Marching out of Madness

By Ben Flynn

This is not a travelogue or a self-help book but reflections of a world that can only be exposed to those that journey by foot

Following the suggestion that every young man should walk a young Australian breaks free from the madness of his daily routine in London, to walk 600 lonely kilometres from Turin over the Swiss Alps to Munich.

Along the way, he faithfully keeps a diary, a record of discovery of a world seen from an entirely new perspective, one that emerges from a time of intense loneliness reflecting on life and the people in it.

His sometimes funny, sometimes dramatic account of fear and isolation; of physical exhaustion when your own body becomes the enemy; lays bare his thoughts and unique observations that prove anyone can open the door to see the world differently.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Mar 17, 2018
• ISBN: 9781546285991

Book preview

© 2018 Ben Flynn. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse  03/16/2018

ISBN: 978-1-5462-8600-4 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-8599-1 (e)

12.jpg

I ’m drunk with sleep. It’s 7am and I’m sitting in my van waiting at the traffic lights on Caledonian Road in north London. On my left is Pentonville-state prison. What occurs to me is that those poor fuckers are deprived of choice. Outside the prison, the streets are glittering with opportunity. At each turn, a perfect face screams from a carefully-designed billboard, inviting passing pedestrians to buy into a cheap version of authenticity. In the car, lunatics on the radio chat and chuckle while informing the world of its insanity. The message is simple: if it is not obedient it has gone wayward. When the comforting smell of caffeine flows from my cup into the inner part of my nostrils it sends a gleeful message, promising me that I will no longer feel drained or have this ugly sense of overworked misery. This was Bill Hicks’ prophecy, a society that gets through the week high on coffee until the weekend and then gets drunk to forget about it. I look beyond the van window and see a stampede of multinational inhabitants flowing down the street in a wild hunt for productivity. It reminds me that I have been part of that stream for seven years. Some absurd form of control must be at play to make so many human animals so obedient. My van is a perfect example. The traffic is fast, aggressive and impatient, yet the slightest error is caught on camera and an infringement notice finds its way to my doorstep. No specific person is asking for my money, just a cold and calculative system which is so cunning that it has completely distanced itself from human interaction. By 8am I’m on a job site. It’s smothered in a gloom that nobody dares speak of beyond the common tongue of a worker’s moans and cries.

My work days are confined to a cell, usually two-metres square, where my labour is to fill bare plasterboard walls with small tiles. I don’t even need to think any more. The tiles place themselves on the wall through me, in a robotic trance. The only variation is the size of the room, the tile colour, size and texture, and the demand of the customers. My mind fizzles away into my dreams which, obviously, are about escaping this dismal routine. At night, I meet mates or go to the gym to clear the physical stress and regain some composure before ending my day in another room. In this room, I enter the world of the internet and watch whatever YouTube suggests to me.

My screen fills with Werner Herzog documentaries and films and natural discovery documentaries. Before sleeping, I lie with my arm over my head, which helps block out the noise from the busy-ness of Kingsland Road in Haggerston. It often brings my attention to my pulse which sounds like the upbeat ticking of a clock belting away. Lately, an unsatisfying set of images comes forth and I’m overwhelmed by the truth that, even after all these years of trying, I’m still in those fucking two square metre rooms. Hope is hard to find without the help of a good film or book. More often I find myself turning to Herzog’s work. There is something about it that simply touches part of me. I’m currently reading an interview with him. It’s called Herzog on Herzog. Spring has come at the same time I’m reading it. The sun is finally blessing London. The longer hours of light have given new colours to the landscape and brought life to the expression on people’s faces. The gloom and frowns have gone with the departing grey clouds. Thank god.

I have made it to a part in his book which, after talking about how he walked from Munich to Paris, suggests people get off their arse and walk. I need to do it. Nothing else has worked yet. I’m still in that fucking room. He suggests writing about it as well, which I am also going to do. I only hope with this thing, that it’s not me writing some ridiculous set of pages about my confusion with myself. I don’t care for being coherent with what I write, it kills off the flow. My objective is simple; to articulate what I perceive of the world on foot; for months maybe, or alternatively until I no longer feel the need to walk. My objective feels insane because the rules of daily life are insane. Fuck it, I’m leaving tomorrow, enough is enough.

