Tactile=ness
August 24, 2007 by warrick
Walking to work this week, this retro footpath, all done in gorgeous blue chalk by some enterprising kids or their nostalgic mother. And, later in the same walk, some love-smitten year 10 had written chalk love messages to her bf on the footpath for a kilometre or so: ‘truly madly deeply’, ‘because you’re mine’, ‘i love ur hugs’. etc etc. And at the end of the trail a yellow snub of chalk, all used up.
Something interesting and attractive about the simplicity of chalk as a tool for entertainment and communication. It’s been years since I used a blackboard in class, and I wouldn’t go back, but something about the low-tech tactile nature of this chalky communication made me smile.
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Hi Warrick – I also saw these markings. Perception is a funny thing. I immediately thought they had been written by a boy – pictured in my mind around Y11 or 12 – who wanted to declare his feelings in a public way! The first one, “I love ur smile” brought a much-needed smile to my own face…followed up further down the street when one came across “Your body is a wonderland”. At that point my own little fantasy that these affirmations could possibly be directed at me came to an abrupt end – my body would more accurately be described as being like Disneyland!!
The ephemeral nature of chalk renderings, on pavements or on blackboards, may ensure their physicality always disappears…but the feelings they invoke and the learning they engendered will always remain. I would love to think that students enter the worlds created by those chalky scratchings like the Banks children did in Mary Poppins.
It’s funny; they made me smile too. I don’t quite know why. I like your ‘Mary Poppins’ image too; I’d forgotten those chalk paintings.