Pursuing Common Pathways

A strategy for finding peace in a troubled world

As my long-term readers will know, since I retired from the publishing world almost a decade ago, weaving has taken up the time I used to spend chasing deadlines. After moving across Canada to Nova Scotia, I found my passion in weaving tapestries that celebrate landscape, seascape, nature, and place. And many of my works feature pathways, usually to places unseen or at least merely hinted at.

Lately, I have been thinking about the many paths I’ve taken in my life, how some of them have been dead ends and many others have intersected, become woven together, if you will, into a tapestry. I suppose that’s something many people think about as they age. But it’s more than that because I have also been in despair, as have many of us, about the current state of the world. Being ever-curious and solutions-oriented, I’ve also been thinking about how we can find – then walk – pathways to kindness, community, re-connection and, on a larger scale, peace in the world.

I’ve walked on many paths and streets over the years. My best thoughts and ideas have been spun while moving through landscapes, both rural and urban, beside the ocean and among tall buildings. I am not alone in this, of course, because there are many writers and thinkers more skilled than I who are famous for their countryside ramblings and the metaphors that have resulted.

But I’ve never just rambled, much preferring to have a destination or purpose in mind for the mid-point of my walk. As a confirmed introvert, most of my walking has been solitary, as are my two pursuits of weaving and writing. But as sit here in my little house, alone at my computer or loom, I realize that the pathways to the salvation of our society and our earth must be walked alongside others – people who are like-minded and those who aren’t, as well as people of all ages. Although we may not articulate or agree on our exact destination – or even have a clear idea of what it will look like – as we plod along the pathways together we might be able to shed some angst while listening to each other enough to find common ground for the future.

The British nature writer Robert MacFarlane wrote what I’m getting at in his 2012 book The Old Ways: A Journey on Foot: “Paths are the habits of a landscape. They are acts of consensual making. It’s hard to create a footpath on your own ... Paths connect. This is their first duty and their chief reason for being. They relate places in a literal sense, and by extension they relate people. Paths are consensual, too, because without common care and common practice they disappear: overgrown by vegetation, ploughed up or built over ... Like sea channels that require regular dredging to stay open, paths NEED walking.”

While I’m no longer able to walk as far as I used to, and I’m becoming more hermit-like the older I get and my public profile diminishes, I still have my unique voice. And I am comforted by the realization that my ongoing contribution to a better future can be through my writing and art. I hope my work can continue to prompt the challenging of assumptions, encourage the exploration of alternative paths to the one our species is currently on, help point out the possibilities that lie ahead just beyond the bend, and explore the connections that could take us to a better place than we are in at the moment.

On a personal level, doubling down on those efforts may also be the path out of my current state of dismay and pessimism. And I hope it can suggest to you ways that you, too, can make your small contribution to helping us get onto the right path. Our voices and our journeys can make a difference.