FIVE WALKING

A Walk in the Parc

A park is mankind's thesis of nature — we want to sculpt nature to accommodate us. With ourselves as the center of the universe, we bend the environment to our will. I would like to speak for nature: we are wrong. Ourselves, the reality called “society” we invented, are merely a fragment of nature. However, we are so absorbed by our constructed world that we mistake it for a true representation of the world. It is not a fault of yours, but that of a selected few powerful ignorant ancestors who left us this legacy of thought.

I insisted on walking to Parc Monceau à pied. It was a manageable distance and the weather encourage such a mode of transport. In comparison to Parc Buttes-Chaumont, Parc Monceau exudes an air of British leisure with its flatter appearance. Britain is known for her gentility, even her geography embodies it. Perhaps it is Britain's natural landscape that shaped her temperament.

Upon entrance, I was presented with the option of going clockwise with the jogging crowd (this time I wore my flyknits) or head straight as one might intuitively. Yet there was something counterintuitive about heading straight intuitively. Either herd mentality has been instilled in the mind so deeply, or a rational set of thinking did, displacing the randomness in intuition. If the latter was to be true, Descartes and Euclides would be grinning in their graves, gleefully pushing daisies as they involuntarily returned to nature. 

Trees were equally affected by the season — frozen in a barren state against the marbled blue sky. Difficult to imagine that the next four days were predicted to rain. Recent predictions have been proven wrong on repeatedly, however. (The next day, despite a shy sun, did not rain.) We overestimate ourselves. 

Statues are another mark of our will to control nature. Stone is a natural element, and statues are our desire to etch it as we please. I beseech you to scrutinize for pain in the sculptures. Silly to think that inanimate rocks can experience sensations, but in each craft, each cut, each polish evoke an agony suffered at our mercy. 

To capture a close-up of our cruelty, I had to walk on the moist grass patches —atonement for our sins. It was when I saw the graphic sign that instructed us to not step on the grass that I realized I was committing another. The plushness of the grass floor felt unnatural. I was curious if the peculiarity stemmed from my constrained contact with nature or the artificiality of the grass. 

American Romanticism erects a dichotomy between nature and man. To the likes of Thoreau, a nature reserve is much preferred over a park like Monceau. It is easy to perceive a park situated in the wealthy 8th arrondissement, close to the affluent 16th and 9th, as an embellishment in the glamorous City of Lights. This embellishment is another pathetic attempt to display our interaction with tamed nature. Walking in it is an easy attainable feat. The park offers no sense of challenge. Each footstep on the gravel pavement humiliates the self if one had trekked unaltered terrain such as the Alps. It lacks the sublimity that the force of nature entails. As such, there is nothing natural, wild, beautiful about it because it holds no truth. In essence, American Romanticists believe that Man and Nature cannot harmonize.

Yet, I believe that the dichotomy is superficial. The ontology of the relationship between Man and Borrowing’s Hegel’s structure in his theory of social science, Nature is a dialogue — thesis, anti-thesis and synthesis. Recall, we are a fragment of nature. Our behavior is organic. The spiraling, circling paths of the park is evocative of Art Nouveau’s metamorphic design. As I walked in circles, my path was conformed to the rhythmic development of nature. 

In continuing the exploration of The roundabout route was necessary despite the park's lack of mystery. Its layout offered a clear view of the landscape, including Haussmann's limestone facades surrounding Parc Monceau soldiers in a military strategy. Interestingly, the decorative elements encompass an impulse of vitality. One might guess that they share genetic material with the Art Nouveau movement.

The statues are another example of our attachment to nature. We sculpt the curves of the human form to replicate ourselves and seal momentary emotional expressions in time. In the process of producing them, the subjects deliberately posed for an extended amount of time, supposedly in an uncomfortable staged manner.

Equal works of man spotted are the possibly artificial ponds and arranged plants spread throughout the park. Disguised as natural elements, the geographical impossibility of certain species such as bamboo trees gave the decorator away. Coincidentally I chanced upon a similarly interesting sight of a Caucasian practicing Tai-Chi by the bamboo trees. Adoption of other cultures and habitats is a manifestation in tandem with increasing inter-nation connectivity. Less shy displays of mankind are represented by a bridge, a colosseum, a carousel ride and a store that offers a limited selection of food, beverage and entertainment material.

The exercise of walking is like the activity of respiring. It is an inherent skill of the human body. When one needs to ponder, one walks. When one is anxious, one paces. Walking keeps one grounded. The heart feels safe, secure, when one is on the ground. When one needs to travel a distance, even on any vehicle, walking is still part of the process. The intrinsic need to walk negates that regardless of the advancement of technology, we cannot  and will not abandon walking as part of our lifestyle. We are in a natural state when we walk and as creatures of nature we can never divorce ourselves from it.

Parks are not a recreation of nature that we invent to deliberately deceive our minds. Our faculties of reason and emotion bear more intelligence which prevents us from such an misunderstanding. We do need to remember that we have the responsibility of ensuring the next generation will not be mistaken as such. After all, we diminish our contact of Nature. To be able to distinguish between true Nature and our fantasy of it (parks) is a crucial skill that we must impart to our successors. Walking reminds us of Nature because it is a natural ability. Experiencing true Nature, on the other, requires more effort today. Hence, i humbly implore you to walk in the parks, but know what you are encountering. More importantly, situate yourself when you can in true Nature. There is no other phenomenon more genuine.