Out to Gauge a P-value of ‘Now’

Well, then… Seems like I’ve got a good deal of spare time. At last. And it’s an excellent day outside.

Again!

Perhaps, it’s all over with the most dire atmospheric events that often pound our temperate latitudes during the cardinal change of seasons.

We should hope so. Or, perhaps, it’s just an esoteric lucky strike.

Right now, my immediate physical reality is a forest trail running across a park. It’s not a sort of cultivated city park — like the one (or, maybe, two) I ‘passed in transit’ walking on the slow morning streets the other day.

Today I’m thousands miles away from that town, in a different kind of place. It’s a pretty decent public recreational area. Officially — it’s a provincial park. Genuinely, it’s an expanse of wilderness laying across the river valley.

All the due infrastructural elements (like a magnificent entry gate built of roughly peeled logs) are in place. On top of the gate there’s a park name in big lettering.

Get under the gate, continue on to the asphalt parking lot, you’ll the WCs, built in ‘chateau style’ — sure enough, closed for season. Bear-proof garbage containers, bulletin boards, trail maps, signage. However, I don’t usually care about these amenities —I’m living in the neighbourhood.

There’s a net of paved paths in the park, you can ride a bicycle on the ‘mains’ (which I do, in the summer). Paths are branching off, multiplying, turning into smaller trails, gravel or even grass. The latter ones are ‘unofficial’, and, like everywhere in North America, the local park authorities strongly discourage visitors hitting the wild bush.

On the major paths‘ intersections there are information plates, poles carrying the sponsors’ names, directional signs, benches. Where trails have to cross the water — creeks, small river channels — there are solid bridges in place.

Yes, it’s quite a modest leisure spot.

I should confess: it’s been since long that I was hoping for this kind of walk. Today is a perfect day, and I anticipate the total fulfillment for all my desires — and these are for a few things. I can walk, think, take pictures, practice shinrin-yoku.

Although it sounds hip (you could probably feel a whiff of something ‘new-agy’, ‘zenny’ in its name) the practice is not too complex, or burdened with the meaningful (or, meaningless) symbolism and ritualism. What you do, essentially, is walk in the forest — and thoroughly enjoy it.

You’re calm, relaxed, marvelling in awe at things around, you’re smelling ‘stuff of nature’, you’re eager to absorb the finest detail . And then whatever you’d manage to ‘grab’, you get it deeply under your skin.

It’s not too hard at all, I can do it!

However, I’ve got a camera, and it is a significant distractor. Although it could be a means to concentrate on something interesting too. Between the shots I’m looking around, sipping in the wondrous spring air, and looking for more objects to aim my camera at.

All this, I soon notice, works wonders on me. The cortisol level is going down by the minute. I’m in an excellent state of mind — relaxed and attentive at the same time — and I’m ready to contemplate on the nature of ‘Now’.

…