I am savoring it right now.  Man, what a deal?  William our friend from Calgary says life begins at seventy so maybe I should just relax about the whole thing and let things unfold gracefully.  Or let graceful things unfold maybe.

We have an outdoor party planned for tomorrow evening.  We have been so lucky with the weather with these winter night outdoor get togethers.  And tomorrow seems good, dry and cold.  Alperfect for huddling around a bonfire and maybe roasting a marshmallow or two.

It will be the solstice tomorrow also.  New hope for the coming seasons will be ignited.  At the summer solstice coming up I will hopefully be looking at six inch high corn plants, all young and green and hopeful.  It will be time to wonder if they will indeed be knee high by the Fourth.  And the weeds will be challenging me for dominance and I will be complaining about them.  Hopefully all that will happen to this guy.  Hopefully you will be here also to hear me complain.

I am at the hospital today for treatment.  Usually I can’t write the blog from here but I seem to be doing remarkably well at the moment.  Let’s see what else is new on my last day at sixty nine on the planet?

Well, down on I-5 the sturdy characters who move locomotives are moving one today.  We learned from the news that these engines weight two hundred and seventy thousand pounds.  It would be easy to move if it were on the tracks, needless to say, really.  But this particular locomotive is smack dab in the southbound lanes of our beloved Interstate.  We didn’t know how darn beloved our roadway was until this happened either.

Let’s see how many Starbuck’s grande coffees would equal two hundred and seventy thousand pounds.  That’s for Seattle folks.  Or how many Gideon Bibles?  Or how many William’s from Calgary?  Well, it’s freakin heavy however you try and look at it.   And they are going to load it on a really bigass lowboy trailer with a really bigass yellow crane.  And off it goes to sit at some out of the way place where sturdy folks with really heavy clipboards are going to stare at it until they can pronounce whether it can be rebuilt or scraped.

Well, maybe that is more than you wanted or needed to know but it is all big news here in the neighborhood.   On the human side people are continually being discharged from local hospitals as they begin to recover.  Hopefully being home for Christmas will be a possibility for some.

Yup, that’s about it for today.  Oh, one more thing, the receptionist at the doc’s office told me on my way out to, “behave thyself”.  That seventeenth century English really put the fear in me.  She doesn’t even know me that well.

Love you guys, Felipe.

What is on my mind is the railway crash that happened yesterday morning just south of Seattle.  Not that I was impacted directly nor any of my family members.  But it somehow is striking everyone in the region, this nasty occurrence.

It is impacting just about everyone that is trying to get somewhere on the roads.  Having all the southbound lanes of I-5 closed has thrown a giant monkey wrench into the local transportation works.  It could be another day before they can get the area cleaned up, repaired and checked out for safety.

Two things strike me on a deeper level.  One is our ambivalence about who or what we are going to put our trust in.  I was hearing some official on the news talking about computers and satellites and other fancy gizmos that were apparently controlling the train.  Sort of sounds reassuring until you learn the the train was going 80 mph on a curve where it was suppose to be going 30.  Hmm.  In my mind there has got to be some scruffy guy with the engineer hat and the red bandana that is at least checking things out and has his hand on the brake lever.

And two, when I was a kid our family had a tragedy that happened in early December.  The time is the unprotected flank of the year when our minds are on home and hearth and peace in the world.  A blow at this time seems so extra painful.  Praying for the many families that were impacted, may they find strength.

Ah, what is the lesson here, that there is always a flip side?  Or that we should always have our empathy card ready to throw down?  I don’t know but stuff happens in our world that can’t really be accounted for always.

Off I go.  Hope that I wasn’t too down today but needed to go through that.  The best to you, love, Phil.

So, much going on these days.  It’s hard to not just spin one’s wheels and get nowhere.  Have a moment before the morning walk to visit.  Yea, how are you doing through all this, keeping sane?

It is a foggy morning out there when even our limited vistas are further limited.  Everything is quiet and close.  If you keep moving you will be warm.  A good morning for the rosary to be said or just to be with.  Yesterday afternoon’s walk was very social and gabby, not maybe like this morning’s.

Both are good.  I trust that the right kind will be there for me exactly when I need it.  The Camino provides, again, still, always.

It is apparent that today will be just what I need.  It is yet to unfold but it will have a life of it’s own and it will whisk me along to where I need to be.  This is total stream of consciousness, channeling along here.

Yup, time to boot up and get out in the air and the rough.  Thinking of you, praying for you, love, Felipe.

Jane one of our Island neighbors is making a tincture of hawthorn from our hawthorn berries along Phil’s Camino.  It s supposed to be good for the heart.  So she is calling it Heart of the Camino.  Nice, right?  You could maybe find Jane and her products at ForestHalls.org .

Just had a nice evening walk with three new people.  They all saw the movie the other night and that got them to come.  The last lap it was getting pretty darn dark.  I’m threatening to make some medieval torches to light the way.

There was a very cool comment from Mary Margaret, our Camino buddy, who bought a property in France and wants to set up a trail, a Camino trail.  I think it is highly advisable that she hire a person with experience in such matters to come over and engineer it.  Let’s see, who do we have on staff here?

Well, have to go and cook breakfast for dinner and watch one more football game.  Good for the heart loves, Felipe.

