The WALKING podcast

REBROADCAST: Holiday Special! Dec 18, 2020

Here, in the darkest, dourest, deadliest, bleakest doldrums of Winter 2020, I don't feel like making any more podcasts, because what's the point, but I thought I'd slip last year's holiday extravaganza episode back into your feeds, in which we exploded the usual format of the show to bring you a star-studded, Yuletide spectacular that harkens back to the homespun, holiday podcast specials of days gone by! With special guest appearances by: Decemberists guitarist Chris Funk, fine arts photographer Meghann Riepenhoff and friends, TV producer Jesse Ziebart, Grammy-nominee Korum Bischoff, and restauranteur and businessman Harvey Wolff from Proper Fish. Come along on a wintry ramble around the island, chasing away a case of the holiday blahs!

The WALKING Podcast Holiday Special is brought to you by Dresden Stollen Bakers. When Irmgard Maron came to the United States in 1928, she brought a cherished recipe for stollen from her native Dresden. She began baking for friends and relatives during the holidays and, at their urging, started a small bakery business. Ninety-one years later, three generations of her descendants still gather to bake this deliciously rich holiday bread once a year and sell it to families like yours around the world.

It has been a comfort these last couple of months, during the pandemic, to pass by the Maron homestead on my walks and see the silhouettes of various Marons, all masked up, still busily packing stollen in the outbuilding to ship around the world, their long tradition undeterred and unstoppable.

A Minefield Nov 24, 2020

Walking on the beach, in a contemplative mood, I gaze out on what used to be an undersea minefield and discover an atrocious-looking jelly fish, oozed haphazardly over the rocks at my feet.

This week's walk is sponsored by The Wild Wine Club, a new online wine shop based in Portland, Oregon that exclusively sells natural and organic wines from around the world. Choose from a monthly subscription box or select your own bottles to enjoy. They offer free delivery in the Portland area and shipping to select states in the U.S. Check out their selection of orange, skin contact and funky reds.

Step Into Liquid Nov 17, 2020

I accidentally walked into a creek.

This week's walk is sponsored by Chris Funk's new solo record, "Songs for Dog Fitness." Pandemic music for walking your dog, or for not walking your dog.

(You may know Chris as the creator of the WALKING podcast theme song from last season, or as the guitarist for The Decemberists. Check out his new record on Bandcamp and you can even buy it on purple vinyl.)

Coffee Regular Nov 10, 2020

I see many funguses. I encounter a massive buck hopping improbably high out of the ferns. Isaac tells me about someone he just met while walking, and I tell him about my imaginary friends. I walk home, in a tiny bit of a rush.

Election Night Special Coverage Special Nov 03, 2020

Four hours, 10.4 miles. I had to stop at a bakery in the middle.

This election night special coverage special is, as always, just a recording of me walking. I hope you'll come along as a way to relax or be distracted. As special coverage theme music, I used "Fanfare for the Frontier" from Mike Verta's Hollywood Masterclass.

This walk is dedicated to Wendy Macnaughton, who will be hosting an election night drawing party / birthday party for herself on Instagram live at 5pm pacific/8pm eastern. Why not draw with her if you need a calm, restorative place to be online?

Dolphins! Oct 27, 2020

While investigating mushrooms at Yucky Pond, I lean over, somehow unleashing the voice of Matthew McConaughey from the phone in my pocket. Then: off to the harbor, where I confront two of life's awe-inspiring and unknowable phenomena: marine mammals and behavioral economics. Special guests: dolphins! Accidental guests: Matthew McConaughey, Dax Shepard.

Walk of Shame Oct 20, 2020

I put the word out on social media that if people made a donation to a cause they believed in, and sent me the receipt, they would be entitled to one (1) classified ad--a message about absolutely anything--which I'd during the ad break in the middle of the walk. I was thinking of my fave podcast Election Profit Makers, which has raised $20,000 for voting rights organizations. I didn't expect to raise that much--that would have been hubris. But I thought we'd get more than two donations.

You can submit your donation receipt and classified through the email address on my website.

The GOATs May 19, 2020

Missing one cohost (medically excused from action; foot injury) the two of us soldier on, and decide to visit the neighbors' goats. Will they bleat? Will we get some bleating on tape? They do not bleat. And they are far away. After recording this walk, I felt a strange melancholy. Is there something about goats that's sad?

