thanne longen folk to go on pilgrimages

including Beryl and I apparently...

One of the assignments in my tenth grade English class was to memorize the first seventeen lines of the prologue to The Centurbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer.¹ Our exam was to recite the lines back—nerve-wracking at best in front of the entire class, and worse still when our teacher asked me to do it twice— then gave me a mediocre grade.

At the time I tried to believe that he didn’t care for my pronunciation of the Middle English (for I knew I had the words right)—but alas, no. It seemed I lacked the the appropriate poetic reverence and he thought I wasn’t taking it seriously enough. Apparently, despite Chaucer’s lighthearted lyrical descriptions (never mind one’s own fourteen year old spring-wrought restlessness), one is supposed to recite in a slow and stately monotone no matter the content.

More fool him — not for asking us to memorize the words, for when March rain is followed by April/May sun and the driest of hills grow green, even the most devoted of stay-at-homes can grow a touch restless—but for missing out on the delight of interpretive enthusiasm. I mean what’s not to love about smale foweles maken melodye — be it in a dry canyon, by a ginormous lake, outside the window of your dusty classroom in Massachusetts in 1976, or on a pilgrimage to Canterbury in the 14th century?

And isn’t the point of knowing things by heart getting to enthusiastically recite them at inappropriate moments, especially when packing for a trip?

I use the word inappropriate here because pilgrimage is not a word I’d normally apply to my own jaunts, and I don’t generally like packing anyway. But movement was happening and I was part of it and packing had to happen: my son and daugher-in-law were heading off on their first road trip with their now four month old baby (who is perfection itself), and Beryl and I were coming to spend a long weekend with their two dogs.

It also felt quite spring-like—even with the mosquitoes—so why be somber?

Certainly the dog’s weren’t. Speckle told Beryl stories about (and demonstrated), the excellent things you get to do when the weather is hot, the grass is cool, sticks are plentiful, and you are a very fast dog.

I got to pick up the poop and enthusiastically practice doing almost nothing.

This is not my specialty to be sure, but luckily Zephirus (The West Wind), used his rather less than sweet breath to enthusiastically stir up a number of thunderstorms—

—so the dogs and I got in some solid lounging and snuggling.

And maybe it was a pilgrimage after all, for I also had some delicious cuddles with my grandbaby (who is apparently quite the enthusiastic traveler)—and isn’t it a pilgrim’s thing to pay homage to one’s beloveds?

At any rate (adorable family aside), the best part of any trip (un-mown grass notwithstanding), is coming home and enthusiastically diving into the things that lovely jaunts cannot not provide.

So while Beryl reveled once again being an only dog—

I gave myself over to the bliss of being back to some reverential clooth-makyng,² done with the seken of straunge strondes, at least for now.

Perhaps it is time to memorize some odes to being home.

Any suggestions?

1. The Canterbury Tales: General Prologue and The Canterbury Tales with a line by line translation:

2. Along with having five husbands, making three trips to Jerusalem, being a wealthy wool merchant in her own right, possessing good humor, self-knowledge and self-confidence, The Wife of Bath also had great skill at cloth making. Though I might not aspire to all of her attributes and desires, she is a worthy role model indeed and, I imagine, would be a lot of fun to spend time with.