Going Nowhere

The sounds of a virtual celebration greeted me a couple of days ago when I clicked onto my phone’s Pedometer/Walking App as I tied my sneakers, put on my sunglasses and began my afternoon walk.  Crowd noises and claps accompanied a screen full of virtual multi-colored balloons rising up and confetti raining down. Congratulations to me! It seems that since I downloaded this App in August of last year to track my walking, I have walked from Boston to Philadelphia!  Wow, I almost broke my arm patting myself on my back.  I am glad that I was able to keep safe from all of those cars whizzing down the Interstate at 70+ miles per hour. And no wonder I’m tired!

In truth, of course, I have not been to those two historic cities in a few years.  Most of the walking that I do is right here, walking around my rural neighborhood.  My long caliche driveway intersects with a rather rough county road that, although meandering around, is actually a dead end. As often as I can, I walk this well-trodden path, up and down, back and forth, round and round, following the fork that stops with the big green gate marking my friend’s property and retracing my steps to the other section that ends with a few more houses bordered by the barbed wire fence of the adjoining ranch. If I’m feeling particularly energetic, I trudge up and down the rather steep hill that ends in the only way in/out of our neighborhood, a Farm to Market road that eventually leads to my hometown a few miles away.  As I walk, I am greeted by the same friendly dogs, and wave at the same neighbors who drive by on their ways in and out. I avoid the same pot holes and speculate about the same vacant lot. The fact is, in all my miles of walking, I have gone nowhere.

Going nowhere is suddenly and unexpectedly on everyone’s agenda around here, as I’m sure it is in your part of the world.  We are all asked to limit our trips, to stay put, and in some locations to shelter in place.  As a nation, suddenly, we are going nowhere.  For me, this means that a long-planned trip to see distant family was cancelled, the calendar is cleared out, appointments erased, and social gatherings all but eliminated. This sudden curtailment of the freedom to come and go is the responsible, safe and prudent thing to do. The economic and social consequences are devastating and this new way of living is hitting me, and I suspect most of us, pretty hard.

I think back to August and all of those months of walking in between then and now. I persevered as the weather changed from the oppressive heat of a Texas summer, through the blustery chilly days of winter and now into the refreshing coolness of spring.  Was I truly going nowhere as I walked along the same route? Although the basic topography has not changed, not much else is exactly the same.  The expanses of grassy lawns transformed from a dry and brittle summer state to the dormant gray of winter.  Just in the last week, that enticing shade of green that Crayola christened Spring is everywhere I look.  The muted orange and crinkly brown leaves lingering on the oak trees are pushed aside as trees leaf out. The redbud trees that spend most of the year hidden in the scrubby overgrowth are bursting out in vibrant hot pink blossoms.  It is always a shock to see them shining through the brush before they fade into the background once again.  Sometime over the winter, road crews filled in most of the potholes.  The vacant lot has some fresh dirt smoothed on it.  One of my neighbors sports a new car and just yesterday a couple of unfamiliar dogs moseyed over before my walking companion helped reunite them with their owners.  And it is not only my physical surroundings that have changed.    I’m a little older; my hair is a little grayer. My calf muscles are quite a bit stronger and my stamina is pumped up. My family circle is widening in joyful ways. I’ve renewed an old hobby and started a new one. As I’ve walked, I’ve sung some hymns new and old, and recently have taken to belting out the rock classic anthem We are the Champions, which turns out to be not only a great spirit-lifter but a perfect way to keep a brisk pace. I’ve sent arguments into the air and prayed and processed. I’ve trod into a solitary place where I pondered concerns and expressed emotions. Maybe I haven’t been going nowhere after all.

There are many kinds of walking, and I turn my thoughts and my feet to the Spiral way, the symbolic shape of contemplation and labyrinth-type walking. This kind of walking is not aimless or casual.  It is not designed to optimize the heart rate or help one prepare for a marathon. Its purpose is simple, and its direction clear. I think about this idea of going nowhere.  Though walking in any form takes energy and intention, anyone who is physically walking a labyrinth is in fact, going nowhere. Round and round from the edge to the center, from the center to the edge, the time and effort spent there do not take one to a designated place. When you finish, you are in the same location were you started.  Labyrinth-type walking can happen anywhere: down a hallway, around the couch, down the block to the grocery store or off into the fields, or here, on a dead-end county road.  Though ideal, neither a special pathway nor special instructions are required. Even without a carefully constructed labyrinth, I welcome this practice with joy and relief, especially now, especially today.

Walking, walking, my steps take me round and round.  I seek a respite from the overload of nerve-wracking information.  I cast off worries, or face them squarely without glib assurances. Confused and fearful, I walk.  Angry and discouraged, I walk. Determined and committed, I walk. I pray. I sing. I let my thoughts wander.  Suddenly plunged into hard times, faced with hours bereft of the close companionship of friends and extended family, stripped of security and with fears laid bare, I take refuge in my forward movement. People of all faiths have long used the metaphor of walking to describe a purpose-filled way to draw near to the Divine.  The theologian Walter Brueggemann writes that the long history of faith is walking into the future given by God¹.  I draw a breath and am reassured that I am not, have never been, alone on this pathway. This hopeful and deliberate faith-practice is the opposite of the idea of going nowhere. It is the joining of our intentions and our hearts to the central, core beliefs of our lives.  It is opening ourselves up to the possibilities of faith.  Something unexpected emerges as the feet move and the mind settles. Walking becomes, then, not merely a physical act but a transformative one, straight into the somewhere of the Divine—a place where fear can subside, hope can comfort, and care can be our companion. 

For now, we are directed to go nowhere, to amend our daily routines and to stay as separated and isolated as possible. It is a serious and unbelievably scary time. So much is out of our control. Yet, as our outer worlds shrink, our inner worlds can expand.  There are no restrictions on our spirits and no protocol that we must follow that requires us to distance ourselves from the Holy. Going nowhere can be going somewhere after all. My part is to stand up, to tie my sneakers, to adjust my sunglasses and to set out once again on a path that is not so familiar and so ordinary after all. One thing I am sure of.  I will not be in the same place I was when I started. I walk with purpose towards a good and restful soul-place. When I launched that walking App back in August I was walking into an uncertain future.  The same is true today.  Boston to Philadelphia? That is just the beginning!  No telling where my next somewhere will be.

Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.  Jeremiah 6:16

 1 Brueggemann, W. (2017). A way other than our own. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press.

Photo by Patrick Hendry on Unsplash