A post about a day in the life of living in Italy (from when I lived in in a small village called Settignano, above Florence 5 years ago.)

I go to a pharmacy to get the schifoso liquid that I have to drink for the colonoscopy. I had been amused when my doctor used the word schifoso (disgusting) to describe the liquid. I didn’t expect him to be so blunt. He was describing the preparation process to me and when he got to the three liters of liquid I have to drink he said “Questa è la parte schifosa”. “Really?” I asked him, a bit horrified. “Yes,” he continued, “È schifoso”. “Is it the taste?” I ask him. “No, not the taste, it gives you diarrhea and you have to stay on or near the toilet for three hours.”

I buy the schifoso liquid and then I try to find a green grocer’s shop that is still open. It is almost 8:00 pm. I walk from Via dei Macci down to the volta and find one. It is one of those little shops where you cannot select the produce yourself. There are two people working, each occupied with customers. I watch as an elderly man announces to the proprietess the first item he wants: “Fragole” The woman uses a stepstool to reach the box of strawberries. She lifts the box down and then begins to place small handfuls of the berries into a plastic bag. I watch the other shopper being helped. The man helping him greets him by name. The patron names the first item: “Pomodori” and not until the bag of tomatoes is filled does the helper ask him “poi?” (next?). The next item is named. Meanwhile the woman has finished filling the strawberry bag for the other customer. She places it near the weighing machine, turns to the shopper, “Poi?” He thinks for a minute, then, “Zucchini”

My feet are aching. I stand shifting back and forth, marveling at the indolent pace. Finally it is my turn. I name the first item: “Carrote” “Quante?” the man asks me. “Cinque piu´ o meno” I answer. They’re deposited in the bag and the bag is placed by the register. I anticipate the familiar “Poi?” and name my next item. Once my groceries are paid for, I step into the cobbled pedestrian street, the small plastic handle of the flimsy bag quickly becomes sweaty and uncomfortable and I wish I had my backpack.

I push towards the bus stop on my aching feet and wonder why I’m not in tennis shoes. In Piazza Ciompi I wait 10 minutes for the electric C bus when a stout elderly woman with ankles pouring over black-heeled pumps asks me if the C bus has passed. No, I tell her, I am waiting for it. She asks if another will pass since it is after 8:00 pm. “Oh, the bus doesn’t come after 8:00?” I ask.

“Smettono alle venti” (They stop at 20:00), she says and my heart sinks. I am feeling decidedly weary. The woman begins to ask everyone in the street if another C will be coming. The A bus pauses briefly and she asks the driver, he says one more C should be coming. We wait 5 more minutes but when another A passes and no C we give up.

I run through the bus routes in my mind to figure out a solution. I realize I can walk to Piazza Beccaria and take the 12 to Campo Marte, cross the bridge over the station to a stop where the 10 to Settignano passes. I hike up to Piazza Beccaria, cross the busy viale and wait 15 minutes for the number 12. I have now waited more than 30 minutes and I am not even at the stop for the number 10 yet. Once on the number 12, a man in a dirty trench coat who is talking to himself shuffles slowly in front of me as I stand up to get off. I think he is going to get off but he stops and blocks my way. I can’t get past him and the bus moves on. I am almost too weary to walk to the front of the bus and say something to the driver. But I am glad I do as he takes one look at my face and kindly says “Vuoi scendere?” (You want to get out?).

“Posso?” My voice is quiet but pleading. I explain that the matto (mad man) blocked me. The driver throws out the ubiquitous Italian phrase “Non ci sono problemi” (no problem) and slows to a stop, not minding that he’s not stopping at a proper bus stop.

With my heart a bit lighter I step off the bus and climb up the rickety bridge over the station. On the other side, I read the schedule at the bus stop: a number 10 passed 8 minutes earlier. Another isn’t due for 45 minutes. It has gotten dark. The poor excuse for a sidewalk is less than a foot wide between the wall and the road. I lean against the wall and wonder if there is any way to get to Settignano other than wait in this dismal spot for 45 minutes. I am in a strappy dress. Cars with male drivers slow down to look and honk. I am too tired to be embarrassed.

