by Maria LoBiondo
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| Maria and her husband with fellow seekers |
My call to the hero’s journey began with a quest for the rarest pasta in the world.
My husband and I celebrated a milestone anniversary by going to Sardinia, intrigued by the prospect of a strenuous 20-mile pilgrimage in the country’s rugged outback. At the end, hikers are rewarded with a bowl of su filindeu. Only three women alive know how to make the pasta known as “the threads of God,” served in mutton broth enriched with pecorino romano cheese.
But as the adventure unfolded, I realized we were tracing the steps of a familiar plot line: the hero’s journey. Popularized anew since the first “Star Wars” movie and the writings of mythologist Joseph Campbell — and a favorite folktale and fairy tale motif — the hero’s journey can be synthesized into recognizable steps. These include the call to a quest, followed by seemingly impossible challenges and help from surprising sources, a climactic test, and, if successful, the journey’s reward.
The 20-mile pilgrimage certainly seemed impossible when we started to plan, as daunting as finding berries in winter, as in “The Twelve Months” (found in Parker Filmore’s “The Shoemaker’s Apron and Other Czechoslovak Fairy Tales and Folk Tales”). We trained at the gym and on the Delaware and Raritan canal path; I bought new hiking boots and a rain slicker. Did I mention the walk started at midnight and continued until dawn? Or that we knew there was a strong possibility that none of our fellow walkers would speak English?
When we began to encounter helpers, seemingly by chance, I began to connect our efforts with the hero’s journey. There was a friend of my youngest brother who found an Italian hiker’s blog that detailed the walk’s terrain. The Sardo wine bar owner who verified the correct starting point. And, folktale come to life, the proverbial wise woman appeared as we needed before the stroke of midnight.
I knew we had lucked out when, waiting in the piazza for the walk to begin, we met Franca. A petite grandmother who had come with her family to support neighbors making the trek, Franca reminded me of the wise woman I imagined as I learned my first tale, the Norwegian story, “East of the Sun and West of the Moon” (a version can be found in “Best-Loved Folktales of the World” selected by Joanna Cole). She introduced us to Giovanni, a skilled hiker. “Stay with Giovanni,” Franca advised.
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| with Giovanni |
It wasn’t so much that we stayed with Giovanni as that Giovanni, a faithful guide, stayed with us. He tolerated my meager Italian and made sure we didn’t lose the way as we trudged on rocky shepherd trails through the Sardinian hills. He was armed with snacks, extra batteries for our headlamps, and bandages for blisters — none of which we needed, thankfully — reminiscent of the resourceful servant who saves “The Thoughtless Abbot” (from Thomas Crane’s “Italian Popular Tales”).
Our climactic test came before dawn. Having climbed a particularly steep, grueling track to a bonfire rest point, we learned we had six more miles to go. At that point the prospect seemed as daunting as Hansel and Gretel finding their way out of the woods (also included in Cole’s book and numerous collections of the Brothers Grimm). Giovanni calmly suggested frequent rests as we walked and watched a glorious sunrise with a blood red moon rising above the sea. He even made sure we had a ride back to our hotel after — yes — our prize, a restorative bowl of su filindeu.
We see ourselves in the characters of folk and fairy tales as they are told to us, and travel with them through the story in our imaginations, but my Sardinian pilgrimage showed me the reverse. As I reflected on actually preparing for the journey and trekking the route, I recognized tales I know and tell in the lived experience.
Now in recounting our Sardinian adventure, what surfaces is “The Treasure,” a Hasidic parable I first encountered in a picture book by Uri Shulevitz. A man follows a dream that tells him to dig for treasure under a bridge in a far-away city. Once there, he learns that the treasure is back under his own floor. He trudges home and digs it out, using the money to enjoy a huge meal with his loved ones and also to build a house of prayer with these words inscribed over the door: “Sometimes one must travel far to find what is near.”
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| The prize: su filindeu |
