Shadow

It is tempting to close out the story of our pilgrimage walk without addressing the dark moments, what Carl Jung would have called Shadow. It is in the shadows that we so often find rich and fertile lessons…

Pilgrimage, like life itself, inevitably brings us to moments of challenge and uncertainty. Bad things can happen, fears arise, and we find that in our quiet moments we come face to face with who we truly are….

Knowing that I have sensitive skin and am prone to sun problems and blisters and bad reactions to insects, I prepared almost hypochondriacally. I was prepared for just about anything, but the dampness of our first day caused a problem with my feet; by the end of the second day, it was clear that I was going to lose at least one toenail — but it also seemed clear that my pain was not going to cause permanent damage, so I chose to walk on…

Following the excitement of Thursday’s successful arrival, I spent  Friday at the hospital getting emergency treatment and Saturday shopping for shoes that would accommodate my tender toes so that I could re-shoulder my pack and walk out of Chartres to catch the train that would whisk us back along the road we had walked, toward Paris and home.

Feeling vulnerable, I wondered if I had failed in my pilgrimage or (worse yet) in my quest for vitality. I had to come to terms with my own limits. In an exquisite moment of soul-searching, I realized that there was a way that I could look at my toes as an opportunity to accept the very blessing for which I had been praying. As I walked toward this cathedral that so beautifully honours the Divine Feminine, I had been asking that my own heart would be opened that I might finally learn to accept the love that so often I have not accepted as my birthright. Though I know it had always been on offer, as an adopted child I have always struggled to allow myself to be fully embraced by the abiding Love of the Mother.

As I shivered in my bare feet on the streets of Chartres, I heard myself apologizing yet again to the women who were helping me so selflessly. Turning a corner both literally and metaphorically, I suddenly realized that this was a perfect opportunity to accept an answer to my prayers. No one was begrudging me the time and assistance, no one was expecting me to be anything other than what I was. I was the only one who expected me to be a superwoman. Divine Love was present and on offer, in the guise of my companions… all I had to do was accept it.

Support

Support comes in many forms…. From the outset, our plans felt blessed by synchronicity and grace. With our iPhones giving us on-road accessibility, friendly text messages and emails continued to give us the almost uncanny support that began when we first made the decision to walk.

The morning after we decided to make this walk, a little package dropped through my letter box; inside was a set of beautiful prayer beads, complete with a scallop shell, that would support me in my spiritual preparation. Such signs of support continued through every stage of our planning and our journey. With no conscious planning, a very special spiritual mentor just  ”happened” to be in Chartres the week we walked, and was on hand to greet us with ceremony and gifts when we arrived. Another mutual friend stepped up to support me through a moment of difficult challenge.  Perhaps more than ever before, I was aware of how blessed I am by the people in my life.

On Thursday evening we were invited by a private group to join them in their private candlelight labyrinth walk and prayer circle in the cathedral. What magic!

Some of you burned candles for us, some walked labyrinths, others sent messages of support and dedicated some of your activities in support of our pilgrimage. As you prayed for us, we were also thinking of you, weaving you into fabric of our walk and appreciating your presence in our lives.

Several friends sent little tokens for us to carry — sweet grass for smudging…  small bags of affirmations to support and inspire us on the days we walked, one to be drawn at random morning, noon and night…  an angel card for each of us  – Lisa’s was Trust; mine was Release, and I felt her close as she encouraged me onwards during my quiet hours of walking…

Some of the clothing we wore was borrowed, as was  some of our equipment, a seemingly small thing, but something I thought a lot about as I felt my walk being linked to dear friends and earlier walks. On some deep level I felt their experiences informing and shaping mine. Connection is a precious gift!

And I want to mention another kind of support… trekking poles. Pure magic! I had never walked with poles before, but so many people had recommended them that I decided to give them a go, imagining myself with a traditional Pilgrim’s Staff. I was worried about losing my balance or tripping over my own feet if I got tired or hungry. Having heard that poles give a full body workout, I assumed one pulled oneself along with the poles, but what I found is that they sort of walk themselves, moving with the movements of my hip. I was enchanted by their companionship and rhythm.

