Heading down from the chapel, a stone in the crowd called my name. It wasn't as small as some I'd seen placed at the bases and on the crosses themselves, nor was it as large. It was just right.
I chose the cross at the .5 km marker, just as you turn the corner to return down to St. Cirq Lapopie. From a distance, it looked like my stone could rest on the top. But when I arrived, there was already a tiny guy nestled in between the curves of the iron.
We chose the spot on the left.
I pondered the meaning of the stones and their placement, but meaning for whom? We each have our own reasons for doing what we do. We are all believers. But for me, there is no one way. "One way" leads to judging and self-agrandizing, and that's not what peace in this world and in our lives require. I looked at the size of the stones, wondering if they relfected the size of problems and prayers or the size of gratefulness? Were they just a way to say: "I was here."? I decided that I was placing mine in gratefulness...I'd made it to the top, I'd found a perfect place for my stone, I've had a chance to be here in my heaven on earth if only for four months, and at that moment gratefulness surrounded me.
Yesterday, I woke to news of a riot in the suburban municipality where I grew up in North St.Louis County. This morning, I woke to the news of the loss of Robin Williams. If I were to place my stone today, it would be a prayer to ask for help in making sense of the volumes of happenings in this world that no longer make sense to me. I seem to spend an awful lot of time trying to understand things that are not understandable. I'm afraid I might need a boulder for success with this one. What about your stone?
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