Unexpected noticing
When I first began walking my dogs within the King’s Billabong Nature Reserve, it was simply about walking somewhere different. Back then, our early morning weekday walks departed from my home and consisted of one of four routes, decided on by little more than where my still asleep mind let my legs carry me.
There was rarely anything different to these walks. They served a purpose, which was for Zena, Cadel and I to enjoy walking together, something I believe is an important component of sharing my life with dogs.
Sometimes I felt bored. Not with my company, but with the scenery. Walking alongside the same roads, houses and vineyards gets boring after a while. Except for the occasional kangaroo in the distance or people working in the vineyards at various times of the year, nothing really changed. So I decided one the weekends I would put Zena and Cadel into my car and take them somewhere for a walk.
King’s Billabong is close to home and is full of walking tracks through scrubby bush and trees, making it the perfect destination for our walks. Our walking routine changed to include a weekend trip down the bush.
Because the bush is an ever changing landscape it also makes for the perfect opportunity for a sniff walk. I am now accompanied by Theo and Claire, who both love a sniff walk. I wish I could ask them what it is that they can smell. Sometimes it is obvious, when they stop to sniff prints left by kangaroos or a lone feather off to the side of a track, but more often than not I have no idea what scent has caught their attention.
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One of my favourite publications here on Substack is The Art of Noticing written by Rob Walker. Rob describes his publication as being about creativity, work and staying human. I don’t remember how The Art of Noticing came onto my radar; I assume it was recommended to me by Substack either within the app or perhaps in one of the weekly email updates they send out.
I do remember clicking through to read The Art of Noticing and loving what I was reading. I subscribed immediately. I appreciate his writing, especially his suggestions for viewing the ordinary through a different lens. It reminds me of my quest to find small moments of every day beauty all around me.
It’s only been during the last few months that I realised that my walks have become a way for me to document changes to the landscape.
It wasn’t long after my initial forays down the bush with Zena and Cadel before I began taking photos. Mostly with my phone, but occasionally I’d take my camera with the intention of photographing anything I found interesting. The overall landscape tended to be ignored, instead I was drawn to shadows created by trees, or tiny flowers alongside a track or a gnarly branch. It has morphed into documenting the larger landscape, as well as drilling down to smaller things.
My walks down the bush have continued with Theo and Claire. They have learnt that when my camera or phone comes out I’ll be making a quick stop to take a photo.
The four photos that accompany this piece of writing have all been taken this year. They document the drying out of the billabong, and are of only that area, not showing the rest of the reserve.
If I go back through my archives I have photos that show the billabong full, all the stumps and dead trees shown here completely underwater or just peeking out of the water.
The flooding of the Murray River in 2022 changed the landscape enormously; after the water receded the difference in the before and after is incredible. Most shrubs and grasses died, drowned from too much water. Trees are stained from being under water for so long, a line that shows where the river height got to.
My favourite tree - long dead but with an enormous trunk and glorious looking roots, which lay on its side in the billabong - was washed away. It is not an overstatement to say I was devastated when I discovered it was gone. To imagine how strong the current must have been to push this dead tree away is unfathomable.
This is my way of noticing. As I walk with Theo and Claire I am reminded that there are small moments of beauty everywhere. I look forward to our walks here. Not only for the good they do the three of us, but also to see how the landscape has changed, even if we were there the day before. Even small changes can be noticed in that short space of time.
Kim