“Look up, not look down,” said the Tree of Walking Free

6/7/26 (Monday)

When I walk, apart from the physical strain of limping, I’m also mentally drained from having to keep looking out for tripping hazards. Once I slipped on an election flyer just outside my flat. I caught the door in time to avoid landing on my back.

Long before smart phones, I was already looking down a lot. Awkward drop off points, curbs, uneven tiles & unmarked slopes which ironically are meant to facilitate mobility fill me with anxiety. 

In my Alexandra Estate Primary School days, the school dentist was located up the hill where Belvedere Primary School was.

Right hand on the railing, & dragging along my left side up those steps were more dreaded than seeing the dentist.

My relationship with steps took on a whole new level when I started university.

Our campus was built on Kent Ridge. Faculties & facilities were linked by series of corridors, steps & stairs.

My youth then & gratitude in qualifying for university gave me the resolve & strength to face those countless steps & endless walkways in order to access lecture theatres, tutorial rooms & library.

For 3 years I limped through it all with nary a whimper, lest my physical condition be seen as a liability.

So I hesitated in alerting the student welfare office to my mobility struggles.

Furthernore, my limp was not considered a disability, but an incapacity.

These days in my old age, besides still looking down & scanning ahead, I have to listen for cyclists, pmd riders, & children chasing one another.  

And I long to shed this armour of hypervigilance soldered onto my psyche since childhood. 

Recently this aspiration led me to the Singapore Botanic Gardens. 

Over there, the trees pulled my eyes skywards, while the broad path beneath gave me a sense of what it felt like to walk freely.  

I strolled along vegetation, stopping now & then for birdsongs, squirrels, fallen fruits & breezes because I wanted to, not because I had to.

As I strolled, I felt as if I was growing a new neck & a new heart. 

I’m beyond grateful that a solitary, seamless walk was the medicine I needed from constantly feeling on edge and locked down.

As the familiar forest chorus transported me to my primary school days, I laid the little girl who agonised over keeping up with her classmates on stairs to rest.