Not long ago, I made a trip to a monastery in Kentucky. I spent a weekend walking in the fields and woods, reflecting on the close of summer and the approach of winter.
The weather was warm and comforting. The surrounding hills were covered with the dusky glow of middle fall. In my wanderings, I entered a grove of oaks and maples that I hadn’t seen before, and as I walked down a gentle slope, I began to come upon statues that had been placed along the way. A weathered cherub held a message from Exodus 23: “Behold, I send an angel before you, to guard you on the way…..”
Past a dark image of the Virgin, I found a decaying shed that held rosaries and notes of petition,. In a notebook there, freed by solitude, I wrote my own wish.
Half a mile further along the path, I stopped at a cement crucifix. On its pedestal lay woodland offerings: a crown made from a pine bough, small flat stones, acorns, hickory nuts, feathers.
I left a page of my journal at that altar and then returned to my monastery room, my heart full of icons and totems. I had become an invisible companion to others in the woods, an accidental participant in their retreat. I had shared intentions with anonymous wanderers, had been soothed by secret communion.
This is Bill Felker with Poor Will’s Almanack. I’ll be back again next week with notes for the third week of middle fall. In the meantime, be a companion, an accidental participant, an anonymous wanderer.
