Shape Your Walk

Day 16
11,353 steps

Along with the good health benefits of walking, you've got to enjoy your walk. So what's the best way to shape your walk? Jeff Speck, urban designer and author of Walkable City, says we humans are programmed to prefer a "sense of enclosure." We are concerned for safety, from our days as primitive man. We need to see out predators and but also be "protected from attack." I'm not talking about muggers but on some level we still operate from a need for safety. We like to see ahead but we we also want a sense of protection, a kind of outdoor living room. We want the grassland and the edge of the forest. We want the a boundary. Speck calls it the "forest edge."

Ideally you want buildings or houses on your walk and some open space too. I drive to a nearby neighborhood that has more open space than my street. There are actually deer grazing in the fancy residential neighborhood where I walk! But there are also homes forming the boundary line-- a physical enclosure.

I had a bit of mystery today-- the foot of a deer was laying on the ground. Did it get hit by a car? Maybe a hunter left part of a deer in the road? Deer hunting season is a big deal in Texas. That deer foot reminded me of a scene from "Twin Peaks" by filmmaker David Lynch. Spooky!