In the Footsteps of Giovanni the Hermit

Chapter II: The Hermit wrestles with his visions

That evening, Giovanni huddled close to a cave on the wind-swept face of Owl Mountain. He was tired down to his very bones. He lay with his ear to the ground, his body curled like a little fetus. His head was upon a stone and soon he fell asleep listening to the rhythms of the earth.

In his dream, he relived the vision that had called him to New Mexico so many years ago. It was a vision that he had had back in Italy. The Holy Virgin had appeared to him at night, and she had spoken to him, saying: “Behold, you are about to begin a long pilgrimage. Your restless spirit must be driven into the wilderness for 40 years in order to be purified. After the death of my own Son, I, too, sought the solace of the wilderness. I traveled in the company of another Giovanni: John the Evangelist, who brought me out of Jerusalem and close to the outskirts of the great city of Ephesus. There, on the Mountain of the Nightingale, called Bulbul Dagi by the ancient Turks, I made my final home on Earth.”

Giovanni adjusted his weary head on the stone before the cave. He sank deeper into his slumber. In his mind he heard a voice asking: “See how soft the stone is beneath your head? See how it melts to conform to your being? Thus was the nature of the wood upon which the Creator was hung. The wood accommodated itself willingly beneath its Maker so as not to hurt him. It was so even as the wood that composed the manger of the Holy Child had cradled him in softest comfort. Nothing dared to hurt the Maker of all things. He couldn’t even dash his foot against a stone.”

The sleeping hermit shifted wearily again. A third time, a voice came to him from the darkness of night. It was a soothing voice that asked: “Are you prepared to suffer? There is nothing easy about the road you have chosen. You must insist on seeing beauty where others cannot see it. You must spread respect for the land and all that grows upon it. You must learn to be contented with loneliness.”

The hermit sat up abruptly in the twilight. He was breathing in the chilly air and breathing out little warm clouds with each exhale. He raised his eyes up to the sky just in time to see a star shooting from west to east. It was one among so many and it was the only one moving across the firmament. He thought of the name that he had been given to him by the few people who had seen him in New Mexico. They had called him “El Solitario.”

He thought back to his velvet prime in the villa of his noble father. He had never wanted for anything when he was young. Horses, friends, food, drink — yes, all were his for the taking. His father had had great ambitions for him. He was to become the family priest. A priest for the rich and the mighty of his village. Now, he had nothing, and it was his own choice.

It had been a difficult choice, but one that needed to be made. He gently removed the whip that he had hanging by the cord around his waist. It was one that

he himself had woven from the fibers of a yucca plant. A disciplina, he had called it.

While it was yet early in the morning, the hermit unfastened the top of his robe and let it fall down to his waist. There was no one there to see him but a coyote eyeing him from a distance. He poured the water remaining in his gourd over the dried-tresses of the yucca whip. They quickly soaked in the water and became quite heavy. He crossed himself with the tip of the scourge and he said: “Sea por el amor de Dios.”

For the love of God, he swung the yucca whip back over his shoulders, raising red welts on his flesh unused to the sudden contact. He saw the sun rising over the top of the mountains and new life returning to the desert floor.

Again he swung the scourge, saying: “Sea por el amor de Dios. Sea por el amor de Dios.”