Ending, beginning , and keeping on

Speeding south westwards across miles of mud scarred, snow spattered, slowly greening, vast in its smallness, landscape, in a fraction of the time it will take to travel north again, a quietness has settled within. There is fullness of gratitude for kindness, care, beauty, selflessness received. And for things not yet understood there is a formation of some acceptance. And for the past few days a reverent silence of thankfulness, which in time will gain words ... 
These past weeks I have mapped routes late at night and early in the morning, whilst remapping the bigger route. This appeals to my secret love of list making and grid referencing. The overlap between ending and beginning has perhaps not been balanced enough though. I wanted to do this quietly and people have respected that, for which I am grateful. I accept that blogging may not seem very quiet! But if in some small way I can convey something of walking a long distance and how it can not fail to change you, hopefully someone else might do this too. 
One of my first memories of walking a (relatively) long way was at 10 years old, and my dad taking me and a friend to climb a mountain a day, in the Lakes, over a week. We took time off school, and listed with pride the mountains we had conquered and the room numbers we stayed in at each youth hostel. Those were the days when it was ok to take your 10 year old daughter up a mountain in trainers, long socks and a corduroy skirt, with an oversized woolly jumper on top, and a hat knitted by someone in the WI. Thankfully my attire has changed, but the love of being close to the rhythm of the earth, high on mountains, or passing through lowlands, has only grown. Well, if I'm honest it has ebbed and flowed over the years. And over periods of hours and minutes too, when the weather is at its most harsh. And over recent years I have discovered I'm brave enough, mostly, to go alone. 
So, I am a little nervous ... I say I'm brave enough, but I think there are plenty of other things to have to be more brave about in life. This depends on the functionality of my body, and mind, and you can only know when you know that everything will work. It depends on weather, military danger zones (there are a surprising number of them), and general enthusiasm. 
For now, Cornwall is still a few hours away. And I have this nagging feeling that I should have double checked my tent for the correct amount of poles ... 

Comments

  1. Viator7 March 2018 at 07:14

    Good luck! And I like the prose-poetry...
    The correct number of poles for anything, anywhere, is 2: ns...

    ReplyDelete

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