I walk through my blindness the way I saunter down streets in Paris: unfettered and alive, ever delighted by the raw material of the senses. Come along with me. Just don’t try to take my arm unless I ask. What’s a flaneur? Read the first post, ![Fog at Isle Royale [Source: wildmengoneborneo.com]](../wp-content/uploads/2008/04/isle_royale_fog.jpg "Fog at Isle Royale [Source: wildmengoneborneo.com]")
"Brendan, this is what the world looks like all the time to me. Just a little fog. It’s a fine day for boating on the Great Lakes.” Without missing a stroke he turned to dart a skeptical glance at me. Brendan the Navigator. When we named him I didn’t tell his mother everything the legendary Irish name implied. But I imagined him taking on the role of navigator for me. Growing up with Coastal Survey charts and tales of Great Lakes shipwrecks, he came to know Superior as another home. He never doubted the wisdom of canoeing there with a father who was half blind. 
If there is an emerging genetic underclass, I could run for class president or class clown. Read more in 
![Charlotte Casiraghi in a red dress. [Source: Stylophile]](../wp-content/uploads/2008/02/charlotte_casiraghi_red_dress.jpg "Charlotte Casiraghi in a red dress. [Source: Stylophile]")
When I figured out who Charlotte Casiraghi was, I realized that I once sent a poem to her mother. 
Poet and street artist Miss Tic isn't exactly a kid in a hoodie with a can of spray paint. Maybe she can still run like hell when the police show up, but can she sprint in high heels? Well-known in international avant-garde circles, her work is exhibited now at the Venice Biennale as well as the alleys of Paris. 
Two details from the morning news stream disconcerted me gloomily as I rode to work with my car pool. David Brooks’ latest reification of the U.S. Everyman brand reduced it to one nervous, order-seeking archetype: Patio Man. “He’s happy with the new street-scape shopping area where he and his family can stroll before a [...]
Entries Tagged as 'foot rage'
A Flaneur’s Nemesis: Suburban Patio Man
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October 21, 2023 at 9:51am
by Mark Willis
Don’t Move That Farmers’ Market!
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July 28, 2023 at 4:01pm
by Mark Willis
On Saturday mornings at the height of summer, the Yellow Springs Farmer’s Market gets as crowded, garrulous, and animated as any Arab souk. The market has thrived for 25 years at the heart of the village. It’s only two blocks from my home, and walking there is one of the best [...]
Edible Dramas · Uncategorized · Yellow Springs · foot rage · garden Add Your Comment
Americans Drove 4.5 Billion Fewer Miles in April
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June 21, 2023 at 12:05am
by Mark Willis
I’ve never heard this metric before, although the U.S. Federal Highway Administration tracks and publishes it every month. Maybe it will become a number everyone watches nervously, like the Dow-Jones average, the Body Mass Index, or the weekend movie box office gross. What we need is a comparable measure of monthly miles walked. [...]
Flaneur · conservation · foot rage Add Your Comment
Foot Rage and the Blind Flaneur
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December 18, 2023 at 6:00am
by Mark Willis
As I have lost eyesight over the past thirty years, walking has been the simplest and most dependable solution to the functional limitations of my disability. When I stopped driving cars at age eighteen, walking was the mode of transportation most accessible to me. This sounds reasonable enough - a problem to be solved , [...]
Flaneur · Paris · Rue Mouffetard · Ve · Walter Benjamin · foot rage · walking Add Your Comment
Hear Voices? It Ain’t the Angels Singing
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December 17, 2023 at 6:00am
by Mark Willis
When a blind flaneur walks down the street, he’s likely to be taking care of business, paying close attention to sensory cues and landmarks. The last thing he expects is to hear an advertisement coming from somewhere inside his own personal soundscape.
So a chill went through me when I heard an interview with Clive Thompson [...]
Flaneur · Playing by Ear · foot rage · walking Add Your Comment