This is the third episode of the third season of The WALKING Podcast, a special pandemic mini-season where I am walking with my daughters and giving them the revenue from your classified ads, because my children won't go on a walk with me without getting paid. Ads only cost $1! Keep them coming and help support family togetherness. Venmo Jon Mooallem LLC and put your classified in the comment.

Thank you to this week's sponsors: Mark in Bloomington for Art Beat Bloomington, Daniel Alarcon for Radio Ambulante, The Cantona Kung Fu football club (@cantonakf), Sam Green, and this season's flagship sponsor, the Garden Girls, Bainbridge Island's only Golden Girls-themed farm stand and the official Golden Girls-themed farm stand of the WALKING podcast. (@pinkfarmstand).

A Bad Case of the Downhill Giggles May 12, 2020

This is the second episode of the third season of The WALKING Podcast, a special pandemic mini-season where I am walking with my daughters and giving them the revenue from your classified ads, because my children won't go on a walk with me without getting paid. Ads only cost $1! Keep them coming and help support family togetherness. Venmo Jon Mooallem LLC and put your classified in the comment.

Thank you to this week's sponsors: Reyhan Harmanci for Patrick Hoffman's new book CLEAN HANDS, Grain Design, Ann Friedman, the Barcott-Dederer family, Todd Vaziri for Feeding America, Sam Green, Drew Hansen (shout out for our very first political ad), Alexis Coe, Bay Nature Magazine, and our flagship sponsor this season, the Garden Girls, Bainbridge Island's only Golden Girls-themed farm stand and the official Golden Girls-themed farm stand of The WALKING podcast.

Dad, What Does 'Trespassing' Mean? May 05, 2020

Welcome to the first episode of this special pandemic mini-season of The WALKING Podcast. And this time, it’s a family affair!

I’ve hired my two daughters as co-hosts because I can’t figure out what else to do with them. That’s right! It’s a whole new kind of walk, with the wordless, contemplative pitter-patter of THREE sets of feet and—they’ve promised; really looked me in the eye and promised—minimal complaining.

Why are these girls doing it? Is it because they love going out on a ramble with their dear old dad? Nope! In fact, they hate it! I’m always asking and they never come. It’s because they want to get paid!

We’re selling classified ads—$1 each. Send us your well-wishes to far away friends; your quarantine complaints, your self-promotions; your tractor parts for sale. As always, we’ll read them in the middle of the walk and post a picture of where we were when we read them. Venmo a buck to Jon Mooallem LLC with a 3-5 sentence message.

PS: The person who was crying at the end of this episode was fine. See you next week. We'll try to keep the stage whispering to a minimum.

SEASON FINALE: You're All WALKING Now! Mar 31, 2020

There is a season--turn, turn, turn. A time to listen to someone else take a walk, a time to take a walk yourself.

We are now in the latter. As I took this walk out to the harbor the other morning, I recognized that walking has become *the* leisure time activity of US Quarantine Culture: a way to maintain the fitness of our lower bodies and souls, a thing not just to do, but to write about and discuss. And so, I made a decision, mid-stride: The WALKING Podcast will be saying goodbye for a while, remaining fallow until conditions change and require it to sprout up again. Stay safe. Help other people when you can. Happy walking.

Please buy my book THIS IS CHANCE! Mar 24, 2020

I'm sorry but you can't come along on this walk. This one's just for me.

My new book is out today. It's called THIS IS CHANCE! You can buy it here on Amazon or support your local shop if that is safe and possible for you right now.

Thank you.

America's Designated Walker Mar 18, 2020

Nothing much to say here. This--as always--is a recording of me walking in the woods. Maybe it's helpful to you. Maybe you'd like to take a walk but can't. I feel lucky that I can, so I feel obligated to share.

This week: no sponsor. But you can hear me phone a friend. This walk is sponsored by a spirit of togetherness.

Let Me Take You Safely Outside Mar 11, 2020

I never knew what this podcast was for; I was always surprised that people listen to it. Maybe it has a purpose now? Maybe it has something small of value to offer? Wouldn't that be strange?

This week's walk is sponsored by Ian Karmel, who sends us a philantvertizement for Kenton Women's Village in Portland, Oregon: "an amazing charity that provides shelter to houseless women in Portland - but that also goes so much further than that. It also gives them hope. I know that's a super corny thing to say, but seriously. The Village is a group of tiny houses, so the women have a sense of security, privacy, and space as well as leadership, self-determination and community. On-site case management, mental and physical health services and long-term housing placement are provided and the results are pretty impressive."

