Thank you, Internet.

http://walkart.wordpress.com/

Wanderlust: Thoreau

Henry David Thoreau, who walked more vigorously than me on the other side of the continent, wrote of the local, "An absolutely new prospect is a great happiness, and I can still get this any afternoon. Two or three hours' walking will carry me to as strange a country as I expect ever to see. A single farmhouse which I had not seen before is sometimes as good as the dominions of the King of Dahomey. There is in fact a sort of harmony discoverable between the capabilities of the landscape within a circle of ten miles' radius, or the limits of an afternoon walk, and the threescore years and ten of human life. It will never become quite familiar to you."

(excerpt from Rebecca Solnit's Wanderlust)

Caroline, a subletter who will be dearly missed, imparted this quote from Louis Nizer on to me, "A man who works with his hands in a laborer; a man who works with his hands and his brain is a craftsmen; but a man who works with his hands and his brain and his heart is an artist."

Marina Abramovic, The Lovers (with Ulay), 1988.

Marina Abramovic and Ulay (Frank Uwe Laysiepen) decided in 1994 they were going to walk the Great Wall of China. Eight years later, their 90 day journey was underway. (Carr 25) 

5x25 push-ups

4x25 sit-ups

5x12 pull-ups

1x16 pull-ups

Ran from Fishtown to Rittenhouse Square and back.

My father pulled his back, lifting something heavy. They were suppose to come down from NYC to celebrate my birthday, this Thursday. I just hope he is okay.

Was recommended 3 books: Wanderlust: A History of Walking by Rebecca Solnit, Time Passing (European Perspectives: A Series in Social Thought and Cultural Criticism), and But Is It Art? The Spirit of Art As Activism by Nina Felshin. Thank you, Rebecca.

No Longer About The Mileage

I got the idea to walk from house (Philadelphia) to home (New York). "Home" will always be where my parents reside, until I start a family of my own. So, as cliche as it sounds, it became more about my journey and less about the mileage (99.2 miles) to NYC. Particularly, the self dialogue concentrated around the lack of pedestrian pathways connecting town to town, and even within neighborhoods. Once you leave the city it becomes a real problem if you have to walk to your destination. Whilst sitting in a Starbucks outside of Princeton I had a telephone conversation with a like-minded friend from New York, Ryan Bourne. Ryan and I discussed how we are slaves to our cars. Starting in the early 20th century, and followed in subsequent generations, cars have been viewed as agents of personal freedom; that life is a highway and begins when rubber meets the road. Sadly, this walking journey has me believing the exact opposite. We are slaves to these personalized vessels that cover vast distances with little to no effort on behalf of the occupant. The driver and passengers fail to experience the environment as they pass through life. There is correlation between experiencing this world with sweat on your brow and one's overall state. Mind you my "outdoor" sentiment refers to the concrete jungle I inhabit. With that said, Vitamin D, from the sun, and air, however tainted by the metropolis's pollution, remain, to name a few, key components to human well being.

The next step for this project:

I purchased 50 corrugated plastic signs (think political campaign lawn signs, 12x18 inches) with a yellow background and larger black font that says, "Sidewalk?" I plan to have a videographer film me driving these signs intro the ground, stake first, as I retrace my 47 mile walk from Philadelphia, PA to Princeton, NJ. I plan to put a sign wherever the sidewalk ends and the shoulder begins.