I was standing today on a French countryside highway, with a cold nose, wet feet, and sore shoulders, holding a carton in my hand stating “Rennes”. I was disheartened from the presumably two hundredth rejection during three hours attempt to find a lift.
Even though it was barely 2 pm, I was already considering the possibility of camping somewhere in the back of the fields. I was feeling tired from my current chaotic lifestyle, which is so insistently teaching me about being at the mercy of strangers’ charitable acts. Although there is tremendous beauty in giving the world the opportunity to show you its various generous faces, in certain moments it can feel frustrating to be repeatedly in the place of asking for help.
After throwing some tantrums at God, fresh rainy breezes stroked my forehead and I called to the roads: “Gods and Goddesses of the roads. You, old protectors of travelers. Old powers you, tell me what I can offer you, in return for your blessings of my ride?” I heard in my heart, “Give us your voice”. I won’t give you my voice, but I can give you a song, I said. It was a deal. As soon as I started to sing a prayer, emerging from the ancient traveler’s bones, a white minivan stopped.
The Prayers Were Heard – Meet Gaelle
Gaelle’s car was filled with colorful textiles and sounds of French Guinean music. She was a former teacher, who moved to the countryside of Brittany and built her own house. There she grows plants, listens to their wisdom, and creates with their help healing hydrolates. She was heading to a small place near Rennes, for a Qi-Gong and song-infused festival of a friend who needed help with building a Yurt.
Gaelle talked about Carnac, Les Landes de Cojoux – Megalithes, the English Stonehenge, and other ancient stone formations around the megalithic areas. She imagined the ancestors who built these ancient stone formations, all uniting in spirit at one particular moment of time – the equinox. What potency all that concentrated energy from various places to one single spot must have had? Whilst we conversed about weird old powers, the mysteries of times, and the peace of living somewhat autonomously in the land, the time flew fast, and we arrived soon in Rennes. She drove me all the way to the door of my couch-surfing host.
Now, what are the odds, that I had this fortunate encounter after my hours-long unlucky attempts of hitchhiking, only after I started to offer a traveler’s song to the old gods? Sure, the prayers will not always have such an immediate response, but it was a beautiful reminder of the power of reciprocal tending. As someone who is born in the city and raised with no framework for non-human relations, I often forget the old and humble custom of offerings.
It is a very sweet one, though:
The universe answers.
Love,
<3