I say all the results at the ad break! Please consider supporting this important work.

Forest Quarantine Mar 03, 2020

Not a very relaxing moment here in Washington State. And yet, thankfully, the trails feel (and sound) exactly the same.

This week's walk is sponsored by Ann Friedman, journalist, newsletter-er, and co-host of the Call Your Girlfriend podcast. Ann stands out in my mind (and in my social media sphere) as someone who's always making an effort to champion what's good and stand up for what's right. I really admire that. Her Philanthvertizement reads as such:

"I would love your listeners to consider a donation to IRAP, the International Refugee Assistance Project, which provides legal advocacy for refugees and displaced people. Their motto is 'Everyone should have a safe place to live and a safe way to get there.' I started donating to this group in 2017, when three things happened. First, Trump's Muslim ban took effect—and protesting at airports felt profoundly ineffective in the face of such cruelty. A few months later, I read Mohsin Hamid's novel Exit West, in which refugees can leave one country and instantly appear in another just by walking through a door. These portals are the only magical element of the story: Mostly, it focuses on the brutal realities faced by a pair of young lovers when they become stateless. And a few months after I read Exit West—but long before I had stopped thinking about it— I heard IRAP's founder, Becca Heller, speak about her work. I have been a donor ever since. You can find a donation button at refugeerights.org"

THANK YOU! Until next week, walk at your own pace and don't touch your face.

Who Else is Gonna Bring You a Bow and Arrow? Feb 25, 2020

Off we go: into the woods, toward the harbor, up the hill, through the old cemetery, and onto my newish pal Berg's house--or, his "almost-house," as he's not quite done building it. Berg needed to set up a rope swing for his boys, and had a fun idea: I'd bring my daughter's bow and arrow over, we'd tie a fishing line to the arrow, then take turns trying to shoot it up over the arm of an old maple. This required me to walk a couple of miles with a bow and arrow strapped to my back. I may have (slightly) frightened a couple of people walking their dog.

This week, another Philanthvertizement (TM) in lieu of a sponsor. This one's from one of my personal icons of podcasting, the Slate Political Gabfest's David Plotz. (Especially love the way he says the word "effective.") David will be riding in this year's Pan-Mass Challenge and aiming to raise $5500 for the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute--in honor of his father, a veteran research scientist at NIH, and to support his friend's son Dmitri, who is one of thousands of children who benefits from the pediatric brain cancer research done by Dana-Farber.

What a wonderful thing to do! WALKING podcast listeners: will you join me and mobilize to get David to his goal? Here's a link to donate. It's even tax-deductible. Wouldn't it be great if we all just did that right now? Let's be...effective.

Straightforward-Forward Feb 18, 2020

Not much to say about this walk: just putting one foot in front of the other. Particularly after the accursed misadventures of last week, this walk was a welcome, uncomplicated delight. It's a walk that unabashedly puts simplicity first: the sensibility of this walk is Straightforward-forward.

I'm noticing a boost in listenership after my appearance on the LiveWire Radio show this week, so all of you who are coming along on the walk for the first time have picked an exceptionally typical place to start. This is representative of what happens here at WALKING: walking.

This week's Philanthvertizer (philanthropic advertiser,) in lieu of a proper sponsor, is a woman who is so talented I accidentally just typed her name as "Avery Talented." Her actual name is: Avery Trufelman. Avery says:

"Rehabilitation through the Arts (RTA) is an extraordinary nonprofit. And, full disclosure, my mom does work with them. Basically they put on theatrical performances in maximum security prisons all around New York. They've changed the lives of the incarcerated people they work with. They also do the incredible work of letting the public into these prison facilities, to see what the living conditions are really like and to witness the immense heart and talents we've locked away. Intense, huh? Maybe your listeners will be moved to donate."

Dive-bombed by Bats! Feb 11, 2020

THIS IS NOT A VERY GOOD EPISODE OF THE WALKING PODCAST.

