A sence of place

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A small tributary to the Middle Fork of the Potlatch River borders our property. It crosses the path at the bottom of the gravel driveway. The trail carries me onward, making rhythmic sounds as my feet contact on the gravel, the sun warming my face, my leg muscles contracting and relaxing with each stride, and my ears filled with the melody of the stream. Stepping off the dusty gravel road, where the smell of the moist, cold morning air becomes the sweet, musty scent of plants decaying back into the soil. The taste of the mornings' coffee laced with cream is swirling over my tongue as I turn to ascend alongside the creek. Once teeming with spawning salmon, this small creek is now dry as a result of the neighbor's farming practices. A Northern Flicker eerily announces her presence with a high pitched squeal that emanates like a rifle shot from somewhere high in the Cottonwood grove. As I move higher up the creek, the air smells sweeter and sweeter. I see a pair of Mourning Doves perched on a wire and remember that I've read somewhere that Mourning Doves mate for life.

How we manage the spacial environment around us is not something that it is on the top of our priority list, but should be. How we arrange our environment plays an outsized roll in how we perform and how our environment makes us feel.

In having a body, we are spatially located creatures: we must always be facing some direction, have only certain objects in view, be within reach of certain others. How we manage the space around us, then, is not an afterthought; it is an integral part of the way we think, plan and behave, a central element in the way we shape the very world that contains and guides our behavior. [^1]

A good strategy is to reduce the complexity and to place clues the support us in our environment. This could be a simple as placing a book under the tv remote. Reaching for the tv remote reminds you that you'd rather read.

[^1]: David Kirsh (1995): The intelligent use of space, 1995, Artificial Intelligence 1, Vol. 73, pg. 31 - 68,
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/222502846_The_Intelligent_Use_of_Space