Random acts of food and service

By Cheryl Murfin

Food made with heart and served with joy—the small gifts of pilgrimage.

I was tired. Walking 10 miles, the 14 miles, then 10 again. After two months of walking seven, then 10, then 12 at least once a week.

It wasn't hard walking; this path has its ups and downs, but we don't scramble or hoist ourselves over large rocks. But add in the steep-ish ascents, a few intense downhill rolls, rocks underfoot, unfamiliar beds every night, the energy of deep listening, months of planning for the walk as well as a family reunion in the country next door after the walk finished, and, well, I was floating on fumes as we arrived at dinner in Lowick, UK.

We'd showered and changed. We looked reasonably refreshed by the time we sat down. Even so, the waitress was instant with a pitcher of water, filling each glass to the top. I've never been good at drinking enough water; I barely take a sip on these long days, and am always surprised to find I'm thirsty. I downed the first glass in one long, loping gulp.

As my friends perused the menu, I excused myself to the bathroom.

Turning the corner, I almost crashed into the waitress, who smiled at my apology: "Not a bother, yer just fine." Have I mentioned how much I love the Scottish brogue? Lilting and strong at the same time, and here in Lowick, even though we were on the English side of the route.

"You're walking the Way," she said. Not a question. She may have been 30, she may have been 50, I'm not good with guessing ages—but I knew she was woman who'd lived. I nodded and laughed: "I bet you can see us coming from a mile away. I think it caught up to me today."

"I can, for sure," she said. "But only since I walked it myself two years ago."

I asked her if she was from the area. She wasn't. She was raised and only recently left the Orkney Islands, about as far away from northeastern England environmentally as Mexico is from Antarctica.

"I needed to think about what to do next," she said. Her kids were grown, and she'd closed her business during the pandemic. "Someone told me that walking out helps you walk in, so I came to walk."

"Did it? Help you go inside, I mean."

"Aye."

"I walked to the island, then turned around and started walking back the other direction to the start in Melrose. Then I turned around and began again."

The storyteller in me wanted to stop time and listen to what she'd found walking those nearly 200 miles. And always my question: What was left behind? But I realized I'd taken an awfully long bathroom break, and she was on the clock. She turned to pick up plates of food the chef had slid onto the warming counter. I turned to the bathroom.

"Owned a wind farm, before," she said, as if I had asked those burning questions. "The walk gave me time to figure out what brings me joy. It was hard to sort—I enjoy a lot of things! In the end, though, I realized, for me, joy comes from nurturing others."

When I returned to the table, the conversation was dancing. Strangers only seven days ago, these women now felt like sisters to me. I sat down again, tiredness filling every sinew; my body buzzed with it, and my mind was a little foggy, and I wondered if I'd really had the conversation in the hallway a moment before.

But when the waitress returned to take our orders, I listened. In her gentle way, she cheered us on.

"Oh, yer doing just grand, the four of you. Only one more day of walking and then a good long rest to consider it all."

Dogs are part of the restaurant experience in Lowick

She poured over the menu with us, giving us tips and recommendations. And when she picked up the pitcher to refill our glasses, she caught my eye.

I immediately felt the miles and the fatigue melt away, replaced with energy and a hunger not rooted in food. In that instant, I saw the fruits of her self-discovery—and the true gift that is being of joyful service to others. "You know what they say," she said as she poured. "Three tall glasses get you through."

It was an excellent meal. We were close to the end and could feel it; the anticipation was a fifth person at the table. I signed the bill without looking. We stopped to admire the dog that sat quietly under the table next to ours for the whole meal (except for his one bark in response to a yelp from the bar dog in the next room).

Only later, when I went to put the receipt into my suitcase, did I see the fullness of the waitress's gift. She'd charged us only for the two alcoholic drinks my companions enjoyed: £ 12 ($15). The meals for the four of us should have cost about £ 150 (nearly $200).

A wonderful meal

There was a note scribbled at the bottom of the receipt: "If you are looking, may you find it your joy."

I was stunned. I hadn't gotten her name, and it occurred to me that perhaps she wanted it that way, so I didn't share the experience with my walking friends.. And, trying to beat the tide and walk over the sands to the island, we left early the next day to return to the restaurant to say thank you.

In more ancient times, it was considered a holy work to care for pilgrims, regardless of the religion or spiritual essence associated with a path. They walked carrying only a bowl to receive gifted food, a stick to stay upright, and the clothes on their back.

