Somebody call the waaa-bulance, ’cause I just installed a flagstone walk, rearranging each slab of natural stone like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. And no amount of Advil is easing the aches.

But I spend a lot of time in my front and back cottage gardens, both laced with walks and meandering paths, and this particular walk was in a low area, getting slippery with moss and in need of a redo.

As I approach my tottering years, it is important to have a sure place to put feet in the garden without having to look, especially late in the day, during gully-washer rains or wintry ice, or when I am hurrying and laden with bags of groceries or whatnot. Throw in porch steps and it can be quite tricky.

And while I have honed a subconscious foot memory from years of treading it all, an over-the-shoulder “Watch your step!” has little meaning with less-adroit visitors, especially at night when they can’t see their feet in the first place.

Not getting into design here because everyone has their own preference between formal straight lines and more feel-good feng shui curves. But paths ought to be convenient — ever notice how postal workers, kids and dogs ignore our best-laid plans and create “desire path” shortcuts across yards?
Public park designers know this, and sometimes deliberately leave some walkway out of their plans, waiting to see where people actually go before laying concrete.

My gardens feature several different kinds of walk/path materials, sometimes in the same walk. I use poured, stained concrete, homemade concrete stepping stones and natural flagstone, even strips of synthetic turf. Some of my lesser-used paths are just soft, natural bark mulch underlaid with a double layer of landscape or weed barrier cloth to help keep it from mashing into the soil.

And there are large-grid mats that can be laid down before spreading gravel, grit and bark. They hold small and loose materials in place and provide a more stable walking surface, which is really important on slopes or in wet areas.

This is especially handy if you want to use loose pea gravel, which is not only noisy and moves around a lot underfoot, but also mashes into the soil, gets weedy very quickly and is hard to keep free of fallen leaves. If you are going to use pea gravel, go with the stabilizer grids or use the gravel between stepping stones.

Better yet, go with coarser crushed stone grit, which locks into place for firmer footing, or my preferred material: chipped limestone or slate that lays flat, providing a firm, quiet, nearly weed-free surface that can be cleaned easily with a leaf blower.

By the way, keeping path edges crisp is crucial for both looks and maintenance. I use a variety of materials, including rocks, bricks, interlocking strips of edging metal from the big-box store and sometimes just fallen tree limbs. I even have a section lined with attention-getting upended wine bottles, like I often see in gardens and high-end flower shows.

Not getting into night lighting, or the pros and cons of low-voltage or solar, except to suggest you make sure you have aligned the illumination so it highlights walks and steps without shining directly in folks’ eyes. That can be dangerous for visitors leaving the glare of indoors after a glass of wine.

Most of us have a spot where footing is iffy or muddy part of the year. Wander around your yard some evening and try to foot-think like a visitor. Might be time for a redo.

Felder Rushing is a Mississippi author, columnist and host of the “Gestalt Gardener” on MPB Think Radio. Visit his blog at felderrushing.blog. Email gardening questions to [[email protected]](mailto:[email protected]).