When I finally get home I have to shower before I can even think about cooking. The erratic shower comes out in a dribble.

OK, that’s pathetic, I did only one blog post in September. I am not writing about the pilgrimage any more on the blog because I am working on the book about it. As far as my personal process I feel very much “out of the woods.” I am stepping into my new life but I haven’t wanted to write about it yet. Therefore, I’m going to do some posts about the Italy of my past. Afterall, this blog is about “Italian Dreams”!

This one is called “The Perfect Kiss” What’s been YOUR prefect kiss?

The July sun pulses through the cobbled streets of Florence. At night we surface in our skimpy dresses when the air turns gentle. The beautiful boys and girls emerge; double up on scooters, and clutter the entrances to gelaterie. Girls with shiny manes and tiny skirts hang on to boys who straddle their scooters like young Marlon Brandos with their rich tans and ubiquitous cigarettes.

Rosa, who the Italians call effervescente, is at my side. I see the boys out of the corner of my eye, as we enter the piazza. They lean against a stone façade of a bar. I note their wavy black hair, their carefully selected Saturday night shirts, their beautiful Florentine shoes. I hear the sexy sound of their voices. I am aware too, of Rosa and I, and our lissome bodies moving under our thin summer dresses; of the way our long honey-colored hair floats in the night like incense.

The boys, who I doubt are more than 20, call out to us.
“Siete stranieri?”
Rosa and I shout “Americane!” over our shoulders. We lift our heads and stride into the piazza like two fillies stepping out of a barn, ears pricked forward, taking in the sights and sounds of the sultry Italian night.

The boys trail after us.
“Dove andate?” they call, “Venite qua!”
We laugh and wave, feeling like movie stars.

We trek up the river to the dicso. On the outdoor dance floor we merge to the middle of the crowd as the song of the summer spins out its lyrics under the Tuscan stars.

Two young men come close to us—long legs in faded jeans and dark eyes under thick brows. I nod yes when Marco asks if I want a drink. We chat in Italian, I learn he’s a carabiniere.

Marco and his friend give Rosa and I a ride home. They drop Rosa off first. Then we drive to the edge of the center. The car is not allowed down my street so Marco’s friend parks a block away and Marco walks me down the narrow, empty via to number 4.

My back is against the chunky palazzo wall. My hands behind me feel the stone, smooth and cool. I look up at him and laugh. And then he kisses me.
“Sei stupenda” he says, and indeed I feel stupendous. He and his kiss and the two-in-the-morning medieval street: Tutto stupendo.

It was the perfect kiss and the sexiest night, with my last Italian.

Marco was my last Italian before I did something I perceived as “sensible” and married a placid American. And when I pull up the memories of that night, I feel the unrequited desire, not only for a carabiniere named Marco, and for his perfect kiss but also for the life in Italy I saw in front of me that night, which I thought would be mine.

So, I read this comment on grief the other day and it reminded me of why I did what I did on my birthday recently.

“As the grief diminishes, it is tempting to wave it goodbye, only to have it return and feel loss and desolation as birthdays, anniversaries and Christmas celebrations come around. It is like a carousel, which circles us, with varying degrees of intensity and distress.”

I wasn’t going to have another sad birthday. Last year I was sick on the couch, having recently returned to Colorado from the nightmare in the Italian hospital. I was still very ill, and I was facing entering into the acute phase of the divorce. The two birthdays before that, I was on the road to separation and thus did not spend those birthdays with my husband. But after so many years with him, I looked around and wondered what the heck to do for my birthday and who to spend it with. While I did spend those birthdays with people I care about, there was still a definite underlying sadness. The sadness wasn’t exactly about the struggle with my marriage, it was more that I knew I was not where I wanted to be in my life. I was in a limbo place, separating from him and from what was, but not yet stepping into a new life. I felt alone. And it wasn’t a good feeling to have on a birthday. That happened for two birthdays in a row and then came last year’s…. sick on the couch from sepsis and a horrendous case of pneumonia. It hurt to breath. It was hard to climb the stairs to the bathroom. I still had major yeast problems from the weeks of intravenous antibiotics. And I was about to file for divorce.