Finally, I have arrived in Turin in Italy. I came here after finding the cheapest flight to Paris. Last night I slept in the airport because I didn’t want to spend a ridiculous amount of money on a hotel after learning that I couldn’t get the train. It’s warm in there and with my backpack I look like I’m waiting for a flight. I passed out on a bench in a cafe and woke up when I accidentally kicked a man in the head. He had unashamedly placed it beside my foot as he tried to sleep along the bench. Why didn’t he sleep facing the other way? I woke in the early morning, foggy headed, and still in need of sleep. I found a bus that was going to Lyon and from there, one on to Turin. I jumped on it more because I wanted to keep sleeping. It was a good call. I had the whole back seat to myself for the most part. An African woman arrived at some time with her kid, who was curious about me, moreso than his mother. Maybe I smell funny. I didn’t get the opportunity to shower before I left.

It’s a long hike home from the centre of town to the hostel where I’m staying in Turin and now I’m luxuriating in the relaxing warmth. My feet are like a motor to my mind, calmly turning everything on. Slight delirium is perfect yet a slight anger as well, having done nothing in particular yet. The last three days have been spent pondering over whether I will walk or not. Matt messaged reminding me that I had made plans to go to Gdansk with him. I packed up my laptop this morning, addressed it to home, and went to the post office where I found myself lusting after the large breasts of the receptionist, regardless of her figure. I met a French photographer and spoke for some time about his experiences taking photos of 18th century churches. A young French girl, who was chubby with glasses and had an intelligence about her face, spoke of going to a film festival. She also loves Herzog’s work.

I don’t really want to go and see Matt. I want to walk. I need to walk. As strange as it is, I want to try it out. The warmth makes me giddy. Cigarettes are staring at me but I have no time for my addiction. I don’t want it to poison my intuition, the canny little shit it is, that ciggy. Just one tug, as easy as that, and it’s all over. As soon as I tug, it’s all over and regret will kick in. Only a couple of days ago, I was trekking to and from the gym. Now I’m leaving Turin and really walking. I notice that when I walk with my head down, I lose myself into the world of my dreams. Today I’m somewhat meditative and the idea lingers and warms that I will walk all the way to some place miles from here, I don’t know where. I think I’m doing it more for the experience of writing about what I observe than for the walk itself. Plus it will show what it means to a person to walk a long distance; it has a more serious call to action about it. But I don’t know if I just think all these things because I’m so heavily engrossed in the work of Herzog. I want to try something unique anyway. Somehow, for me, there is an element of romance being opened up within me that puts the mundane to rest. I realise what I’m doing is somewhat ridiculous but it’s important to do something ridiculous once in a while.

My shirt has dried white with the salty filth that’s pissing out of my body. It’s about 30 degrees, windless, and the sun is beaming down on me. It’s not so searing that it’s unbearable but it’s enough to make me aware that I’m dehydrated and have gone a considerable time without having to urinate. I sit in the shade in a street off the main road heading north east towards Lake Como. Thank god I’m away from the trucks, they scare me. I’m walking on some slim main roads with cars passing by at about 110 kilometres an hour; the trucks barely fitting on the road, much less steering well clear of me as I stick to the thin white line at the side. The back of my neck feels like it’s home to a hot iron. The sunburn turned up almost out of nowhere.

I noticed when I finally got the balls to start walking, that with every decision I made, the one that was neglected lingers. It echoes in my mind, explaining its logic and every now and then the questions that made me stall came to light: what of insanity, will the isolation get the better of you? What if you lose the ability to converse after some time with yourself and give up the ability to keep friends and meet girls and socialise and do the things that you enjoy? What if you get lost and something weird happens? But above all, I mostly grew fearful that I might lose my friends. I realised, however, that for a long time my life had been sitting between my dreams and what I’ve got. As long as my feet keep moving, my dreams are being charged. The cowardly act is to decide not to satisfy the two parties in me – comfort and risk; living in comfort while dreaming of risk. The coward stays motionless, he doesn’t act and therefore never lives.

Dragonflies buzz my escape route in the bushes on the slope just off the white line. With every truck that comes towards me, I consider jumping but stand still, teetering on the edge, as I wait to see if the truck driver has noticed me. Horse flies eat away at my legs. Hot, steamy grass is the worst of