With our fine fleece and coats, soft B&B landings, huge breakfasts, and largely high-end dinners, walking this or any pilgrimage today is a different experience—a luxury of time and contemplation.

And yet, for the first time, after walking many pilgrimages, the waitress gave me my first true experience of being a pilgrim. I was tired and she renewed me. She fed us without expecting compensation. She encouraged us.

I sent her a card expressing my gratitude when I returned home and thanking her for the lesson she proffered. I hope she got it.

But even if she didn't, I know her actions were also a gift to herself—to serve is to continue to keep moving on, to stay always on the sacred path.

To end a pilgrimage is to keep on walking.

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Writing from the road

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The Bag and the Bench

By Cheryl Murfin

The bag sat on the bench for days as everyone in the village waited for somebody else to claim it. 

Nobody did. 

And so, eventually, the mayor came, with grand ceremony and a speech, and opened the bag in hopes of finding a name to which they could forward the sack by post. 

But there was no name inside the bag. Just an old pair of shoes, one shirt, and a pair of pants that looked like they had walked around the world and back again. "Well then," said the village counselor, "perhaps we should simply throw them in the rubbish, and also we should put up a sign so those wasteful pilgrims take their belongings with them."

There was no reason to open the church. 

No one had set foot inside for at least five years, when the priest was called away, because the congregation had shrunk to less than four people. At that time, they shuttered the doors, tied down the bell, and said a blessing over the bodies who would be forgotten in the cemetery, as their gravestones were covered by uncut grass, and the building was taken back by the Earth which gave it. 

Still, every now and then, the village teen (because there was only ever one) would run away from his shouting father and hide behind the church to find a moment of quiet.

It was there that he heard the moaning. 

At first, he thought it was just the wind in the trees or that low wind sound that comes with the cold. But he listened harder, and he realized that it was not the trees at all, but someone in discomfort. He walked around the building and saw nothing. And then he looked up and noticed a chapel window broken open. Not one to break the law, he ran to get the mayor, who also told the postal clerk, who also told the shop owner, who also told the farmer, and by the time they got to the church, the whole village had come to investigate. 

"Who's got the key?"

"Not I," said the mayor. "That sticky diocese didn't leave one behind."  

"I have a crowbar," said the farmer, and so they opened wide the dark red doors of the church. 

Inside, they found an elderly man lying on the bench,  gaunt and gray, with clearly not much time to live. The pharmacist went up to him, felt his pulse, then removed his cap and bowed his head. "Not much time for this one," he said.

"The village teacher stepped up to kneel: 'Can we help you, sir?' Can we make you more comfortable?"

The older man grunted but finally found his words.

"Aye," he said. "I'm too far gone to help, but there is one thing. I've lost my bag and I can't seem to find it anywhere. I cannot die without it."

The teen jumped up with a squeal. "Your bag, sir! We got it," he cried as he flew out the door to the village center to grab it from the postal bin (they had, after much deliberation, decided to mail it to the church charity since it was found on church land). 

Everyone gathered around the elderly man who, by then, surely had no more than moments before he stood before his maker. But seeing his bag, he rallied to a seat and slowly, rumbly opened his bag. First came the shirt, which he gave to the teen, then the old shoes, which he tossed to the cheesemonger's dog, who immediately set upon chewing the leather. The pants he gave to the janitor "for good rags," he whispered. 

Finally, reaching to the very bottom of the bag, he pulled out the last item—the one each villager who had looked into the bag had missed.

When he opened his hand, there was a glow right in the middle. Not quite a candle. A simple glow that danced on his palm, flickering brighter, then dimmer, seemingly suspended in the air, but seemingly also a part of him. 

"Ohhhh" and "Awwww," all the villagers exclaimed at the mystery. The mayor stepped up because he was the mayor, and it was his job. 

"Sir, what is this that you were holding?"

The old man turned to them.

"This is the light of love. It was given to me to carry and protect, and I have done my best for 100 years. It is too much for one person to carry." 

He coughed, paused, and took so long to take the next breath that the villagers were sure he was gone. 

A shallow inhale brought him back: "I pass it to you—all of you—for safekeeping. It is your sacred duty."

And with that, he fell away, his face a beatific smile, his job well done.

From then on, the village people kept the light. Every time a stranger passed by, they threw open their doors and prepared a meal, pumped hot water for baths, and gave them new clothes to pass the light on. The passersby did the same. And it wasn't long, perhaps just a century, until all the world was aglow.