This year’s birthday came around and it seemed I had no one in Colorado I could really count on. My friends seemed very wrapped up with their own lives. I was not going to have another sad birthday. So I got a sub for my Friday class, flew to California, and went with my parents to the cabin in the Sierras that my parents own. I grew up going to this cabin every summer. It has always been one of my most favorite places.

Being up there was so deeply nurturing that I wanted to stay for weeks. The Forest Service had ordered us to change the color of the trim on the cabin windows. I loved painting with my dad in the morning and then swimming each afternoon with my mom. The lake was unusually clear… the September light putting a golden glow on the green water. It was wonderful to be outside everyday and not in front of a computer.

Once, when my mom and I got back to the cabin after a late swim and the air had turned cold, we jumped into the outdoor shower together. We suddenly looked at each other and said: “Hey last time we were in a shower together was in the Italian hospital!” We giggled about the crazy hospital shower that flooded the floor, we recalled the nurse’s reaction and we laughed. It was good to laugh with my mom about an experience that had been rock-bottom traumatic for us both.

I realized that’s all I wanted for my birthday. To be at the cabin, to help my dad paint and to laugh with my mom. Nothing could have been richer for me.

Link to the post about the Italian hospital shower

On the fourth day I faced one of the hardest parts of the route: Steeply up the Apennines. I had been walking 5 hours when I came to the village of Castello di Casola. It was 1:00pm, a perfect time to stop for a trattoria meal. I knew the village to was too small and too remote to have a trattoria but I hoped there might be a little grocery store. I asked the first man I saw and received the response:

“Non c’e’ niente qua. Deve andare ancora quattro kilometri.” (there is nothing here, you must go another 4 km.) At that point, four kilometers may was well have been the other side of the moon. I needed sustenance NOW. I sunk wearily to a bench at the edge of the village and drank the last of my water. An old woman with a wooden pole walked slowly toward me. I began to chat with her and she sat on the bench next to me. She called me “cara” and was quite upset that I was alone. She kept telling me there were bestie (wild beasts) in the woods. The only wild animals I could think of, that I might encounter in those woods were vipers and wild boar. I figured I could handle that risk. It wasn’t like I was walking alone across the Kenyan plains.

She asked me who would know if something were to happen. I told her I had a cell phone. I told her that other pilgrims had done the route alone. Nothing assuaged her. When I tried to steer the conversation to another topic, she reverted to warning me of the bestie. She kept saying “cara, non puoi farlo da sola, non puoi!” (dear, you cannot do it alone, you cannot!) I found myself laughing when she brought up the bestie for the 5th time. It was not like me to laugh when I am supposed to be polite to the elderly. I wondered if I was light-headed from the heat and from the lack of food. Was I dehydrated? Why was I giggling?

Here is a map of the Via Francigena (the part in Italy.) I started in Fidenza which you will see to the left of where it says in red “Provincia di Parma.” I walked to Aulla on the other side of the Apennines, and then skipped the part between Aulla and Lucca. I started up again in Lucca and walked to Sutri (two days before Rome.) I had to train into Rome because I physically could not walk further. However, even the directions I was following (in Italian) suggested busing into Rome on the last day as the route was on a statale road which was heavily trafficked with very little room for walking. Another pilgrim I met told me that it was “pericolosissima e bruttissima.” (Very dangerous and very ugly.) I would have been miserable doing it at the best of times, never mind as a woman alone with plantar fasciitis and a diarrhea problem that seemed to have come on from exhaustion.

