“The most profound transformations happen when we make a conscious decision to walk while holding everything encountered to be deeply sacred. This mindset allows us to let go of the landscape dwindling off behind us, read the landscape stretching out before us, and cherish the landscape surrounding us — imbued with the stable beauty of […]
The day proceeds, as days are wont to do, and my hips soon begin to tell me in no uncertain terms that I need to slow waaaaaay down — so slow way down I do; limping along step by step by step; looking for a bench upon which to pause and rest. No such place-for-purposeful-pause […]
The day begins to close as I wobble into Nyon and head smoothly & directly to the Notre Dame de Nyon (the city’s catholic church) … It is just past business hours when I knock on the door to the church’s administrative offices, and yet Christine is fortunately still on hand. She hears the general […]
I woke pretty easily after a intermittent night’s sleep on the church’s meeting room floor (having huddled close to the wall radiator while rolling from one hip to the other throughout the chilly evening), and hobbled up the street to hang out in a nearby coffee shop until Christine arrived for our appointed farewell coffee […]
I bid the church a-Dieu (pun lovingly intended 😉 ) and headed down towards Lake Geneva to commence the day’s slow hobble southwestward, and yet my attempts at making it back to the lakeside Camino were thwarted by one dead-end after another. :O I then managed to re-strain my right hip while scramble-limping back the […]
One of the tendencies common to many of the world’s pilgrims — especially those choosing to walk paths that offer longer stretches of solitude — was the act of self-accompaniment; often coming in the form of singing or humming or speaking with one’s self, and yet also sometimes manifesting in the form of the recitation […]
Up and into the village of Celigny and stop for some water at a nice little local restaurant ( l’Enclave ) and a wonderful couple — Pascalle & Gilles — overhear my mention of The Walk and call me over to their table; where they treat me to a miraculously delicious vegan Thai meal and […]
“Kindness is a choice, Giving is a choice, Respect is a choice, and Caring is a choice. So remember that whatever choice you make makes you. Keeping this in mind, choose wisely — which requires remembering to choose selflessly; remembering that it is not the particular load or challenge carried that breaks you down. rather, […]
Signs like this one were regularly seen along The Camino. Of course, the only way for any pilgrim to truly SEE the same is to realize that not a single one of them is ever precisely accurate — that not a single one of them objectively illuminates any pilgrim’s specifically unique route, much less includes […]
I walked into and through the village of Founex and then into the town of Comugny. The protestant church alongside the path happened to be open at the time (one of the VERY few times this was the case during my pilgrimage) and I sat therein for awhile and soaked up its semblance of solace […]
I left the sanctuary, physically still hobbled yet spiritually re-tanked, and headed over to knock on the parsonage next door. After waiting several minutes and wondering if I was going to have to amble onward to town’s “next” & “further” for the day’s place of rest, pastor Ken McKinney (from Memphis, Tennessee, no less! :O […]
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