A few weeks ago, for reasons I explain in this episode’s ad break, I decided to try something new: instead of a traditional sponsor for each episode, I’d start asking people I admire to tell me about a non-profit or philanthropic organization that they believe in, and then I’d tell you, the listeners, about it. (I would call this innovation “Philanth-ertizing.”) One of the first people to reply was Hrishikesh Hirway, who told me about a great organization (see below.) I wrote back: “Perfecto! I’ll do this next week!"

Well, I did not do Hrishi's Philanthertizement next week. Or the week after, or the week after that. In fact, ever since, it’s like I’ve been cursed. I went to record the next episode of the show and my recorder broke. I recorded an episode using a backup recorder, but then couldn’t get the file off it. Then I got sort of busy and it slipped my mind that I make a podcast. (Probably not part of the curse, but who’s to say; could be a mind-curse.) Three weeks went by—no new episodes. Finally, one night after dinner, I laced up my shoes, switched on my new rig, and walked out the door to get this episode done. It did not go smoothly.

It was dark. I had a headlamp on. But just as I got to the end of the driveway, the headlamp started flickering—then zonked out. So I turned tail, back to the house, to fetch another headlamp—and just as I did, my phone started chiming with texts from a friend. (I’d forgotten to silence it.) Inside, I tried to hug my daughter and knocked her over. Then, back outside and finally walking, I got dive-bombed by a bat. Then another bat. Then, I discovered a tremendous tree had fallen over the trail! Then, as I stood in front of the tree, talking into my recorder, trying to explain “Philanth-ertizing” so I could get to Hrishi’s ad, I got dive-bombed by a couple more bats. Then finally, after some more walking, when I was almost home, an owl flew right in front of me, very low, like a swift white phantom, and scared me shirtless. Anyway, here it is: a cursed and atypical episode of the WALKING podcast.

This week’s walk is sponsored by Hrishikesh Hirway on behalf of Women’s Audio Mission, an organization that brings the art and science of audio engineering to women and gender non-conforming people. Please consider supporting the work they do. Thank you, Hrishi, for letting us know about them.

Snow Falling on Seavers Jan 14, 2020

I was thinking about Growing Pains on this walk--the old TV show. I was thinking about how the dad, Jason Seaver (Alan Thicke), worked at home; he was a psychologist with a private practice in an office right off the family living room. (Horrendous home-office placement, particularly in a family with three loud, wise-cracking kids, but I digress.) I'd never before seen a dad who worked at home. None of the actual dads I knew, in real life, worked at home. They all drove away in the mornings to be middle-men, or lawyers or "sell components"

I can't claim that sifting through these memories of Jason Seaver as I walked through the woods birthed any great epiphanies or insights. It's just, some thirty-five years later, I'm a dad who works at home myself. And on days like this--a snow day, when my daughters are off from school, rambunctiously skipping back and forth from the neighbors, making snow angels and sledding, and I'm up in my office over the garage, yapping on the phone with book publicity people and typing (always typing)--I feel grateful to be a dad who works at home: grateful to be here, looking down on them from my peculiar perch, and taking a break to share hot cocoa, share the burden, share in the laughter and love. Rain or shine. All the time.

This week's walk is sponsored by Sean Sullivan, who thinks you'll like The Monolith, a short documentary by Rosie Walunas. You can see it here.

Grief Mistaken for Joy Jan 07, 2020

Sometimes you're walking in the woods and stumble upon a wedding. Sometimes what looks like a wedding is a memorial service.

This week's walk is brought to you by our friends at North Light, the friendliest all-day bar and kitchen, with a specially curated book and record shop, in Oakland, California.

BONUS: Holiday Special! Dec 17, 2019

Exploding the usual format of the show to bring you a star-studded, Yuletide spectacular that harkens back to the homespun, holiday podcast specials of days gone by!

With special guest appearances by: Decemberists guitarist Chris Funk, fine arts photographer Meghann Riepenhoff and friends, TV producer Jesse Ziebart, Grammy-nominee Korum Bischoff, and restauranteur and businessman Harvey Wolff from Proper Fish. Come along on a wintry ramble around the island, chasing away a case of the holiday blahs!

The WALKING Podcast Holiday Special is brought to you by Dresden Stollen Bakers. When Irmgard Maron came to the United States in 1928, she brought a cherished recipe for stollen from her native Dresden. She began baking for friends and relatives during the holidays and, at their urging, started a small bakery business. Ninety-one years later, three generations of her descendants still gather to bake this deliciously rich holiday bread once a year and sell it to families like yours around the world.

