My dad, who lives in a long-term care facility in western Pennsylvania, had a recent bad spell with complications that landed him in hospital and me on a plane heading east. Thankfully, the crisis is past and he’s doing much better–at age 99, that’s a relative phrase–and so I’m here with family, visiting him every day. And every day I walk the same course.
There is something in that walk that is developing as subtext, an underlying rhythm that is gradually becoming a kind of pilgrimage. A space carved through repetition and intentionality.
I wake up each morning and see a patch of blue out my window above the rooftops–cloudless blue sky and sunshine. The route I take to see Dad is not particularly scenic or dramatic, but there is a familiarity to my path that makes it seem significant.
First it’s out my brother’s back door and down the back alley, past a grassy bit of infield and a tree where kids climb.
Down the hill to the light, and then along the slate sidewalk beside big Victorian houses–towers and turrets, big porches and peaked roofs. Some houses are careworn and look lonely, but others are well kept up, gracious, and almost regal. Like people you might pass.
Cross the railroad tracks, and down the hill to the light at Route 40, the National Road. This ordinary-looking street, with a Fluff-n-Fold drop off laundry service on the corner, was once the main route for settlers heading west.
Over the bridge and broken pavement, up the hill and left onto a steep ridge with small older houses on one side. I know where the dogs are now, and which ones will surprise me and race to the fence to bark, and I know where the cute house is, the one with the sign and garden.
Up past larger houses and greenery where the family of deer live in Tarbuck Regency Park, lounging as comfortably as family pets. Sometimes they are backlit at the top of the hill looking like so many cardboard cutouts.
Now it’s past the rusting truck and into the little treed area where on the hilltop sits Dad’s care facility and “campus”, always in sunshine it seems. Lovely green vistas and a big oak tree. Twenty-five minutes. People are surprised I’m walking.
Heading back home is all downhill, but I relish both coming and going. This is my breathing room, my meditation, my prelude and my postlude. It has become an unexpectedly welcome time to contemplate life and death, love and family.
If a pilgrimage is a journey to a sacred or meaningful destination, with intention and attention, well, then, these simple walks would qualify. My days are underscored with thoughts of a life well lived, how fragile it is, how long we’re here, how loss visits us all. And ultimately how families adjust.
A pilgrim should travel on foot, I believe, and can simply be “one who travels from place to place, a wanderer”. It’s what occurs during the journey that makes the difference; things like taking time to be open to the layers of our lives. We allow our personal histories to be considered. We accept our doubts and our shortcomings, and somehow touch the deeper currents below and above us. Along the way we take many steps.
Walking while paying attention allows us to find the sacred in everyday life.
Photo credit:
Photo © Star Weiss – All Rights Reserved
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Beautiful piece. Thank you, Star.