Italian pilgrimage a lesson in strength, empowerment
By Kristen Browning-Blas
The Denver Post
Posted: 08/10/2009

Chandi Wyant, left, walked 264 miles on the Via Francigena, a pilgrimage route in Italy, staying in convents along the way. On the last day of her 30-day walk, she visited nuns and their pet dog in a Franciscan convent in Sutri, Italy.

Bio: Chandi Wyant, 44, a history professor at Front Range Community College, walked for 30 days on the Via Francigena (fran-CHEE-jee-nah), a medieval pilgrimage route between Canterbury, England, and Rome. Equipped with a 19-pound pack, two walking poles, four sheets of moleskin, two journals and three pens, Wyant left for Italy at the end of May and returned July 13.

The challenge: Last summer, facing a divorce after nearly 10 years of marriage, Wyant traveled to Italy, “the greatest love of my life,” to gain some perspective on her past and find a vision for her future.

“It wasn’t just a vacation,” she says. “It was a trip that had profound meaning for me.”

Two days into the visit last July, while preparing to spend a day on the Tuscan seaside, Wyant fell ill with what she and doctors thought was a virus. “Suddenly everything completely shut down, and it was clear I had to call an ambulance. My appendix had burst, and sepsis was spreading in my system.”

She was so sick that the anesthesiologist’s first words when she awoke from emergency surgery were “era una cosa bruttissima” (“that was really horrendous”).

She spent three weeks in the Italian hospital and another week recovering at a convent before returning to Boulder.

For the next six months, she recuperated from the near-death ordeal and worked through the divorce, blogging about the pain of both (italiandreams .wordpress.com).

But she didn’t get much exercise. Before her illness, Wyant was a fairly active person, doing a hut trip every summer and taking dance classes in the winter.

The idea for the walk: “It sort of dropped out of the blue sky and landed in my brain. I learned this year, for the first time, that it is not only OK to choose my passion, but it is actually the right way to approach life choices. This was a stunning revelation for me, to realize I had never lived my life that way, and to realize that in fact I could,” she says.

Did she consider going from a near- death experience to walking across Italy in less than a year might be a little much?

“There is cause to be concerned that I am not in shape,” she acknowledged in May, days before departing. “But I can walk. I just know this is how I’m going to get strong. I haven’t done training but this walk is how I’m going to get my mind and body back. I feel that I have a very strong spirit and staying alive in that Italian hospital took everything out of me. If I can do that, I can do this walk. I just hope my knees will not give me too much trouble.”

The journey: Less well-known than the Spanish pilgrimage route, Camino de Santiago de Compostela, the Via Francigena ranges over asphalt highways and tractor tracks through farmers’ fields.

Before she set out, Wyant wrote her intentions for the walk in a journal: to regain strength in her body, empower her spirit and trust her heart. She took the first steps toward that goal in Fidenza, a town near Parma in the Emilia-Romagna region.

After walking all morning, she stopped for lunch in Costamezzana, a one-restaurant village where the waiter handed her a magazine to read while she feasted on prosciutto, sopressata, pancetta, crepes and fizzy regional white wine. A quote in an article set the tone for the trip: “The journey of the pilgrim is from the head to the heart.”

About halfway through the pilgrimage, Wyant felt a shift: “I stopped thinking about what went wrong with the marriage and stopped having flashbacks to the hospital.”

She learned quickly that the hybrid sandals and lightweight trail runners she thought would be just right for hiking the rolling Appenine Mountains were no match for the miles of pavement along the way. Finding ice for her aching feet was a challenge, but her hiking poles provided essential support.

“My trekking poles were the best item I brought with me. For one, there are vipers in the Italian countryside. I used them to pound the ground in front of me vigorously to warn the snakes,” said Wyant. “And there were a lot of dogs barking ferociously. I could fling a pole out at them.”

By the end of her 30-day walk, Wyant developed plantar fasciitis, a painful heel condition. She let go of the idea of a triumphant stroll into Rome and decided to take the train. She spent extra time with nuns as they sang “Ave Maria” for afternoon prayers in small towns on the route — Bolsena, Montefiascone, Vetralla and Sutri — where convents often host pilgrims.