Walk cheerfully over the world, answering that of God in everyone.  – George Fox

Chartres!

Thursday, 3 September

With sore feet, we set out before breakfast Thursday morning, eager to catch our first glimpse of the cathedral and buoyed by the fact that we only had to walk 12 miles that day. Only 12 miles! Never in my wildest imagination did I ever think I would utter those words.

Breakfast was fruit and a fresh baguette, eaten as we walked out of Maintenon, a charming village. Seeing our packs and scallop shells, an old woman rolled down her car window to call out Bon Journee, an act of true encouragement. At the edge of the village, we saw the first signpost to Chartres as we prepared to  follow the road out across the fields. The wind was blowing hard — another natural element I had naively not anticipated.

Apparently a pilgrim’s lessons on the road are quick… I would have thought that walking into a headwind would have drained the fun out of the walk, especially when combined with sore feet. But discomfort  just melted away into a non-issue. What mattered was the next step, and the next. That’s all. It was that simple. I became acutely aware of my body’s signals. Hunger meant a need to pause to refuel. Because I didn’t want to dehydrate or suffer from sun, I paid attention to the little signals reminding me to drink and apply lip balm and sunscreen regularly. For once, my scheming monkey mind was absorbed into the Now, and it was an amazing experience. I learned not to look too far down the road because the appearance of distance could be a disheartening illusion; the reality was that I would arrive when I arrived.

But that being said, it was a breathtaking and emotional moment when we first glimpsed the far-off spires of our destination… the Chartres cathedral seemed to float out on the horizon, and every step was bringing us closer and closer.

We stopped one last time for coffee just before walking into Chartres, a chance to sit together to reflect on our walking and anticipate our arrival. Then finally, we began recognizing familiar roads as we navigated our way across the River Eure and up the narrow streets leading to the Cathedral. We turned on last corner, and there in front of us was the North Porch..

We had arrived!

Mid-Walk

Wednesday, 2 September 2009

What a joy to wake to clearing skies and perfect walking temperatures! We walked out of Cernay la Ville and headed towards Rambouillet, greatly enjoying the prospects of flatter terrain and a drier day. Our morning’s walk lead us down out of the forested hills toward the broad fields that would mark the second half of our walk. We were definitely in the countryside as we walked from village to village, making welcome stops for coffee or baguettes or sandwiches as we went along.

Once again, we walked just far enough apart to allow us to savour our own flavours of silence, but close enough to feel connected and in sync.  Our goal was to arrive in the village of Maintenon by nightfall, and fantasies of a sauna-equipped B&B kept us going. Unfortunately, the fantasy evaporated when the reality of our uncooperative hotelier set in, but perhaps its purpose had been served in urging us forward over the course of the afternoon.

Finally settled into our B&B, we walked into the village in search of dinner, and came up trumps. We found a little restaurant, cozy and beautiful, with a friendly welcome lovely menu, and good wine. Can life get better? Even with our limited French, we managed to convey the idea of our pilgrimage, and were warmly supported and encouraged. With warm hearts and full stomachs, we walked back in the misty rain and enjoyed warm baths and a good night’s sleep.

Many thanks to Lisa for most of these pictures…. she must be fitter than I am because I wasn’t the least bit interested in my camera at this point. And she did so much to make our walk fun — here she is being one with nature!

First Day of Walking

Tuesday, 1 September 2009…

We set out along the Rue St Jacques in the wee hours of the morning, well before Paris woke to the day. Our walk through the dark and deserted streets felt sacred. By dawn we were on the outskirts of the city; we had not wanted to stop even for coffee or a baguette as it would have meant breaking the strangely mystical silence of the morning. By 9:00 we had walked  out of the Porte de Versailles and passed over the Paris Periphique. And the rain had started. Not heavy, just steady. We stopped midmorning to buy little goat cheese pastries which we ate while  huddled under a railway bridge to get out of the rain. Early in the afternoon, we reached a lovely village, Jouy en Josas, where we found a little cafe serving lentils and grilled sausage — surely the most divine food in the world at that moment.