The WALKING Podcast will be back to normal next week, i.e. no talking.

Put 'Em In a Tree Museum Dec 10, 2019

The school carpool collapses last minute, scrambling my morning agenda, but I manage to sneak in a walk anyhow before getting in the car and journeying down to Portland for a meeting. Sometimes you have to walk before you can drive. Lace up and come along as we encounter a dissonant and grave disturbance in the woods.

This week's walk is sponsored by: RICHARD'S FAMOUS FOOD PODCAST. It's a food podcast that's "more like Pee Wee's Playhouse than the Splendid Table," from creator Richard Parks III. Wow, I encourage you to give it a listen! Tagline: "Jump into the Brine" (with a little tm next to it.)

And don't forget: You can be a Stickfluencer! Send $5 to The WALKING Podcast (via Venmo) and I'll thank you during the ad break for "sticking up" for the show. Also, if you want, I'll mail you a stick I pick up along the way. A real-life stick!

Cold Open Dec 02, 2019

Welcome back! It's Season 2 of The WALKING Podcast. Brrrrrr.

The theme of Season 2 will be BUILDING BRIDGES (SEO interlude: Jeff Bridges, Phoebe Bridgers, Phoebe Waller-Bridge,) so let's bundle up and take a walk to an actual, new bridge, built by local non-profits and civil servants! Setting out at dawn, as a sleepy Thanksgiving weekend comes to a close, we'll hear along the way: the crunkle of boots on frost-stiffened grass; vigorous sniffling; the startling, low moan of a fog horn; a prudent jogger approaching from behind; a neighborly convergence full of cheer.

This week's walk is sponsored by Mat Honan on behalf of birds. Mat encourages us to appreciate birds and to help them. You can check this out, he says.

BONUS: Scary Crossover Episode Jun 12, 2019

I'm proud to present this very special crossover episode of the WALKING podcast, in collaboration with 10 Things That Scare Me from WNYC Studios. Well, I am proud and also mildly mortified. Our most vulnerable episode to date! I took a walk and recorded myself listening to a recording of myself taking a walk--and also talking. That's what's different this time around: the talking.

I trust you are all enjoying being alive on planet earth during this ongoing hiatus of the WALKING podcast. Hope to be back with you before too long. Until then, let's all keep putting one foot in front of the other.

"Things Have an End, But Feeling is Infinite" Mar 22, 2019

This is the Season 1 Finale of the WALKING podcast, and possibly the last one period. I read some prepared remarks at the ad break, while sitting on a stump, on a cliff, as the sun went down.

This week's walk is brought to you by an anonymous stranger, in memory of Bear and Elmer, two good dogs who loved walks.

Thank you to everyone who listened. That was nice. See you at #FootForceDelta.

Bottle Episode! Road trip! Mar 19, 2019

"Sometimes finding a key is not the start of a grand adventure, but the end of one." - Jon Mooallem, right now.

Friends, I bumbled my way into a high-intensity snafu while recording the walk this morning. A boatload of genuine drama ensued, relative to our typical walks together, at least. It was so bad that I felt obligated to initiate the WALKING podcast's first-ever "take two." And so, here it is: take two.

The other day, I heard Gwyneth Paltrow interviewed on fellow podcaster Dax Shepherd's Armchair Expert podcast. (Incidentally, both Dax--if I may--and I appear on Vulture's new list of 100 podcasts you should be listening to. Then again, not to be ungrateful, but I'm not sure how worthwhile that list is, being that all lists are sort of silly and that Mystery Show wasn't on it.) Anyway, in addition to confessing how much she loved a good walk, and extolling the emotionally curative powers of walking, Gwyneth (if I may) told Dax (if I may) something that stuck with me. She said that, as a public person, she feels obligated to share her foibles and insecurities and mistakes with the world; as uncomfortable as it might be, the alternative--to merely broadcast curated images of her supposedly poised, perfect lifestyle--would be dishonest and cruel. In that spirit, I decided to share the details of my snafu at the ad break.

Also, this week: Squirrel chirps, a happy encounter with my friend Zach, barbed wire (inaudible), a rustic foot bridge.

This week's walk is sponsored by the always-fascinating podcast THE MEMORY PALACE , by Nate DiMeo. It's another of the hundred podcasts you should be listening to, according to the aforementioned list which, as noted, I feel some skepticism toward, even as I also feel great delight. It's complicated.

