Love Letter: Dancing with life is a most curious thing

#73 When things break, something new may fly free

Jul 17, 2024

(We know the day we were born, but most of us do not know the day we will die. This love letter to my life is written on the day I've designated as my death day: the 17th of every month, and reminds me to be grateful for my joy-filled life. —Joyce Wycoff)

"Always, pilgrimage is a journey of risk and renewal.

For a journey without challenge has no meaning;

one without purpose has no soul."

-- Phil Cousineau, *The Art of Pilgrimage*

Possibilities are exploding

Life is the most curious thing. For weeks I have been planning a "big trip," influenced by Phil Cousineau's thoughts on pilgrimage, which carries with it the idea of purpose, a pilgrimage to something or for something, responding to some sort of call from spirit.

The whole trip was initiated by my fascination with Brian Thomas Swimme's book: Cosmogenesis. When I saw that he was participating in a workshop in France, I signed up without hesitation. The fact that it would be held in Chartres, France, and include an experience of walking the labyrinth and working with Cousineau plus the idea of pilgrimage were simply footnotes. However, I dutifully began to read The Art of Pilgrimage.

“A month in Paris” she thought

His words began their alchemy, and the ten-hour flight to France opened an invitation for a longer stay and more exploration. The obvious idea would be to spend time in Paris, reigniting a thwarted idea from years ago of spending a month there. So, off on that path I went, researching where I might want to go, and actually booking an airbnb for a month.

Phil tells many stories of "pilgrim people" who have embarked on pilgrimages, both sacred and secular. Fascinating stories that left me with a gnawing emptiness about my own journey. I have long contemplated and yearned for the challenge of a journey such as the one to Santiago de Compostela. However, while it would be a long, challenging walk, it didn't feel like the right one for me. It didn’t connect with my spirit.

When I told friends about the Paris plan, they told me not to miss the stained glass windows of Sainte-Chapelle. They were right … the photos called to me; I wanted to be surrounded by that glorious light. This was the right path ... a pilgrimage focused on stained glass and rose windows could provide challenge and purpose. So, I proceeded, researching the endless history and art; it began to seem like all roads led to Paris instead of Rome.

Then I hit a wall and my curiosity stalled. It happened suddenly, unexpectedly: a chisel-sharp certainty that this was not how I wanted to spend a month of my life. As much as those windows called to me, a month in a huge city just made me tired. I dithered for a couple of days and then cancelled the airbnb reservation. Month in Paris … gone.

The curtain drops. The lights go out.

End of Act 1.

There is no Act II, so what now?

* Intermission … time passes … memories come and go *

When that workshop called me to Chartres with its ten-hour flight, it seemed logical to explore more while I was there. Once Paris was sidelined, I began to look at the land and lakes and rivers of Europe, recalling my youthful past when I had dreamed of taking a tramp steamer to Switzerland and hooking up with Heidi to backpack through strange lands. (Details of that fantasy trip are lost in the dreamtime.)

Opening up a Google Map, I began to ask not *where* I wanted to go but *what* called to me. A legion of internet writers rose up offering their advice about small art towns, towns with mural and street art districts, photogenic towns, incredible forests and lakes, UNESCO heritage towns, medieval villages, and retreats for writers, painters, yogis, walkers, bikers, and candlestick makers.

Exhaustion sets in

Just contemplating all of that exhausted me so I booked seven days on a farm on the edge of a forest in the middle of France. Now, the plan consists of ten days in Chartres, including the workshop, and seven days foresting with a resident bicycle to take me to all the surrounding less-than-tourist-hotspot villages, which sounds delightful.

However, seventeen days and still, I didn't have a pilgrimage identified. "I'll figure it out as I go," I thought. The plan was to do the research and make a flipbook about possibilities so that when that time came, I could choose the next stop ... or return home since I will be booking a one-way flight. End of Act II.

Act III opens

with me standing in front of my tiny library. Over the past two decades, I've moved too often and with each move, fewer books made the cut.

However, here I am noticing three books about the same artist, two coffee-table worthy (if I had a coffee table) and one small but exquisitely printed catalogue of graphic works. My mind drifts back to several years ago when a brief relationship did not turn out the way I had hoped but left me with a curious gift ... a fascination with an artist and architect who had prompted the purchase of these three books: Friedensreich Hundertwasser, an Austrian free spirit and environmentalist-before-his-time who despised straight lines and revered color. He seemed to be related by spirit to Gaudi and Gehry, and by chance and choice to my own fanciful aesthetics.

Immediately, Vienna gained a place on my increasingly starred Google Map when the "things to do" entry that caught my eye included the Hundertwasser House and Hundertwasser Museum. One of those books on my shelf, Hundertwasser, The Art of The Green Path describes the artist as ...

"... an advocate for a peace agreement between man and nature, and a leading thinker in promoting life in harmony with nature."

The Art of the Green Path … sounds like a pilgrimage-worthy theme. Act III isn't written yet, but pieces seem to be falling into place. Hundertwasser is often described as sui generis, in a class by himself, unique. It makes me think that he would make a great pilgrimage guide to exploring places and things I find unique and fascinating rather than follow any tourist trail.

Here’s a one-minute introduction showing Hundertwasser’s last project: (click here) I think there’s a flipbook-in-the-making about all of this.

Reflecting back: Before there was Substack, I had a blog. I wondered what might lie in those dusty blog posts about pilgrimage and found one titled: The Gift of Time. Fifteen years ago I was contemplating a pilgrimage to all of Frank Gehry’s buildings. Maybe this fall, as I wander through Europe influenced by Hundertwasser’s mind and works, I will also get to Bilbao for Gehry and Barcelona for Gaudi.

Now is the time.

And, what about you … have you done a pilgrimage or planning one?

I’d love to hear your thinking about what makes a trip a pilgrimage for you.