We walked all afternoon, 24 miles in total that day. I was astonished to find myself capable of walking up long hills with fairly steep grades, in the rain, without pausing. When did I become capable of that? I hadn’t considered that we would really have to deal with inclement weather. A few spots of rain, perhaps, but not steady rain. And yet, it wasn’t a problem, at least not at that point. It was simply a matter of putting one foot in front of the other, over and over again. The rain merely added to the rhythm of the walk.

By afternoon, we were tired and feeling slightly alarmed by the narrowness of the roads we were traversing, jumping onto grassy curbs when vehicles approached, then walking on the hard shoulders until it was time to dodge another stream of cars and trucks. Still we walked on, managing to navigate by the maps posted on signposts outside of the villages we walked through. 24 miles in 14 hours, with only an hour’s break for lunch. Next time we do this, we’ll add an extra day into the itinerary!

Good friends, Giles and Christine Tournier,  met us on the road into Cernay la Ville and took us out to dinner, giving us encouragement as well as sustenance. Giles has made this pilgrimage 13 times, so he knows both the road and its lessons!

This first day of walking showed us a bit of who we are and what we can do. 24 miles is a longway to walk in a day, and a 20 pound pack is a hefty burden, but my body held its own. The wide hips which have brought be such despair over the years showed me that they are good for more than bearing children — my pack rested comfortably on my hips allowing me to carry my own supplies and possessions. My legs were strong and my heart uncomplaining.

We were also enjoying the silence of being together. Not having walked together before, we couldn’t preplan our approach. We quickly found that Lisa’s pace was slightly faster than mine, giving us space for hours of contemplation and silence, even though we were never very far from one another. Close enough for companionship, but too far apart for idle chatter.

This was our longest day of the walk, the following morning would  see us leaving the canopy of the forest and heading out through the fields…

The Beginning of the Road

Monday, 31 August 2009

We decided early on that this pilgrimage would not be a journey of deprivation, but rather one of celebration and joy. Two close friends, heart sisters, celebrating mid-life empowerment and vitality. Our day in Paris was carefully planned to be a time for relishing our sense of adventure as we anticipated the road ahead of us. We wanted to mark our course with a careful and meaningful setting of intention. Our anticipation ran high as the Eurostar whisked us out of England and across France. Arriving in Paris, the weather was glorious, the city beautiful. We were on our way! The Rue Saint Jacques, with its history of pilgrimage, welcomed us with familiar pilgrim symbols. We dropped our packs at our hotel, then wandered through the Latin Quarter on our way to Notre Dame, the spiritual beginning of our pilgrimage. We lit candles to dedicate our journey to the Divine Feminine, appreciating the scallop shells and amazingly beautiful depictions of Mary. Leaving the Notre Dame and its gawking tourists behind, we walked on, heading towards the Tower of St Jacques, the traditional gathering place for pilgrims on the Camino de Santiago. Here we marked the beginning of our physical journey, feeling the presence of the centuries of pilgrims who had gone before us. It was peaceful and quiet in the little square park, full of Parisians enjoying a few quiet moments in the late summer sun.

From here, we took the Metro to Montmartre, home to the Basilica of Sacre Coeur, the beginning of our heart journey, and another opportunity to light a candle for the journey ahead, with all its internal and external implications. This was my point of coming full circle, my return to the exact spot where I had made my decision to reclaim my vitality so that I could say yes to all that Life has to offer. In 15 months, I had made good on my promise, had lost the 100 pounds (7 stone in British parlance) of weight that buffered me from fully engaging with life; Iwas here to accept the challenge and invitation I had given myself.

