just before lausanne on the Via Francigena, a full day’s walk from donkeys and highways of orbe, on the french border, there is some kind of nunnery where you can stay on a cot behind the sunday school hall for five swiss francs. which is like very satisfying big half-dollar looking coins. I was looking for said nunnery in the rain, when I went into a very unexciting pub by a bus stop to ask to use the telephone. it wasn’t of much consequence, except for two things; it did help me find the little cot that I slept in that night, and what emerged from a franglais-conversation the world might call “broken” was a life-shattering new piece of information for me.
HANNIBAL CROSSED THE ALPS WITH ELEPHANTS
believe me, my knowledge of the punic wars has rusted over the past 2,000 years, and I don’t really like writing the name Hannibal because its’s confusing in the modern imagination BUT is there a better three-word history than
ELEPHANTS IN THE ALPS
a mere google image search of pen and ink drawings of the historic event, honestly gives me chills. even the tiny pixelated version gives me full on Washington-crossing-the-Delaware vibes, it might be to much before going to sleep.
so super happily, I also discovered this light 1950s version too, where English university students got permission to take a rowdy elephant from the Turin Zoo through the Alps one summer in honor of the ancient history.
Obviously, this plan could be updated for 2020 in ways that are more compassionate to the elephant. But also, WHAT!
from John Hoyte-
Whatever the reason, the question stuck in my head even though, laughingly, I recounted all the reasons why it would be impossible: No money. No elephant. No experience. No reason to justify it. No possibility. No way! However I could not get to sleep that night and began to think outside the box and put aside the impossibilities. I let myself imagine the possibilities! Suppose I was actually able to get an elephant. What then?
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maybe it’s just another way of saying, do NOT dream too small!