What she gained (and lost): Wyant walked about 425 kilometers, or 264 miles. She learned that the rule of thumb that your pack should be a fifth of your body weight was wrong, at least for her. She shed as much as she could and found that 13 pounds (about a tenth) was more manageable.

She will return to teaching this fall and update her blog, which she thinks could turn into a book. And she will continue to muse on what she learned as a pellegrina (pilgrim).

“I was tested toward the end because I had to really recognize my body was falling apart and I couldn’t walk the last couple of days into Rome, but my time with the nuns was more valuable to me. Although it took a toll on my body, my spirit got stronger. There’s been a big shift because I love my life again.”

My pilgrimage route, the Via Francigena, entered Siena at Porta Camollia. The medieval porta bears the inscription in Latin: “Cor amgis tibi Sena pandit.” (Siena opens its heart to you wider than this gate.)

The Via Francigena was fundamental to Siena’s growth in the middle ages. Siena is not in a strategic position. It is not easily reached by sea, nor is it in a position of natural defense. The fact that it grew to be a significant Italian town is due to the Via Francigena and the foot traffic of pilgrims who passed through Siena in the middle ages. Within Siena’s walls at least 36 hospices grew up in the middle ages to provide accommodation and medical care to pilgrims. Santa Maria della Scala which still exists in Siena, was one of the first in Europe, with its own organization set up to care for pilgrims, assist the poor and provide for abandoned children. It apparently was founded in the year 898.

I stayed in Siena with my friend, we’ll call him Adam, who lives right next to the Porta Camollia. I got to know him when I last lived in Florence. He was one of the expats who frequented the wine bar on Friday evenings in Florence where a group of expats used to meet. He is 11 years younger than I am. Adam loves to sing. I went with him to his choir group who had an evening practice in a lovely little green-marble church. On the way home he put his arm through mine and back at his apartment he asked if he could give me a massage. I declined.

The problem with being a pilgrim is that it is hard to go out at night. I had to get up early and go to bed early. Staying up late would cause me to leave too late in the morning. As it was, I didn’t get out Adam’s apartment until 7:45 on the morning I left because we chatted over breakfast and he wanted to take photos.

I exited Siena through the Porta Romana–so called because it faces south toward Rome. I felt the history of all the pilgrims before me who had exited Siena through that Porta. The road at first was the kind of country road I enjoyed on the pilgrimage. It was not large or busy. It had enough houses to be comforting and enough gardens with flowers and enough views over rolling hills to keep my spirits light.

After a few hours I had to walk a ways on the Cassia which had very little room beyond the white line. A huge truck came barreling past and even though I crammed myself over the white line, the truck passed me on a corner and it seemed to lean toward me, as if it might topple over. I had grown to detest walking on the Cassia and I hoped the Via Francigena would soon turn off of it. I had to hike up a hill on the darn Cassia before I came to a turn off. The route led me down a dirt road, through a farm, between the barn and farm house. I passed a pasture with horses and foals. I wanted to stop and watch them but when I stopped I was bitten by flies. Past another farm I heard a dog barking ferociously and I hoped it was not loose.

It was after that farm that I got truly lost for the fist time. The tractor track I was on came to a “T” with another tractor track at the top of a hill. There were some pilgrims signs pointing to the left. The directions I carried with me, written in Italian, did not correspond to anything around me so I followed the pilgrim signs. After about a mile, which included quite a few turns on dirt roads, I came to a farm house and the path seemed to end. I saw no more pilgrim signs. A man on a tractor paused his tractor to tell me: “Devi tornare in dietro!” (You have to go back.) “Il sentiero non c’e’ piu’, e’ bloccato.” (The trail no longer goes through here, it is blocked off.) And with that he rumbled off on his tractor. “Ma QUANTO in dietro?” I cried out, although I knew he couldn’t hear me. (But how far back?)

