A path to Heaven

For this blog, I would like to retrace a path I have taken almost every day of the week throughout my life in Derby. For you see, walking makes you think, Aristotle was already demonstrating that in his time. And to walk the same path becomes very interesting, especially when this path is of good duration, when it is in the middle of the city and it is important for us, because of its deep purpose. So, I’m going to tell the story of the path I used to take every day from noon (the best time of the day) from my home (Wilson street) to my haven of peace (St Mary’s church).

First of all, when you get out of the house, it’s like getting out of bed, because it determines your whole attitude out there, your mood. The advantage of Wilson street is that it’s a slightly elevated street exposed to the morning sun, a bright, blinding, warming sun. So as soon as I opened my door, I was delighted, all I had to do was hum in my head to become the last of the idiots in front of the slightest passer-by. Most of the time, these passers-by were homeless, people in difficulty or even handicapped. And there, all my attitude was crucial with these people, a bit of kindness and my day would continue to light up as I went along, and in contrast, a slightly annoying idea and I would become the only one walking in the street without seeing anything or anyone. The two attitudes followed one another, day after day, according to a few parameters: mood, time, personal problems, etc. I considered this step as the one that would determine the path. This small step embodied the straight line of Wilson street, then the descent to Victoria street and the heart of Derby.

Arriving at the bottom of the street, I make my grand entrance into the living centre of Derby, and there my identity no longer belongs to me. I am no longer myself, but I am an individual in a crowd of other individuals. Turning left on Corn Market, this state of mind is striking when you think about it, and yet so unconscious in the heat of the action. All that comes out of me is the image of a boy walking pretty fast and taking a decidedly relaxed yet nonchalant step. This image, constructed from scratch, is that of the individual wanting to protect himself in the face of so much complexity, surrounding him, stimulating him intensively. For yes, walking in the very centre of Derby throws on each individual a disturbing stream of strangeness that does not resemble us, that we do not know, that we will never want to know and that yet in spite of ourselves we classify ourselves in our mind. All this complexity, it is the individual value of each person that is added in the common spirit of all this urban din, what is commonly called, and to reassure our worried mind, the city. For the city, we know what it is, it is known to everyone and does not change according to consciences. And yet, the city does not exist, it is simply the fruit of each individual reason for being, turned, diverted, conscious, unconscious; it is only this individual reason for being that forms the city, because, adding to another reason for being and then another and another, will, after hundreds of thousands of other reasons for being, form what each one will have produced. Namely, shops, pubs, churches, sports clubs, homes. 

Yes, these buildings are only secondary, I only notice them after studying those for whom they exist, the people around me, walking towards the reason that makes them work. All this is a game, a play, and whoever manages to be sincere can only be completely crazy. That’s what I tell myself, before I try, against all odds. Making a smile, giving a coin to a homeless man and saying a few words to him, sometimes it’s not much, but it’s me, simply trying to give a little more of what’s inside me to this unknown crowd. 

As I go on my way, it gets simpler, I understand more things, I pass by this imposing cathedral that might look like me and yet is not where I would go to rest by being almost completely myself. No, I continue on Queen street and there it is the space of people in a little more hurry, driving in these cars, which escape from everything I have just experienced, since they offer an individual bubble to the person on board, he only sees the point where he has to go and the emotional stimuli will be very limited on board this material shell. I make my way through these emotional tanks and finally, I fly over them, on this incredibly well imagined bridge (Saint Alkmund’s Way Footbridge), as it is the height of calm above the whirlwind of urban life. All I see now is the end of my path, great, gentle, inviting me to come and rest, St Mary’s Church.

This path was a way of experiencing a theory, one that gives the city as an accelerator of the individuation process. The individual forms the city, with the help of all the other individuals, and then this city inevitably becomes a factor of individuation. We can go in the opposite direction, trying not to individualize ourselves, going towards the other, if the latter is willing. Or we can accentuate this individuation factor. With music in our ears, we are more individual than ever, we stay in our head and we feel very, very good. The car does the same thing in a much more radical way. And finally, what I could see, the off-peak time, between 4 and 6 in the morning; that moment when the city is no longer the city, it doesn’t exist, not yet, all that exists is where I come from and where I’m going. For a city that is not alive is indeed a dead city.

Jérôme Vermeulen

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