As the day grew to a close, we could feel ourselves shifting into Pilgrim Mode. We stumbled across a restaurant that intrigued us…. truly an ideal place to celebrate our departure. Located just off the Rue St Jacques, the walls were covered with scallop shells and we dined in true Parisian elegance, sipping  champagne and feasting on beautifully prepared and delicious shellfish. Walking back to our hotel in the balmy evening air, only one thing remained to close out our day: we tied our scallop shells on our packs and went to bed.

Arrival!

We made it!

Lisa and I walked  into Chartres Cathedral early last Thursday afternoon. Still wearing our packs, we walked directly to Mary, Vierge du Pilier, lighting candles as our eyes blurred with tears of emotion.

I am writing this belatedly… in fact, we are both home and settling back into our daily lives, though I suspect we are forever changed by this past week. We needed to come home quietly, giving ourselves time to just be with our hearts, and to begin the process of integrating our experiences. Over the next few days, I’ll be sharing some of the images and stories that feel so precious to us.

But first, let me express our gratitude for all of you who followed us in thought and prayer, who wished us well, and who supported us in so many meaningful ways. We carried you in our hearts as we walked, and treasure the connections that transcend distance.

The Journey

In pilgrimage, one’s inner journey reflects the outer journey.  There are as many ways to make a pilgrimage as there are pilgrims, but a thread of sacred intent weaves through them all. My friend Sally Welch says it thus: The essence of pilgrimage is made in a spirit of searching, with an openness to what the journey can teach.

We will be walking a traditional pilgrim route, an early stage of the famed Camino de Santiago de Compostela which winds its way from various points in Europe, gathering momentum as it crosses from France into Spain, and onwards to Santiago de Compostela. The road of St James, or the Milky Way as it is often known. The symbol of this pilgrimage is the scallop shell. Today, as in the Middle Ages, thousands of people walk the route each year, guided by a series of emblems which mark the route and point the way. Our feet will be joining their footprints.

The Paris to Chartres route is an early stage of the Camino, chosen because of its personal significance to us. We will be walking from Notre Dame de Paris to Notre Dame de Chartres, culminating with a walk on the labyrinth before we make our way to the High Altar. It is a pilgrimage to the Divine Mother.

Before leaving Paris, we will visit three places, the Basilica of Sacre Coeur on Montmartre,  the Tower of St. James, and Notre Dame,, where we will light candles to set our intention and dedicate our journey to Mother Mary, who represents the Divine Feminine.  Very early Tuesday morning, we will set out from the heart of Paris, walking towards the Porte d’Orleans, and out into the countryside.

We will walk for three days, hoping to arrive in Chartres on Thursday afternnon, where we will be met by a dear friend and spiritual mentor, Rebecca Rodriguez. We have been invited by Veriditas to join them in their special evening labyrinth walk that evening. We’ll spend Friday in the spectacular cathedral, enjoying and appreciating its treasures and beauty before heading back to London via Paris on Saturday aftenoon.

We are honored and blessed to be supported on this pilgrimage by many friends in various way. Some are lighting candles, some have given small tokens to carry, others are holding us in prayer.  Our altar tonight, as we prepare to leave at dawn tomorrow, reflects the love and support of dear friends.

We ask you to keep us in your hearts as we journey….

The Call to Adventure

I tend to see life as a Hero’s Journey. For many years I taught a class on Myths, Dreams and Symbols at Sonoma State University, using  texts by Joseph Campbell and Carl Jung. Over time, it has become second nature for me to look at life symbolically, and my weight loss and quest for vitality has been a Hero’s Journey of epic proportions. This has been one of the hardest things I have ever done, not because of the dieting, but because of the inner work I have done to support it. I have had to become a new person, not only in my approach to food and exercise, but in how I think of myself and how I relate to the world.