I didn’t have a fricking clue how far back to go. Was it just to the first turn, or the second, on the dirt roads, or was it all the way back to the T with the tractor tracks where my directions had no longer made sense? It was noon and it had to be close to 35 degrees already. I wandered back along the dirt roads. The fields were dry, the road was dusty, there was no shade. I was hungry. I was hot. I put my pack down and rested and assessed. I scanned the dirt roads for cars. None. The chances of a car or a person passing were nil. “OK Chandi, you have to figure this out yourself.” I told myself. Part of my brain just kept saying “Ma QUANTO in dietro?” But I took some long drinks of water and sat on my pack and told myself: “Just breath, just think, you can make sense of this.”

I decided that the most logical thing would be to go back to where my directions had stopped making sense, at the T with the tractor tracks. I was weary by the time I got back there. I read, and re-read the Italian directions. “giriamo a destra imboccando una carrareccia che scende…” There was no right turn on a cart track that went downwards. No matter how much I re-read the directions, I could not make them add up to what was around me. “OK, forget the directions!” I told myself. “Just pick a direction on the tractor track.” I chose a track that went up a hill. “Every tractor track must lead, at some point, to a farm house.” I encouraged myself. “At some point this will arrive somewhere, and you can ask directions.” I kept telling myself this as I climbed past fields of wheat, through the dry grasses on the dirt track, with the hot sun beating down on me. I started to have anxiety about vipers. I knew it was because I had just read about them the night before at Adam’s house. I stamped my poles particularly forcefully into the ground which slowed my progress. (Picture of the terrain where I got lost)

I came, as I expected I would, to a farm house. As I rounded the large red brick house, which I noted was shuttered up, a gray-green snake rustled the dry leaves near my right foot. It did not appear to be a viper but it rattled my nerves. Its tail was bizarre. At first I thought it was trying to carry something with its tail. The tail was curled and seemed to be dragging. The snake did not move in the normal graceful way. I realized the tail was smashed. Perhaps it had been run over. I was relieved to see the Cassia at the end of the house’s driveway. The heat was, at that point, relentless. I had walked for 5 hours and had about 4 more if I was going to walk the whole way. My nerves were frayed and it was too hot. I walked along the Cassia looking for a bus stop, which I shortly came upon. There was actually a posting on the pole with the schedule. I noted that a bus to Buonconvento would be coming in half an hour.

The first day of the pilgrimage I walked from Fidenza to Costamezzana (near Parma in the region of Emilia Romagna.) Costamezzana is a small village with one restaurant and one church and a hostel where pilgrims stay for 10 euro a night. I arrived at lunch time and was famished. No, I didn’t want a frugal lunch of bread and cheese by the roadside. It was my first day, and I had not gotten lost but I was very tired and I eagerly entered the restaurant and told them “Una persona.” There was only one other table occupied. There was no menu. I was told what the options were. I had a plate of salumi, prosciutto, sopressata, and pancetta to start. It seemed at first, too much, but I ate it all. Then I had crespelle (crepes) with a super good bechamel sauce, and then an insalata mista. I had a 1/4 liter of the fizzy white wine of the region. The waiter, hearing that I was a pilgrim, brought me a magazine about the Via Francigena. In it I read an interview with Don Mario Lusek, Director of the National Office for the Pastoral of Free Time, Tourism, and Sport. Quoting him:
“I think that nothing is more secular, and more Christian, than considering life as a journey, a search, a pilgrimage towards the discovery of the source of our common human nature. We believers call it God. No one, in the name of God, is a stranger to me.”

The lunch turns out to be free. The waiter says: “Because it is the first day of your pilgrimage.”

