Permeable Space

I’ve long been attracted to the idea of permeable space, places that are neither entirely inside nor properly outside. Much of this comes from having a body that isn’t always mobile and can’t handle being out in all weathers. Being able to sit somewhere I can feel connected to the outside, is a real blessing. I used to sit in doorways a lot, for that reason.

Camping creates those liminal spaces of not quite in or out. I’m also aware that for a lot of human history, if you were crafting pre-glass windows in any less-warm part of the world, you’d sit at the edges. Crafting is something to do in doorways, so as to have both light and shelter, or under the eaves. There’s a sense of ancestral connection in taking up that kind of position, I have found.

I’m drawn to sensory interactions with the world. Enclosed human spaces tend to be fairly sterile, in terms of the experiences we can have. I crave the feeling of wind in my hair, sun on my skin. I want to smell petrichor in the air, the fragrance of flowers, the watery smell of the stream. I need the songs of birds in my soundscape, the rain and the stream, the wind in the trees. To be in between, not entirely exposed and not entirely insulated really speaks to me.

In my time on Hadrian’s Wall, I had a great doorway for sitting in. At the moment there are exciting glass doors that open onto greenery and it’s a bit like living in a treehouse. I like the idea of living in a treehouse, or in some building that intersects with wildness in deliberate and responsible ways. Oddly enough, living on a boat didn’t give me that, the boat felt like a very closed thing, and there was only watery movement in stormy conditions.

And of course there are all those riddling, folkloric, fairytale motifs around things that are neither one thing nor the other. Neither barefoot nor shod, neither riding or walking, one foot on a goat and one foot on a well… these are the places where the magic gets in. I wish to live on that margin.