oh yes... my first introduction to wandering was an indoor sand pit.  Our
home in Vermont was built on ledge rock all exposed till it met the sea of
sand at the low side of the house.  The stairs descended at the middle of
the basement:  to the left dinosaur land, to the right earth mover Tonkas,
tractors and architecture... 900 square feet of sand protected from the
elements, accept when it rained hard or during mud season when a small
stream ran over the stone to the south-east corner of the house where a hole
had been drilled by Hezzy, the farmer up the road, to alleviate the flooding
problem.  He allowed that water was a funny thing of nature and his
experience had told him it was best not to go against it.  While this amused
us, it also convinced our Mum that the downstairs would never be more than a
sand pile.  Yes... Our little built environments were only disturbed for
improving or restoring areas the cousins messed up.  Pyramids could be next
door to the Frank Lloyd Wright stuff and although there were bridges,
fences, walls and roads there was no ownership or property rights and there
had to be a unanimous decision before any demolition.  Sometimes we'd get
bored and rebuild a corner, but you could always tell what came before.
Wars were not allowed.  Outside we were Indians and knights with forts, but
inside was regulated and protected.  You could be banned from the basement
for "bad form".  There were no roads in dinosaur land and the only violence
was the occasional volcano eruption.  We wandered. My brothers and I
developed these worlds over a seven year period until barn dances and the
Rutland Fair had more allure.  But that wonderful space and freedom of the
imagined places built of sand I"ll always remember - the wandering period
before cars.
The second sense of wandering is from Virgil's Eclogues. As a teenager I
became truly influenced by his concept of "montes erantes".  Mountain
wandering, a Roman version of the Australian walk-about.  Not to be confused
with the American Indian deity "mountain shifter".  He's the guy  that moves
the mountains behind each other when you go for a long walk.  (Who is
Brunelleschi?)  This kind of wandering was therapeutic and involved finding
oneself and as a consequence lead to answers for questions of the real
world.
The third sense of wandering is what John Leeke does.  You don't have to
memorize Witgenstein to understand this.  You speak, talk and write until
you become something, namely your language.

With respect,
Leland
-----Original Message-----
From: Ken Follett <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
<[log in to unmask]>
Date: Monday, February 16, 1998 3:00 PM
Subject: Maps Are Us


>John Leeke mentioned the idea of spreading the IPTW to Alabama etc. My
>brother, Jim Follett, mentioned he thought Alabama etc. needed more dirt
work
>than hand. Bryan asked for a clarification. I responded, and caused Bryan
to
>respond wondering what the hell I was talking about, to which I now
respond.
>
>I see on BP an effort to put common definitions on the table. I support
this
>initiative and encourage it by falling out of my chair, therefore causing
>everyone to get alarmed and insist on some decorum at the table.
>
>We all carry different maps. There is that idea that was bouncing around
on
>BP of  getting historic preservation on the psychic map. Which psychic map?
We
>all have different psychic maps.
>
>After 40 years of relating to each other I may have no idea what my brother
>meant by his comment, then again, it has never stopped me from pretending
to
>understand. We also seem to have just fine of a time missunderstanding past
>each other, it is a habit we seem to enjoy.
>
>What I was expressing was an early map of mine which I shared with my
brother,
>and a few others. As a kid we had five acres of woods and a lot of sticks
and
>stones to play with. We called it a sand pile, though there was not much
sand,
>mostly leaf humus. I’m not sure how it started but we sat down in the dirt
and
>built villages, towns, communities, cities, kingdoms, and empires out of
the
>sticks, stones, and dirt. When we moved to the local crick (a small creek)
we
>had merchant fleets that we enjoyed chasing and sinking. We were always
flying
>off somewhere, to a rotted stump or the barbecue pit (our earliest
experience
>of skyscrapers).
>
>You can make a semi-circle of small stones and set a flat stone on top and
>call it a house. It can also serve as a redoubt for gray or blue plastic
Civil
>War soldiers. Small twigs pounded into the ground would serve as corrals
for
>the twisted horses, chickens, and pigs. You can then take a larger rock and
>drop it out of the sky on your houses, like with Enola Gay. Sometimes you
miss
>and the puppeteers get bruised. A different sort of experience than Sim
City.
>Our bombs were not always smart and on occasion we hit each other. This
>usually resulted in our neglecting the empire while a more godlike battle
>ensued, therefore saving the empire, and all it’s little buildings for
another
>day... preservation by neglect.
>
>At about 11 years I stood up one day and said I was leaving the sand pile,
I
>felt an urge for a wider mapping of my world. I have been working my way
back
>ever since.
>
>When I lived in the Washington, DC area I drove cab in MD for 14 days.
During
>that time if I fell asleep I dreamed the map. Much of my supervisory career
in
>construction has consisted of driving to some other place, like the
hardware
>store or the stone quarry. I have always had a need to know where things
are,
>and who is where there with them as well. The buildings are a decoration to
>the human play. I like driving around, it is an extension of Sam Walton’s
idea
>of management by wandering around. I keep the world in an orderly fashion
by
>visiting it often. It helps to have well developed psychic maps. I
encourage
>everyone to develop good maps in their heads. After I mastered the
wandering
>in DC I was able to move to NYC. I continued to make a living, not so much
>from having intelligence, as from being able to be sent somwhere with the
>expectation that I would return in a reasonable amount of time. I continue
to
>wander around. Wandering around is the best part of my work.
>
>Outside of my maps, as with everyone else, there is a vast nothingness that
I
>have heard is populated. I go there once in a while in order to find the
>other, something different than myself.
>
>One aspect of my early map development was visiting all these historic
>villages in the US and Canada. My brother has these places in his map as
well.
>I don’t share his psychic map of Alabama. Then again, he does not share
many
>of my maps.
>
>Which gets back to John Leeke’s original suggestion... that consideration
>should be made for staging future “trade” (IPTW) oriented events with more
>imagination regarding American geography, the distribution and character of
>historic structures, and the distibution of those skilled (or unskilled but
>still stuck with the task) in maintaining these structures.
>
>][<en Follett