The Salt Path: A Memoir

by Raynor Winn

Had I seen enough things? When I could no longer see them, would I remember them, and would just the memory be enough to fill me up and make me whole? He walked away, slowly back the way he came. Could anyone ever have enough memories?

Everybody needs beauty as well as bread. John Muir, The Yosemite

Meet me there, where the sea meets the sky, Lost but finally free. Inscription on memorial bench, Mên-y-grib Point

How can there be so few individuals who understand the need for people to have a space of their own? Does it take a time of crisis for us to see the plight of the homeless? Must they be escaping a war zone to be in need? As a people, can we only respond to need if we perceive it to be valid? If the homeless of our own country were gathered in a refugee camp, or rode the seas in boats of desperation, would we open our arms to them?

Most people go through their whole lives without answering their own questions: What am I, what do I have within me? The big stuff. What a waste.”

At last I understood what homelessness had done for me. It had taken every material thing that I had and left me stripped bare, a blank page at the end of a partly written book. It had also given me a choice, either to leave that page blank or to keep writing the story with hope. I chose hope.

All I knew was that we were lightly salted blackberries hanging in the last of the summer sun, and this perfect moment was the only one we needed.

But most important, all the love to my children Tom and Rowan—thanks for believing that I could walk 630 miles and write a book when I didn’t believe it myself. And of course Moth.