Mr. Cool Mar 12, 2019

It’s been a busy couple of weeks here at Mooallem SuperValue™ (That’s my private nickname for myself when I’m working hard to meet deadlines, and when I feel less like a human writer than a scrupulously-optimized, prose-production corporation—you know, checking facts and cashing checks, etc.) I was working so hard, finishing a big magazine story and the book simultaneously, that I didn’t have an opportunity to go for a single walk—or for much self-reflection of any kind--and didn’t even realize that until the work-week was over. By Friday evening, I was beat, and settled in to read the local paper. There was an obituary for a longtime islander I’d never heard of, a man named Gale Cool.

“Gale Cool was a visionary,” the notice began. I read that Gale Cool was an architect and developer, with an energetic commitment to showing people the value of “living in nature not next to nature.” In an era when everyone was starting to build big homes on small lots, he started building small homes on big lots, and clustering them together, to show humans their relative size on the landscape of the island. He did this for a while. Then, something happened. Mr. Cool was an avid salmon angler, and he noticed it was getting tougher to catch fish; the local fisheries were declining. He “declared he’d never build another building,” the obituary said, and became a self-described “undeveloper” instead. “He assembled 80 acres of land, dug ponds, raised the water table with a weir, and reintroduced beavers”—that land is now a city park. Then he revamped an estuary not far from my house, gradually drawing in waterfowl and seabirds, and salmon that spawned. It’s gorgeous there—I walk by it often. I had no idea that it hadn’t always been so beautiful, or so full of life.

The morning after I read the obituary, I got up at dawn and headed out for a walk. I was thinking about change—how it happens; who makes it happen; the blurry line between making it happen and letting it happen. I didn’t come to any great conclusions, except that I ought to make this episode a little tribute to Gale Cool.

This week’s walk is brought to you by Jamie Lowe on behalf of the podcast Food on Franklin, where there is always stimulating conversation about food on Franklin Ave. Have a listen!

Hearts and Thoughts They Fade Mar 05, 2019

I continue to be confused as to whether anyone reads these summaries. Anyway: It’s been almost four years since we moved to the island from San Francisco. Two or three nights after we moved, my wife and I took the ferry into Seattle to attend a dinner for a friend's non-profit. It was so fun! And we met lots of fascinating people. These included: a very kind muckety muck at Starbucks; podcaster-rockstar double-threat John Roderick; and a wonderful guy who worked for Pearl Jam. A great many quintessentially Seattle-seeming things were happening in that one room. The experience left me exhilarated and optimistic; I thought to myself, “Wowzers! I just got here and I’m already having dinner with someone high up in the Pearl Jam organization!”

Four years later, I get into Seattle very rarely and live a pretty quiet life on the island. Do I feel like I'm missing out sometimes? Absolutely. Is this the life I imagined for myself? No way. Still, I’m happy. I feel lucky. I take a lot of nice walks. So...did I change? I changed by not changing at all. Small town predicts my fate.

Special thanks to this week's guests: Michael Barbaro and a mylar balloon whose flying days are through. This week’s walk is sponsored by my old neighbor, San Francisco-based certified professional life coach Pam Daghlian. Pam is great, and offering a special rate for WALKING listeners at: pamdaghlian.com/walking

You Like Me? You Really Like Me? Feb 26, 2019

Busy week here on the Internet, with a sterling write-up of the show on Vulture and oodles of new listeners. Meanwhile, in real life, the same old silent trees and trails. I mean, wow: it took walking alone in the woods for me to feel a part of things online. Anyway, since it’s still not apparent to me that anyone reads these show descriptions (do you?) I’ll just provide this short summary of this week's walk and be done with it.

THIS WEEK'S WALK by Jon Mooallem

Stopped right away:

boots needed tying.

Spooked some ducks,

watched them flying.

Beach rocks crunchin’.

New house construction.

This week’s walk is brought to you by media mogul Max Linksy, who calls your attention to the remarkably good and remarkably bananas new book THE MASTERMIND by Evan Ratliff. Go buy it!

