Over the years, when I’ve felt the need for retreat, I have
taken myself to Wilbur Hot Springs.
We’ve been going to Wilbur for well over 35 years. Max was a tiny baby the first time we
went. It’s one of those places that
feels like home away from home to me.
For years, we went with a crowd every Thanksgiving. I have many fond memories of those holidays and
also of our family visits (and a few not-so-happy ones), but today I’m mostly thinking
about my solo trips to Wilbur. It’s always been a healing place for me.
I think the first time I went without Barry was to heal after
my miscarriage (Christmastime, 1977). The
most recent was this year when my undiagnosed physical symptoms were really
getting to me.
During one of my solitary visits I took the opportunity to
work on a process recommended by Clarissa Pinkola Estes in Women Who Run with
the Wolves. She calls this exercise descansos. Descansos are
markers of the changes, the turning points, the deaths (literal and figurative)
in one’s life. She says, “Descansos are symbols that mark a
death. Right there, right on that spot, someone’s journey in life halted
unexpectedly. There has been a car accident, or someone was walking along
the road and died of heat exhaustion, or a fight took place there. Something
happened there that altered that person’s life and the lives of other persons
forever.” They are the roadside
shrines that mark places where an accident claimed a life. I also see them as crossroads, choice points,
places where you choose one road and might have taken another.
It makes sense
that I’d be thinking about this in this time of “retreat” I’m undertaking and
in seeing myself at Hecate’s crossroads.
So, what Estes
recommends is taking a long sheet of paper and mapping out a timeline of your
life. At every point you remember one of
those timess, you make a little cross to mark it. You can then look at and reflect on all of
those times, all of those challenges and choice points, all of the roads taken
and not taken.
This morning as I
was writing, the descanso that leaped into my mind was when I went to library
school at Simmons in Boston. Assuming
there is a reason that particular time popped up – that there is something for
me to glean from that memory – I’ll explore it here.
Fall, 1970. I had just graduated from the University of
Florida and spent the summer with a friend in Santa Barbara (my first trip to
California). I had chosen to go to
Simmons for graduate school because they offered me a fellowship, complete with
stipend for living expenses. A better
offer than I got from Denver or Berkeley (besides which, my parent said I’d go
to Berkeley over their dead bodies – it was 1970). I was in love with a guy who had been a real
guide and mentor to me in all ways counter-culture, but it was clear that our
paths were diverging. I chose to stay
longer in Santa Barbara than planned to see him one last time. My parents were furious, having expected me
to be home for a while before heading up to Boston. It was the worst time in my relationship with
them, ever.
My stipend money
wasn’t due to arrive until 3 or 4 weeks into the school year. I had my ticket to fly to Boston, but almost
no money. Refusing to be beholden to my
folks (who I felt were too controlling and didn’t understand my lifestyle), I
called a former boyfriend who agreed to loan me some money (nice guy; maybe he
did it out of guilt for dumping me the year before, but no matter). Off I went to Boston. I knew no one. I had no place to live, other than a
depressing room reserved at the YWCA.
Now, I’m a 6 on
the Enneagram. Fear-based. This whole situation was WAY out of my
comfort zone. I don’t take big risks, at
least not easily. Nevertheless, I landed
in Boston, checked into the Y, found a copy of the latest underground
newspaper, and read a housing ad for “The Zoo.”
It was a flat on Mass. Ave. full of friendly hippies, including a
Harvard senior whose first question to me was “Do you like toads?” Yes. I
met Barry the first evening I was in Boston.
I moved into The Zoo the following morning.
Is it easier to
be courageous at 21 than at 63? Good
question. Probably. But this is the descanso memory that surfaced
today, so it must mean something about taking risks and following my own road. The fact is that I was able to take
care of myself, to make decisions, to dive into a new life. Maybe that’s what I need to remember now.
Also, that it is
possible to move to a new city, to make friends, to try new things and to thrive.
We can do
this. I can do it, broken foot and all.
