I think my grandfather had a walking stick, cane with a curved handle, bit like an umbrella handle really. I didn’t perceive that he had a limp or anything , he just used it as an aide. Not as if he was from the blind institute down the road or anything. They come tapping along the footpath with their supersized canes, navigating their way along the series of yellow and green dots embedded into the footpath- they remind me of wine gums – jellied sugary explosively sweet , I don’t feel the need to extract one of those guidance buttons from the footpath though to seeif they are equally as sugared.

I have a walking stick for hiking, lightweight, aluminium or something. It telescopes into itself and makes a missile for the ground, spiking its way into the dirt – you could use it for planting seeds I suppose or aerating the garden. There’s that great smell you get when you are working down at the ‘grass roots’ level …the earth, the loamy soil, the moisture. Nothing smells quite like dirt – there’s different sorts, dry, wet, coarse, fine. It’s all dirt. More than a year ago now we were pulling out weeds from my fathers garden clearing the house up for the deceased estate auction, even with gloves that were protecting my tiny hands, blisters and occasional thorns would pierce me if they were a walking stick.

In the mountains I have run into people with two telescoping walking sticks- barrelling along at incredible pace, almost oblivious to any other walkers- what are they getting out of this I wonder?- Is it about ‘getting there’ or about the journey? You can be very busy without being effective or getting things done can’t you? Perhaps they have a cold edged computer brain like mine. Hard drives for hearts, whirring away saying get to the end of this computation and move on to the next. No silly dallying about with numbers and crunching etc, just be here ‘NOW. A walking stick surely can be a crutch and sometimes a necessary one – my mothers voice springs to mind saying ‘religion is a crutch’ well she used it in the end didn’t she?