I walked on & one & on this day, and finally reached the tiny village of La Clauze, where I had originally intended to stay the night. And yet before I could search for a place to hunker down and rest my head, I was presented with a far more pressing matter — I really needed to use a restroom. Unfortunately, the hamlet of La Clauze was extremely tiny indeed, so much so that there were no public facilities available whatsoever — no public library, no public restrooms, no town hall, and not even a church or parish to be seen .. :O

Fortunately, Coustette de la Clauze — a castle-resembling B&B — was visible on the far end of town, and I headed towards its central medieval tower in the hopes of finding some less-than-medieval relief ( 😀 ) … Unfortunately, the proprietress was less than friendly on that particular day and completely unsympathetic to my situation — both towards my Walk in general and, far more importantly at that moment, to my more immediate potty-predicament … 🙁

I really didn’t want to soil either myself or someone’s private garden*, and things were starting to look pretty grim in either regard, when a private bathroom was indeed finally offered by a local resident ( 🙂 ) … Still, I was left to marvel at the callousness I had witnessed at the uber-posh Coustette — as well as how often it was that those who had the most to offer a stranger in need were also most often those least likely to know the pure Joy that comes from providing the same.

“To be hesitant towards strangers is in effect to fear Love — and thereby to fear Life itself. And those who fear this Love (and thus this Life) are quite sadly themselves already three parts dead.” ~ via Bertrand Russell

*While regularly finding clean restrooms along The Walk was one of my unusually primary concerns before setting out, I was only forced to go “au natural” twice on the entire Journey … 😉

Filed under: Peace Pilgrimage #02: Walking HOME (2019) by Scaughdt