This pilgrimage is a hero’s journey within a Hero’s Journey, a fractal. To not respond to this call to adventure when it stirred my soul would be to invite stagnation into my life. To accept it is to risk failure as much as to invite success. One of the hard truths I have had to face this year is my own stubborn perfectionism: I don’t want to try something  unless I have some guarantee of success. Shedding weight has taken away my main excuse for saying no to adventures, my main tool for buffering myself from failure and the world. I wore the truth of my fear rather than speaking it.

The truth is that I may not succeed in walking all the way to Chartres. The walk may prove to be too much for me… and all of you will know about it because I’ve finally chosen to break my silence and announce it from the rooftops of Blogland. And therein lies my success.

In my quest for vitality, I’ve had to come face to face with the demons of an aging (and sagging) body. I’ve had to learn for myself that vitality does not necessarily mean trying to look like a young supermodel, nor does it mean accepting every challenge on offer. It means honoring one’s hard-earned battle scars and accepting some limitation with grace.

I love shopping for adventure clothes, love the gear, love the planning! I will always be a curvy woman, will never, ever have the trim stick figure I long for… but I now fit nicely into medium-sized clothes, which delights me no end. I love that I can finally wear zip-off trousers! I will confess to having spent many happy hours shopping for clothes and  trekking poles and rucksacks over this past month. But not shoes; no fancy new high-tech trail shoes for me.

I have a serious problem with my right foot. It’s one of those hard-to-explain problems that seems to defy definition and diagnosis, which persists despite having  had a toe-joint replacement in an attempt to address the swelling and pain. This foot worries me as it will no doubt trouble me on our walk. I have tried on literally dozens of boots and shoes, but in the end I will be wearing the running shoes I bought in California last spring. The enthusiastic and knowledgable saleswoman, Deborah,  spent over 2 hours with me, evaluating my feet, watching me walk and run, finally suggesting I think of my new shoes not in terms of any specific activity but simply as Going Forward shoes. I like that! I am honoring my body’s limitations by wearing carefully chosen shoes and using trekking poles for stability, but I am still managing to answer my call to adventure with a resounding YES, balancing my sense of adventure with a dose of common sense.

The Call of the Pilgrim Path

I haven’t written anything for a long time… it’s not that I haven’t had anything to say, but rather that I’ve had too much to say, and I haven’t been sure about how much I wanted the world to know about the process unfolding deep within my soul… But I miss writing, and there are things I want to share here. So, where to start?

On September 1, I will set out from Notre Dame in Paris and walk the 100 kilometers (60+miles) to the Notre Dame Cathedral in Chartres. My good friend Lisa Moriarty will be flying in from Minnesota, and we’ll take the Eurostar to Paris,  before setting out for Chartres. We plan to walk for three days and will be met in Chartes by several dear friends. This is a midlife celebration of our vitality, a pilgrimage in the deepest and most sacred sense of the word.

Last year, when I was in Paris, I had a hard time keeping up with my friends, and in the spirit of pilgrimage, I had an epiphany in the Sacre Coeur, high atop Paris’ Montmartre. Having spent the previous Christmas in a pediatric ICU in California with my grandson, Aaron, I sensed that my own life was about to change drastically in response to the experience of seeing these young children fighting so hard for their lives…. I was just waiting for the spark of  insight that would illuminate my next steps. Finally, amongst the tourists and mosaics of Sacre Coeur, something lit my heart on fire, and I promised myself, and God, that I would fight for my vitality, that I would do everything in my power to lose the weight I needed to lose and regain my fitness, health, and most importantly, my vitality. That was 15  months ago, and in that time,  I have lost an amazing amount of weight and and am ready to take to the road in a new way, making a pilgrimage that I’ve been harbouring in my heart for a very long time, a dream rekindled by seeing the pilgrims on the road to Compostela during our recent trip to Spain.

This past year has been grace-filled. I have loved the weight loss process, the fitness, the new look. And on a deeper level, I have been thrilled by saying YES to life. Shouldering my rucksack and following an ancient pilgrim road is an old and cherished dream…