The next day was full of rain, mud, wet hay, wet feet, and strangers who became friends. I left the hostel at 6:45 and went to the one bar (attached to the one restaurant) intending to get a glass of hot milk into which I could pour my protein powder. The bar was closed. A sign said “Chiuso Lunedi.” I ate some of my energy nuggets there in the empty street and headed down the hill, in the rain, following my printed directions. At the bottom of hill I turned up a steep narrow road through the woods. The beech and Pine trees dripped with water. On my left a ravine with a stream and on my right a steep hill with a castello at the top. There was not a single car nor a single person. With the rain and mist and heavily wooded road it seemed almost dark. The square red brick tower of the castello stuck up through the trees. My shell rain pants did not breathe. The hike up the hill had generated enough heat that tomatoes would have grown in the pants. I turned onto a tractor track next to a vineyard. The shoes I had waterproofed twice seemed to be letting in water. I walked through the wet grass on the track and my socks felt suspiciously wet. I told myself I must be imagining it.

The clay-like dirt of the track had turned to sticky mud in the rain. Every few steps I had to stop and poke at the mud on my shoes with my hiking poles. It quickly piled up on my shoes making it feel like I was walking on very uneven platform shoes. “Note to self: tractor tracks don’t work in the rain.”

I had hopes of passing a hamlet with a bar so I could have breakfast but thus far it was silent countryside with no signs of a person. I came to a paved road which was a relief after the mud and I through the mist I could see some houses. One beautiful stately green one with rows of white-trimmed windows that came and went through the mist. When I arrived at the small group of homes, not a person was to be seen. Just to humor myself I said out-loud: “Anyone want to give a pilgrim some breakfast?”

I was reminded of the poem The Listeners, and I quoted to myself:

‘Is there anybody there?’ he said.
But no one descended to the Traveler;
No head from the leaf-fringed sill
Leaned over and looked into his grey eyes,
Where he stood perplexed and still.

After a short bit on the paved road, the route had me turning onto another tractor track. The valley and the lines of hills around it, were so lovely, even in the misty rain, that I had to stop, get out my camera and take a photo.The fields all had different patterns and colors, some green, some golden, and here and there a farm house on a ridge, and mists filled the valleys. It was utterly tranquil. Then I tried to walk down the track. My shoes became impossibly caked with mud at each step. I was wobbling ridiculously on clumpy uneven shoes. I tried to do a silly shaking of my feet with each step. Nothing helped. At the bottom of the hill was a farm house. “Maybe someone will be up and about now that it is 9:00 am,” I thought.

A dog came out barking and a man followed. “Buon Giorno!” I called out. He responded and we exchanged a few words and soon enough I was invited inside. I took off my muddy shoes at his doorstep and followed him upstairs where his wife fixed me coffee with warm milk served in a bowl. I was more weary than I had realized. I sat with my feet in my wet socks at their kitchen table for over an hour. Their two teen-aged children arose and came into the kitchen sleepy-eyed and found a wet pilgrim at their breakfast table.

We shared a stimulating conversation about the death penalty (a topic that Italians often bring up with me due to my country’s stance on it) and about health care (my pet issue lately.) The man had traveled in California and with a big grin he repeated a few times that there is a town in California named after him: Modesto. I had never before met an Italian called Modesto.

They sent me off with a prosciutto sandwich and a chunk of Parmeggiano Reggiano. Two products from their region which they’re very proud of.

Packing light enough for a long distance walk is a challenge but I’M IN! Seeing my pack weight today, I would say I am off to good start, given that I had to get all this together in only 2 weeks. I selected my items carefully and packed tiny amounts of toiletries, such as only 1 oz of shampoo. I packed it all today and weighed the pack and I’m in at an acceptable weight on the first try I have a Golite pack which is light weight, not super small but not large either. The pack, with my stuff in it, weighs 19 pounds but that’s without water, so add a few more pounds for water. A rule of thumb for an appropriate pack weight is that a fourth of your body weights is cumbersome. From one fifth and down, you should be able to hike comfortably. A fifth of my body weight is about 26 pounds.

