Self Guided Tours
Today was the day that all of our self guided tours were due! Before we traded tour kits we were instructed to go through our kits and reduct them. This meant that we had to go through and black out any proper nouns. Luckily my didn’t really have anything to black out. We got into groups of 4 and then swapped tours. After swapping, we broke up into groups of two and went on our merry way.
My tour belonged to Christine. Her tour kit included a hand bound book and a little box. I found this box to be rather curious because it contained blank pieces of paper and a lighter. Intrigued I set out on my tour.
My tour booklet took me all up and down main street to different locations. All of these locations had some significance. An alley way, a dumpster, a mail box, and a bus station. At each location to book told me to take out a piece of paper and write down a memory pertaining to each locations significance. The alley way was deception, the trash can was regret, the mail box was longing, and the bus stop was escape. Each memory went back into the box for safe keeping.
After I had visited each of the locations I at last came upon my final destination. This destination was a bridge overlooking a small creek. As the water flowed beneath the bridge I read the final pages of my tour. It told me to take in the tranquility of the space, let go of the past, and become a peace with my memories so that I could continue to flow like the river. I then took the lighter and lit my memories on fire and let the ashes fall into the water and be carried away. It was all very poetic.
I really enjoyed this tour because it was mysterious at first and then became very personal. The elimination of proper nouns also left it up to a bit of interpretation. I really liked how Christine put a lot of thought into her tour and made it about the tourists interaction with themselves and then using the space to help them in some way.
Looking back I wish my tour had been a little bit more personal.
After my tour was over I sat in a coffee shop and wrote a more personal reflection of the tour, as seen below.
DylanKalina on The Line 
Wow- I really love your response! You really got the message I was trying to convey. Thank you! 🙂