“accept the gifts life keeps giving you again and again without you asking” - Osho
I am writing this from after dinner at a friendly restaurant with Scottish owners in Châteauvillain.
“We moved here to France because my wife’s cooking wasn’t good enough for the English” the owner jokes dryly from behind the bar. It’s a joke for the English family that’s just walked in, but I laugh too!
I’ve been in France for three weeks now.
After dinner, we have a nice conversation. They tell me about Paul McCartney’s carpool karaoke.
It’s been a long and winding road today from Bar-Sur-Aube.
I was woken up at 4am from a visit by Mme. Migraine, another reoccurring friend on this trip. By the end of breakfast, I feel back up to speed, but I’m cautiously optimistic, thinking to do just 15km for the day.
I hit the tourist office on my way out of town for a nice stamp in my pilgrim passport and a point in the right direction. They tell me the nunnery, my first choice, is already fully booked on this Friday night. But, if I can make it to the address of this boulangerie 30km away in Châteauvillain, there will be a place waiting for me.
It sounds like a big challenge at high noon.
« J’ai besoin de courir! »
I say, as I stuff my maps in my pockets and sprint for the door.
I feel I’m riding for a fall to take on such a big late day when I know I’m not quite fully recovered from my shorter march yesterday, but I also know I can do it if I have to.
I stock extra water and two chocolate bars, grab my backpack straps to put a bit of weight in my hands, and start running.
I pace myself. Instead of trying to continuously run, I count to 120, or the next good tree, or the end of the downhill, then switch back to walking. Run, walk, run walk.
I remember drills over Cat Hill in Central Park.
“Lean into the downhill, let it take you”
I repeat now, and it works. Gravity seems to work double time with the backpack and 2-liter of water. Somehow this feels easier than walking. I remember every step I take is behind me forever as I close in on my goal.
I’m almost to the first town, just 5km in, cruising, when I hear a car beside me. I peek inside, it’s just a kind-faced french woman with her groceries and little dog in the backseat.
She offers me a lift to the next town. I remember the feeling of this morning’s migraine, calculate my impossible splits for making it to the boulangerie, and accept!
She says she can just take me down the road a bit, and that’s fine by me.
I explain pilgrimage in my best french, and she explains the Nativity patchwork she made for the church last year. I’m leaning a lot of new words. Patchwork is just patchwork with a french accent, so is Amish!
She tells me she learned about them on a TV program, she likes to learn how people in other places live.
A pilgrim passport seems to be as good an invitation as any for people to voice the changing nature of their relationship with the Church and spirituality. So I try to catch what she is saying and learn another new word, «rebelle! »
D’accord!
My head spins at how fast the fields are going by, but I am also happy for an unexpected conversation after anticipating another long day alone in my thoughts, between my two earbuds.
She leaves me off 10km from my destination, but not before piling peaches, banana, and cookies into my arms and writing down her name - Murielle! and phone number. I write down my blog and she files it for her daughter.
I continue on to Châteauvillain, a 15km day after all.
When I reach the town, I realize it’s beautiful, and I am grateful to find it with plenty of daylight left. The town hall is bright and modern, and they give me the key to the pilgrim apartment, which is generously operated on a donation only basis.
It takes a few times around the block to discover, but when I find the building and unlock the apartment it is cheery, clean and bright.
I relax, put my backpack down, and go outside to explore, charmed at every corner by the city’s cobwebbed alleys and stone walls.
I see some children cast their bikes down and run up a hill buttressed by a stone wall and overlooking a bright stream. I notice little bags and papers floating down into the water while I take pictures below.
The children are laughing. I think to scold them for littering, but I don’t know the words.
I start walking up the other side of the hill and they jump and screech towards me, elbows and hands bent in the universal gesture for “pretend monster”
I feign a scream back, shake my head wildly and run and run and run up the next hill without looking back
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