Welcome to Litsy!

While I am glad they were able to spend more time together, I can‘t imagine the risks they ran or how much pain her husband was in at the beginning of each walk. Sometimes the tone felt very incongruous to the situation. I completely understood why people backed off in many cases when they learned the couple were homeless. No one likes to be reminded of how close we are to being homeless ourselves or of our mortality.

'Excited, afraid, homeless, fat, dying, but at least if we made that first step we had somewhere to go, we had a purpose. And we really didn't have anything better to do at half past three on a Thursday afternoon than to start a 630-mile walk.'

Strictly speaking, this is about fellwalking rather than #Hiking, but they‘re two sides of the same coin!

#DaysDevotedTo
@Eggs
@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

A sad story in the end. If not the book, then the author. The story of a cancer survivor who decides to commemorate this by walking from Washington DC to New York City and write about the people he met and the places he saw. The book was published in 2023. the authors cancer relapsed and he died this year.

#bookspin for October - LOVED this! So sad, yet uplifting, really makes me want to walk the south west coast path one day!

#hauntedshelf #skeletoncrew

Apparently I have a green thing happening today. 💚

Shattuck embarks on six walking/canoeing journeys that Henry David Thoreau took in the 1800‘s. If I were to suggest a book of Shattuck‘s to read first I would read A History of Sound but this book is a terrific 2nd. Quotes from Thoreau and Shattuck‘s experience and descriptive writing offer some delightful comparisons. His unsettling description of an Airbnb he stayed in was enough to make the experience of reading this worthwhile. 🔽

Finished the last two pages as I went to bed. I've hear her speak about her ASD and life, in general, a few times and was therefore interested in this. I kind of fell in love with her mannerisms and blunt assessments on herself and her surroundings. Much of it rang true, a huge amount dug up reminders and memory about my youngest as they were growing up. An important read, and one to mull over.

@Suet624

@Suet624 I think Ben Shattuck is now officially one of my new favorite authors. The little book is just lovely. Funny, thoughtful, profound. It was a joy, no, it was such a privilege and treat to accompany this fine author on his walks and listen to him describe the people he meets, share quotes from Thoreau and also what he sees, feels and draws! Yes! His sketches are interspersed in the narrative… I might have a bit of a book crush, too.