Lindeman

This trip, unlike Thoreau’s trip to Walden, did not even cost me 28 dollars. All I had to do was walk a few yards outside my door. Perhaps this is the reason I couldn’t quite enjoy the experience like Thoreau did. I like the idea of the pond, but it is far from solitude. I could hear the cars on the road and see the parking lot and campus. It didn’t even smell like “fresh air.” As someone who grew up on a farm and has spent hours hunting and wandering in the woods, Lindeman Pond just feels like a shell of nature. It is hard for me to see it as the real thing. Even so, I tried to make the best of the opportunity. I enjoyed certain aspects of my walk around the pond. Any time I am able to get out of the confines of a dorm room or buildings on campus it is a good time. The air is fresher outside at least. I stood on my head, which was actually a really neat experience. I can see why Thoreau and Emerson wrote about it. Something so familiar, when seen from a totally different angle, is something entirely new.

It is hard for me to try and understand Thoreau’s technique. As someone who is balancing all of my classes, sports, friends, and family, it is difficult to understand just writing about my experience of living and walking in the woods. I can see how Thoreau found his solitary, simple life refreshing. I wish I would have read Thoreau back when I was a kid wandering around and exploring the woods behind my house. I think I appreciated it more back then, when I wasn’t worried about doing homework or other things.

I mentioned earlier that it was hard for me to see Lindeman Pond as a real piece of nature when I’ve spent so much time out in what I see as the real woods. Just because I feel this way doesn’t mean I think everyone feels that way. Lindeman Pond is more of a pond than my roommate, who is from Las Vegas, has ever seen. Thoreau would probably think that what I see as real is nothing. Everything is relative. I definitely think that taking a walk in any form of nature is refreshing, and can see why Thoreau wanted to live there.