Buzzing with bees. Bursting with bugs. Shady forests give way to open prairie. The grass grows tall. We watch birds, listen for owls, and spot deer as one foot follows another.

We’re closer to the start of the next school year than the end of the previous one. Summer gets away from me. It always does. Still, for the moment, it is the middle of July, and we have less to do than we will in the middle of October. So a peaceful summer walk seems like a good thing to do.

Enjoy it while you can, I guess.

***

Walking with my dad near the Mississippi River in St. Paul. Walking with my sons up Mt. Nittany in State College. And now walking with my family in Iowa City. Taking a walk is a good thing to do.

Ralph Waldo Emerson has an essay about walking. We taught it in 11th Grade Themes in American Literature at Roseville High School. We read Thoreau as well. Discussed nature in relationship with the Transcendentalists. Nature is certainly a theme to tease out of American Literature. The heart of Emerson’s essay? Walking is a good thing to do. Being in communion with nature is a good thing to do.

A friend at Penn State does walking research. She invites people to specific places with specific topics and then records the conversations that happen. Takes notes on the affect of moving with people through a place. She’s a brilliant Art Education scholar. I love the idea of walking as a way to create knowledge. Or to reveal knowledge that is already there.

I also love the idea of walking with my family on a warm, July night. No need to research it to understand it better. Or to overwrite about it. One foot in front of another. That’s important.