Whether a Facebook post strikes a chord with friends is determined not so much by the number of ‘likes’ or comments as by the number of shares. Recently I shared an article from a friend’s wall — a piece published in BBC News Magazine nearly a couple of years ago, titled ‘The slow death of purposeless walking’ — and found it shared almost instantly by many other friends. The high number of shares, clearly, amounted to the collective admission of a terrible guilt.
Really, what does it take to set out on a purposeless walk? Absolutely nothing. No gadgets. No special clothing. No companion. No credit card. Only a little bit of time, something most of us have in plenty even though we whine about the lack of it.
Walking leads to discovery, discovery leads to knowledge, and knowledge, as we all know, makes us a better person. I mean, what’s the point reading (and sharing on social media) all those earthshattering stories and lovely dispatches from across the globe when you don’t know what’s going on in your own backyard.
Let me recommend a simple exercise which should make you realise that walking — with no particular purpose in mind — not only makes you healthier but also enriches your mind. Choose any five-km stretch in your city and travel the entire length sitting on the backseat of a car, and make notes of all that you see and experience. The next day, cover the same distance on foot, at a leisurely pace, and make notes. On Day 3, when you compare the notes, you will realise that you only scratched the surface on Day 1 and produced the rough draft of a timeless piece of literary value on Day 2.
Not surprising, therefore, that most writers we idolise and imitate happened to be inveterate walkers. We wouldn’t have got A Moveable Feast had Ernest Hemingway not walked the streets of Paris as a hungry young man. But why go that far. Two of India’s most celebrated writers, R.K. Narayan and Ruskin Bond, could write only because they walked aimlessly. One walked in Mysore, the other in Mussoorie — and Ruskin Bond is still at it. Their prose makes you want to follow their footsteps, literally.
Both Mysore and Mussoorie have changed beyond recognition, but I am sure that even if Narayan and Ruskin Bond were starting out as writers today, they would still write charming prose. The simple reason for this being that the walker, unlike any other commuter, has his feet on the ground. He sees the simple side of life — and he also gets to the see the truth.
One moment he brushes past a millionaire. The next moment he comes across a beggar. A few steps down the road he shyly observes a bunch of beautiful women walking in his direction. Further down he notices a man who seems to have lost his job. And soon after another man, who seems to have got a promotion. Then he walks past a couple — young lovers. And soon after walks past a married couple (and realises how marriage changes people). And all this while he has been walking past countless hawkers on the pavement, who happen to be the best mind-readers in the world. No one escapes the walker’s attention — not even pickpockets.
Simplicity and truth make a potent combination when blended as prose, which is why, even if you have rigid preferences as a reader, you never say no to a book by R.K. Narayan or Ruskin Bond. They are the only Indian writers who make you think and smile at the same time. And their primary qualification? Purposeless walkers.
Their elegant prose proves that purposeless walking is not without purpose — it is actually meditation in motion.
