On Dec. 31, volunteers will lay out a labyrinth on the floor of the Peterborough Town House.
It is an annual tradition started in 2000 and has continued every year except 2020 and 2021 when it was canceled due to the COVID pandemic. Shelley Goguen Hulbert, Beth Corwin, Terry Reeves and other volunteers who help organize and set up the labyrinth are excited to bring it back to the community this year.
“We are so happy to be offering it again,” Goguen Hulbert said.
The labyrinth is a life-size replica of the one at the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Chartres, France. Walkers enter through an opening at the edge and slowly make their way down the winding path until they reach the middle.
For Goguen Hulbert, the labyrinth acts as a meditative walk and a tool for reflection.
“When I walk, I like to think about the year that is coming to a close,” she said. “I remember the joys and the painful moments and I ponder their meaning and the things I have learned.”
Goguen Hulbert explained that the idea for the labyrinth in the Town House started with a local man named Ross Jennings.
“He knew how to measure and lay out labyrinths,” she said.
Jennings created one in Putnam Park and taught a group of volunteers how to lay it out. They used temporary spray paint on the grass and cut sticks to 17 1/2 inches to measure the width of each circuit. It gave Goguen Hulbert, Corwin and Reeves an idea.
“What if we got Ross to come and do this in the town hall?” Goguen Hulbert said.
Corwin was a physical education teacher and suggested they use gymnasium tape for the outline because it is stretchy and makes forming the curves easier. They taped a plunger in the middle of the labyrinth and attached a rope with chalk to mark the lines. They still use the same sticks they had cut to length as measuring tools. Jennings has died, but the Peterborough labyrinth lives on.
“It’s so cool that you just use these silly things like a plunger taped to the floor,” Goguen Hulbert said, and the sticks are “so organic.”
When it’s all done, the labyrinth covers most of the floor, and is just over 42 feet wide. Goguen Hulbert reported that around 300 people walk it each year, which they keep track with a guest book. About 40 volunteers are involved, with 12 to 15 people tasked with taping down the path and volunteer who hosts the labyrinth every hour to help guide the experience.
Goguen Hulbert thinks the Town House is the “perfect place for the labyrinth. It’s a gathering place for people of our community. A lot of people have gathered there for many, many years.”
But Goguen Hulbert described walking in the labyrinth as a deeply personal experience.
“There could be two people or 21 people walking in the labyrinth at the same time – it doesn’t matter,” she said.
Her experiences watching people walk the labyrinth have been special.
“I especially love watching children walk,” she said. “When my children were young, they understood that they were to quietly walk the path, which thrilled them because it was like a maze, though unlike a maze you cannot get lost. It is one path that leads to the center and out again. They would enter the labyrinth walking quickly in single file and amazingly, within a minute or so, their pace slowed and the magic of the labyrinth touched them.”
The labyrinth is important to Goguen Hulbert because it’s community oriented, offers people a meaningful experience and is an art project – all things she loves.
“I think that in any given year, a lot happens in the lives of individuals, whether there has been trauma or great celebration,” she said, and straddling the new year, the labyrinth allows people to “reflect on the year past and the year to come.”
Everyone walks the labyrinth in their own way, at their own pace and in their own thoughts.
“There is no right way to walk the labyrinth,” Goguen Hulbert said.
The labyrinth will be open on Dec. 31 from 1 to 8 p.m. and on Jan. 1 from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. It is open to the public and is a free event, but donations are accepted. The donations cover the cost of materials and advertising, and surplus funds are given to a local nonprofit that serves the community.
Goguen Hulbert emphasized, “We don’t want anybody to not come because they can’t make a donation.”
Anyone who would like to help create the labyrinth can go to the Peterborough Town House on Dec. 31 from 9 a.m. to 1 a.m. Goguen Hulbert said volunteers do not need experience and should bring a pair of scissors.