The day after Christmas, in search of medieval ruins and a good hike, Tom and I drove an hour from Le Broc to Chateauneuf, one of many medieval villages scattered across the foothills above the Mediterranean Coast. They’re so numerous that at night their lights look like constellations in a vast sky.
The trail started out on a steep incline, well-marked by a path of loose stones. Then it leveled off, winding through low bushes, oaks, and pines. We climbed wide stone steps to the ruins of the castle of Chateauneuf. It stood in crumbling splendor on the site where it had been built in 1132. The sense of place and the passage of centuries was palpable. I imagined people still living nearby with ancestors who had been part of this village. I grew up in Southern California where everyone has come from somewhere else, and nothing stays the same. I felt a kind of visceral longing to connect with the ghosts of the human community that had dwelt in this place.
I touched the stones and ran my hand along curved walls covered in dry moss. As the sun passed its zenith, and shadows began to define spaces, I discovered an arched entryway into a cavernous room, so eroded that it looked like an open mouth. It beckoned me, this portal, to enter the dark interior. Crossing the threshold felt like falling out of time as I know it. Once inside, I crouched comfortably on the smooth dirt floor, and looked around. The interior was like a womb. I could feel the still air, and smell its earthiness. All the accoutrements of my identity in the outside world as a psychologist, an artist, a writer, seemed to fall away. And I felt like I belonged there in my basic humanness.
As we continued our walk through the ruins, I was drawn to portals, intrigued by the variety of sizes and shapes: rectangles, squares, and even one that looked like a heart. The last one I entered was a narrow room with a vaulted ceiling, illuminated by light streaming in through the doorway. I could see my way to the back wall, stepping around rocks scattered across the floor. When I turned around, rather than having an inward experience, the light seemed to be calling me out into the day, to rejoin Tom and resume our hike.
Back on the trail I fell in behind Tom, and thought about portals I’ve opened in the last decade of my life, some incredibly beautiful, and others heartbreaking. I’m writing about some of them in Whole of Life. But what came to mind was Christmas day, just the day before.
We were invited to Nice for a family lunch in celebration of the holiday. Mariel, our host, is a figurative painter whose passion and inspiration for her art is the opera. Being welcomed into her home was like crossing a threshold onto what I imagine a stage set of La Traviata would look like: red brocade walls, heavy velvet curtains, and beautiful antiques. But best of all was the art…not classical French, but magnificent contemporary, figurative paintings, many larger than life in vision and design, created by Mariel and Ivan, her friend of many years and an artist she represents. Even before champagne was served, I felt drunk on the images, and the feelings they aroused in me. A portal had been opened, and I do not yet know where it will lead.
When we got home that night, I googled the word portal, curious about its origin. It comes from medieval Latin, portale, and means “like a gate, a doorway.” The Old French word is portal. I would love to hear about your experience of entering a portal that changed your life. Our sabbatical in Le Broc is certainly changing mine.
When do you return &…through Nyc?
Happy New Year,
Christopher.
Passing through a portal of time is a rare, deep, meaningful occurrence and it can be a life changing affair. The coverage of this striking experience is a marvelous piece of writing. Thank you for sharing it with us.
Dear Sharon and Tom,
What a wonderful experience you are having and creating! I so enjoyed reading this blog, and recently Tom’s, to share your adventures, both external and internal. The metaphor of entering and exploring the castle is a powerful one ?.
Portals…yes.
We just returned from our week+ trip to Oxford. We took a day and visited both Wells Cathedral and also Stonehenge. The day was wet, cold, mysterious. Because members of our larger party needed to keep moving, we enjoyed but a cursory passing of the ruins of Stonehenge. Yet even such an encounter left both Carolynn and me feeling a calling, an echo beneath the earth and within us, something profoundly human and primal. It was something that we both recognized. Not being able to linger, I decided to not attempt to penetrate the particulars of it, but to accept the calling as it was, and to allow it to reverberate and teach me what it might, about who I am and we are and our relationship to one another and this cosmos.
Then at Wells Cathedral, again we found it to be a portal, although different. Even though we know that its history is littered with checkered events, there was a transcendent calling for prayer and contemplation. I presume that, having been in continuous use for centuries, the calling was clearer. We again felt transported into the mystery.
Dear sister, thank you for welcoming this contemplation.
What an amazing journey. Love feeling through your writing.
Keep sharing.
Peace
Dear sweet wonderful friend,
I honor your honesty and courage in accepting this whole stay in Le Broc as a “portal” in many ways…I love that you enjoy discovering an old castle in my home land, and that you get the powerful sense of roots that most of us Europeans can feel…
It has taken me a very long time to develop even a tiny sense of “roots” her in California: and as I spent today in silence by myself tending burn piles and taking care of this land that I am entrusted in at present, I realized that for me the “portal” was this extraordinary expanse of nature that is here, that I came to trust and not fear, so unlike our finite, crowded European spaces (that i also love, and feel very comforted by still…). This canyon was my challenge and is now one of my homes…Best wishes to you in this new year, I love you dearly, Catherine
Thank you for sharing your amazing journey. You are inspiring me and I am eager to hear more. Happy New Year!
One of my best portals lead me to marrying my beautiful wife, which continued to lead me to meeting one of the most strongest, independent, caring, knowledgeable woman I know and love and treasure to this day. She has not only helped me to see and shape the world into what I see, but has opened my eyes to the portals unseen.
I love you Mom
I am grateful to you, Sharon, for including me in your email and link to your blog.
The “portals” theme resonates strongly with me having traversed many in several countries. Thank you for your writing on this rich theme.
Coincidentally, in 1982 I collaborated with a contemporary artist, Rosemary Mayer, on a book titled PONTORMO’S DIARY. My essay about Pontormo’s and Rosemary’s work was titled “Portae.” I’m happy to send you an offprint when you return to California – if you wish.
May you and Tom experience many wonderful passages throughout the New Year. Julia