Night Walks and Emerson

Every night, I go for a 20 minute walk with my dog. So, going on walks is not something that will conflict with my daily life. Often, I take him into the woods just because I grew up in a very rural area and have always loved being in wooded areas. Actually, going on walks with my dog is one of my favorite parts of the day.

I suggest everyone try going on at least one of their walks after the sun sets. Everything takes on a completely different texture and feel. I admit that I scare easily, so sometimes I cut my night walks to ten minutes. The night time normally, though, is so calm and relaxing for me. The stars distracted me so much on my walk that I am writing about. I made myself dizzy from craning my neck so that I could look at them while walking. It's amazing to think about how huge the sky is. How much more is out there that we cannot see? How many of those stars are a part of a solar system with life? I remembered that I had wanted to be an astronomer when I was young because the stars and the universe fascinated me so much.

As I walked, I noticed how my dog explores EVERYTHING when he walks. He stops to sniff something constantly. Normally I would have gotten annoyed with him and told him to hurry up. Instead, I wondered why he is so interested in everything. Is he curious because he does not live outdoors like dogs are “meant” to?

On to Emerson, though!

I am very glad that I took Prof. Case’s forewarning concerning Emerson seriously. I do like many of his ideas and find it interesting, but he goes big, then bigger, then even bigger with few “smooth” transitions. I found it very interesting that he says that nature is actually for man. Emerson writes, “Nature, in its ministry to man, is not only the material, but is also the process and the result. All the parts incessantly work into each other’s hands for the profit of man” (7-8). He then continues with some beautiful imagery to support his argument. It makes complete sense for Emerson to believe that nature is meant to serve/is for man because he was a Christian man. I wonder what Emerson would think, write, or say if he saw how the world is now. I feel like man takes advantage of nature for the majority of the time. The section of beauty stuck out to me as well, especially when Emerson writes that even a corpse is beautiful in some way.