Here is what my pack contains:

Clothes:
1 Golite synthetic long sleeve layering shirt
1 poly coolmax sports bra-top
2 lightweight coolmax hiking t-shirts
1 pair hiking pants that zip off into shorts
1 pair REI nylon shorts
1 pair Prana capri lightweight pants for evening
1 cotton t-shirt for evening and sleeping
1 light rain shell pants
1 light rain jacket
1 bandana
1 sunhat & sunglasses
1 pair light weight Solomon trail shoes
1 pair Keens
5 pair REI hiking socks
4 pair quick drying women’s hiking underwear

Miscellaneous & gadgets:
1 pair hiking poles
2 small notebooks for journaling + 3 pens
passport
print outs about route and accommodation
1 lightweight sleeping bag
pack cover in case of rain
headlamp + extra AAA batteries
digital camera + charger & adapter
ipod with Sacred Contracts book by C. Myss on it
emergenC packs
protein powder (because Italians don’t eat breakfast)
camelback bladder + one Nalgene bottle
potable aqua tablets
Nuva Ring prescription
Synthroid prescription

Toiletries/First Aid:
1 travel towel
4 sheets moleskin & 4 blister pads
bandaides
Newskin liquid bandage .3oz
Ibuprophen
Tiger balm pain relief patches
hand sanitizer 2 oz
bug spray 2 oz
small army knife
toothbrush & 2.7 oz toothpaste
hand lotion 1 oz
face cream 1 oz
sun block 3 oz
Dr. Bronner’s soap 4 oz
shampoo 1 oz
deodorant .5 oz
diva cup
hair ties

“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way. Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Begin it now.”

(Attributed to Goethe but in fact by William Hutchinson Murray from his 1951 book The Scottish Himalayan Expedition)

This quote is important to me because when you take a risk in your life & do something that doesn’t follow the status quo, inevitably the naysayers fling their doubts at you. “You’re crazy” “I’m afraid for you” “You’ve come undone” “You’re risking your life” All these I have heard as I plan my pilgrimage walk. You’d think I was planning to walk across Afghanistan!

I have to filter these comments, and set them against what my experience has been, when I’ve been on the road alone. I compare the two, just to be sure I am not crazy. And then I have to make a concerted effort not to take on their fear. I want to learn to embrace the higher power, I want to leap and trust that the net will appear. It is not easy to hold that energy, that approach to life, to the world. Fear and doubt are powerful. They will take up residence inside of you very quickly if you open your door an inch to them.

I am not religious and I don’t know how to pray. But I am glad I’ll be staying in monasteries. With so much prayer expressed within those walls, for so many centuries, the energy is one of faith and trust in a higher power. Grant me the ability to open my heart to that energy.

I met a man called Jim on the Slow Travel forum. He is an experienced backcountry, long distance hiker. He reassured me by emailing me this note:

“There are some key elements to being a successful solo hiker…..introspection to make all that time on the trail of value to you; resilience in being able to overcome the hardships; and a sense of adventure to make it all worthwhile….in a scan of your blog it certainly appears that you have all three.”

He also sent me a quote by Teddy Roosevelt:

“It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.”

Jim then went on to say:
“I would apply this to the people who have told you this is not doable, too dangerous, etc. You have succeeded just by committing to the trip, regardless of the outcome which, I am fully confident, will be nothing short of a full rejuvenation of body and spirit.”

While many of my friends have been encouraging, it is interesting that some people I know well have said nothing about my trip, have not responded at all. And here is this man I have never met, taking the time to send me so much encouragement and to develop a belief in me, to where I feel held. If he holds, as he says he does, the completely confident thought, that my journey will be “a full rejuvenation of body and spirit” then I feel held. I feel held in the love and light which is at the core of each of us and at the core of the universe.

We don’t have to run around bombing each other, hating each other, creating negativity. We don’t have to do it. We have a choice. And I don’t know why this is so hard for human beings. All we have to do is change our thoughts. All we have to do is invite love in, keep our hearts open, and see the humanity in others, not just in those who are like ourselves, but in those who are different.