The Snowy Day, by Ezra Walk Feets Feb 19, 2019

We had tremendous snow. Historic snow! A back-to-back-to-back #snowmageddon scenario. School was cancelled, life was disrupted, the power went out and everything was white. Finally, I put on my big honking duck boots and noisy nylon pants and went for a proper walk. (By the way, does any one read these summaries? Just curious.) It was all so novel and disorienting: the bristly sizzle the snow made as I sunk in near to my knees; the altered, iced-over geographies of the trail; the disappeared blackberry vines, weighed down and buried somewhere in the drift. The world was familiar, but different: a semi-barren, bleached-out cousin-planet to my ordinary home. I was thinking about the Mars rover, which had shut down that week after all those years zapping back dispatches from its ramble across a similarly alien landscape; its final missive home: “My battery is low and it is getting very dark.” Well, unfortunately, my recording rig doesn’t carry itself with the same dignity. Friends, it zonked out on me unannounced, a thousand steps from home. And so, this episode ends without ending—we will set out together, but never return. And you will not be hearing my own signature sign off either, though I mean it just as earnestly as I type it out now: Thanks for coming on the walk. That was nice.

This week’s walk is sponsored by Erik Bloom’s Birthday, brought to you by his friend Chris Colin.

I Fell Down Feb 12, 2019

It was bound to happen.

In 1864, Captain William Renton arrived on Bainbridge Island and built what would soon be lauded as the largest sawmill in the world. A town blossomed around it, with churches, a school and a 75-room hotel, and a separate village of Japanese workers, with a bath house and ice cream parlor. Then, in 1888 the mill burned down. In 1907, it burned down again. Then vertically-integrated midwestern logging concerns moved into the area, drove down timber prices, and soon, the mill was gone.

Recently, calamity struck again. I was tromping around the ruins of the mill when my boot slid out from under me on a muddy embankment and—whoosh—I slammed to the ground. Does Marc Maron ever fall down while podcasting? What about the Two Dope Queens or PJ Vogt? Probably not. Probably, I am the first podcaster ever to fall down in the middle of his show. It’s a distinction I’m proud of. Damn straight I left that audio in.

The rest of the walk—the upright part—was equally fulfilling: chilly, leisurely, gray. Toward the end, I encountered an unfamiliar Canadian in the forest with news of unusual weather further uphill.

This week’s walk is brought to you by Samin Nosrat, who wants to encourage donations to the criminal justice non-profit Uncommon Law. I read Samin’s ad beside the giant, upended root ball of a fallen fir.

Walk of the Rising Sun Feb 05, 2019

It was one of those Saturday mornings when the wide, blue sky begged to be walked under. So out I went. And I wasn’t alone. This episode features several salutary exchanges with other walkers—or, as I like to call them, fellow citizens of “The Trek-nited Feets of Walkmerica" (trademark pending.) Keep an ear out for their doppler-tinged Hi’s and Howyadoin’s as they shuffle by, all of us enjoying our solitary walks…together!

Meanwhile, the journey was full of surprise Animals. Choruses of crotchety crows caw-cawed overhead; a sea lion ejected his belchy croaks somewhere offshore. Gulls just wanted to have fun. Downhill, uphill, and winding back home: I covered a lot of ground that morning—with my feet, but also with my mind. A joyous and rejuvenating loop. Enjoyed this walk so hard I got a blister on my soul.

This walk is sponsored by North Light, a new, cozy all-day spot in Oakland’s Temescal Neighborhood—cafe by day, bar by night.

"What's Sour in the House a Bracing Walk Makes Sweet" Jan 27, 2019

The quote is taken from Thoreau. The walk was taken out of stress. I took this walk after getting an email from my editor which (long story) made my work life (which is a big chunk of my total life) feel instantaneously disorienting and urgent. I panicked and started doing lots of stuff to adjust. Then, I went for a walk--to let my brain catch up with my emotions. I walked pretty fast, especially at the get-go, busting along, churning out all the nervous energy with my legs. (Listen to me go!) But by the end of the walk, I was moving at a more reasonable pace, the sun was setting and the owls were starting to make owl noises. The work problem was still bewildering, but I felt bigger in proportion to it. It was a luxury to be able to take that walk. I appreciate it.

Do you ever want to hit pause on life and go for a walk? You should! And if you aren't able, come along on mine...with your ears!

This walk was sponsored by the Walking podcast's inaugural sponsor, MUSCLE, the debut novel from Alan Trotter, out February 7th. (I stopped to read the ad at a sour-looking bog I like to call "Yucky Pond.")

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