Literal translation
to make oratories
Meaning
to stop at every step along the way
Explanation
This phrase means 'to stop at every step along the way'. The literal image draws on the wayside oratories, small chapels or religious monuments once set up along roads in Provence, where the pious traveler would once stop to pray or reflect before continuing on. Multiplying the stops along a journey by lingering at each one thus amounts, through mocking extension, to 'making oratories' the way a scrupulous pilgrim would, except that the halt here has nothing religious about it and comes simply from the slowness or distractedness of the walker. The word for oratory keeps exactly its religious sense in our sources, which confirms the perfect transparency of the image between its old use and its current figurative one. The expression conveys a kind of affectionate irritation at a traveling companion who never moves straight ahead, stopping to chat, look around, or dawdle at every chance, in a familiar and picturesque register deeply rooted in the Provençal countryside, dotted with these small devotional structures.