pyat

Thursday nights I take Elizabeth to a music class in Burlington. I usually take the hour she is in class to sit in the library, walk, or eat a foot long hotdog at Easterbrooks, a locally famous restaurant. As the weather improves I've been doing more walking through the nearby Central Park. This park contains, among other things, a labyrinth. This particular one is an 11-turn labyrinth, based on the one at Chartres Cathedral. On my previous visit, it was teeming with children running back and forth.

Today, it was raining and cold, and I had it to myself, as it were. Given the date - significant for Pagans and early Christians - I decided to take a turn through the labyrinth. It was a curiously ruminative experience. It seemed to take a very long time indeed to get to the centre of the pattern, and the route twisted back and forth on itself, bringing me to unexpected quadrants of the greater circle. The route, outlined in salmon-coloured stone, reminded me variously of the nestled windings of an intestine (eew), the convulted strand of a knotted rope, or a path through a hedge. Coming to the centre at last generated a thrill of achievement, but upon arrival I also found myself very relaxed. Focusing on the task of wending through the maze sort of concentrated my attention, and I could see how doing this in the long term might create a kind of quiet trance state.

Reaching the centre, I also suddenly realized that the only way out was back in. So, out I went again. And, for several minutes afterward I was in a sort of quietly content and reflective state of mind. Upon emerging, I found it had taken a full 15 minutes to traverse the pattern, even though the circle itself is only 25 feet wide.