The trail is still pretty dry with no standing water and the creek isn’t flowing.  So, rubber boots are not a necessity as of yet.

Monday 0900-1000

Tuesday 1530-1630

Thursday 0900-1000

Sunday 1530-1630

We are not walking December 22 -30, Christmas break.

Always good to see you, Felipe.x

Here we are with the last of these reflections and this one from Hye:

”We are facing death in every single moment of our lives, but it is hard to recognize it.  However,  when we realize this fact, everything will change.  This change happened to Phil because of his cancer.  Cancer was a turning point for him, and I realized that he gained a new pair of eyes to see his daily life differently.  Dr. Kathryn R. Barush mentions T.S. Eliot’s statement in her article ; “an end is where we start from.”  When we get another point of view at the end of an experience, we begin a new chapter in our lives.”

Thank you Hye.  I have spoken of my cancer as being a catalyst.  That still sounds like the perfect word.  It is not a good thing in itself but it can bring about change.  And that change can be good or bad depending.  Or maybe it is partially good and partially bad but the point being that something can be made from it.  It is possible to whip up some lemonade from the situation.

Well we have covered six different views from people who have studied art and pilgrimage and who have brought up some good ways to look at Phil’s Camino and what is going on here.  Thanks you all.  I hope that you make it up here to walk at some point.

Also something really big is happening and maybe at this very moment.  We are constantly on phone alert as our daughter Tesia is about to give birth to a little granddaughter, God willing of course.

Off to lunch.  My Rebecca made this incredibly good navy bean soup and that’s what is on the menu.  Love, Felipe.

Hi. We continue with the reflections of the grad students in the Art and Pilgrimage class. I think that there is one more after this one. This one is Minhwi’s. Thank you.

“Lastly, I would like to take a look at Phil’s contribution to the pilgrimage of Camino. As Phil’s story spread, many people made friends with Phil’s handmade Camino and they shared its various stories. Jesus said that whenever two or three are gathered together in his name, that he would be in their midst (Matthew 18:20), and he emphasized the church community of small groups. Even today, there are many forms of trails, like Phil’s Camino, where there are many people walking alone or walking with others, praying for the rosary, and creating pilgrimage communities. Furthermore, there will continue to be people who experience communitas, by looking back at themselves through the people they met, through pilgrimage and in gathering spaces.”

What sticks out at me is the line “…people who experience communitas, by looking back at themselves through the people they met…” I’ve never have thought about the situation in that way or in that light. But maybe that is what we are doing as we bat around ideas as we walk. I guess that is true that thoughts become clearer or more organized through sharing them.   And ultimately we are building a body of thought, lap by Phil’s Camino lap.  I like the feel of that whole quote and that whole idea, thanks Minhwi.

Off I go to rake leaves.  Still trying to clear up after the fall and the fall wind storms.  Not supposed to start raining til later today.  Thanks for being here, always fun, love, Felipe.

Good morning! Here are some thoughts from Elizabeth:

Phil’s desire to walk in his backyard in a meaningful, pilgrimage-like way quickly became its own ritual act, a proper pilgrimage in its own right, and was concretized by his use of material culture. Phil turned walking into a way – his efforts made ceremonial the core elements of a pilgrimage, which are deceptively basic and fundamental to the human experience (walking, eating, communing with others). Without a site or a historically-christened journey on which to base his spiritual exercise, Phil’s pilgrimage may have initially seemed impossible, or perhaps merely a shadow of the “real” experience. However, it is clear that he distilled the important aspects of the pilgrimage and incorporated them into the space he had and the life he lived. His walk became a journey and his actions became those of a pilgrim, and the materials he used to bring this about (maps, records, schedules, food) were crucial to signify and sacramentalize this activity. There can be no doubt that Phil embarked upon and experienced a true pilgrimage, and now others follow in his footsteps on his way, and use his cues to also create their own.”

Thank you Elizabeth in coming up with the word “concretized”. But I get it, thank you. Again, here is another one of Catalina’s students who each in their own way came up with a little different view of the workings of Phil’s Camino. Each has a little different angle. This is all very helpful to me as I am too close to it. I don’t see it in a larger context the way that these folks do.

It just came to me that maybe most of the art and artifacts that are studied in Catalina’s class are from other eras and when they look at me and my walk it is current, evolving and changing. I just walked with Dana just minutes ago for our Thursday morning walk. She adds to it as she walks for instance. And so do all the others.

Well, off to work outside. According to the weather man this is the last good day with rain coming tomorrow. Have to get some leaves around the house cleaned up. OK, see ya, love, Felipe.

Here in front of me I have a reflection paper from Lauren and this is part of what she says:

“The courage and creativity that was necessary to create his own Camino brings tears to my eyes. He didn’t resign himself to despair and inaction with a stage four cancer diagnosis, but rather created something of great meaning that would help him (and his family and community) find healing with his given circumstances. The Camino de Santiago inspired, and he created his own sacred site. St. James was certainly afoot.”

This is a nice simple statement of what went on here in 2013 with challenges, inspirations, influences colliding. The result was the trail and a way to think about it. In other words a physical trail and a way to link it with something bigger. Somehow it all worked out. I didn’t have anything to work from really, had to make everything from scratch.

And we are started walking again across Spain. We are a ways past Orrison. I am doing a whiteboard map this morning to keep track of progress. OK, here we go, love Felipe.