We are off and running in our “pilgrimage across Spain”. We have crossed the Pyrenees and been in the places: Orisson, Roncesvalles, Burguete, Biskarreta and have arrived in Zubiri. And by my count in the logbook 13 different folks have walked with me and shared stories and insights. It’s late summer and the corn stalks are still standing, the sunflowers are still beautiful and feeding the birds. The grass in the pastures and around the trail has greened up considerably after the drought. The blackberries are gone but the apples and pears are on.

Right now I am mowing to keep the grass growth down and planning on getting the six bird feeders up and running. These six feeders mark the six “Our Father’s” in the saying of the rosary if you are working on that. They need some minor changes to make them more squirrel proof, a constant battle.

If you are coming to walk for now just have a hat and rain jacket to protect yourself from an occasional shower. No need for heavy boots yet as there is no standing water. Here is our schedule: Monday 9-10, Tuesday 4-5, Thursday 9-10 and Sunday 4-5. Do it. Felipe.

This starts out with Jennifer and I rushing in the early morning trying to surf through the traffic to get to the hospital. We stopped at a grocery store to pick up some healthy treats for our doctors and nurses. In the process of grabbing her Eco friendly shopping bag from the Audi trunk Jennifer locked the car keys in there.

We didn’t realize that was our situation till we came back out from the store and then, “Oh, my gosh!” So Jennifer sees that the sun roof window is open four inches and she crawls up on top of the car over the back bumper to see if she can reach the door handle but no bueno. I’m looking around and me being the fix’it guy, the tool guy, I see the landscaper’s truck parked close by and ask the guy if I can borrow a hoe. So Jennifer gets busy trying to hook the inside door handle with the business end of the hoe and the landscaper is fishing around with another tool, some kind of long handled scraper. I’m freaking out in my own quiet way. This is an Audi people, be careful!

Our Plan B is not working so we take a breather and she remembers that she has a spare key in her purse. Where is the purse? There it is on the floor of the back seat. So eventually with enough tries she hooks the strap and hoists it aloft and out the sunroof with the hoe. Slick!! I left a package of snack tomatoes on the front seat of the landscaper’s truck as a thank you. And we were off.

So just the kind of comedy, of fresh air, that our doctor recommended. He wanted us to stay open, to be present and let the unexpected in. He was saying to do this to dilute the heaviness that can accumulate and cause us to feel overwhelmed. So yea, we laughed our tails off, just what the doctor ordered. And I would have loved to have gotten a pic of Our Jennifer in all her glory attacking what ailed the beautiful Audi with a common garden tool but unfortunately my IPad Mini was at that instant locked inside. We were laughing too hard to think of that anyway, next time.

So, we made it to the hospital and were a few minutes early actually in spite of the unplanned caper. All in a day’s work for Cancer Commandos. Fresh air loves you’ll, love Felipe.

A chance encounter on the ferry to Seattle just because I was present. And then to see her walking toward me outside the hospital and to talk with her in a busy spot. Then I turned to leave and she grabed my arm and pulled me out from a meeting with a moving car. Ooh, that was close! Thank you my angel.

Of course, I wouldn’t have been there in that siuation without her and I wouldn’t have needed saving it was pointed out to me. Yes, true but…

Alperfect, once again, love you, Felipe.

I have to back up and straighten things out. Yesterday I attributed the Book of James to the apostle James and really it is another James. What do I blame this on? Too much chemo, too much what? I actual did a study of this back a year ago and had this straight then.

So the current thinking is that the Book of James was written by James, the brother of Jesus. He was not a follower of Jesus while Jesus was here in body. He later came onboard. The two Jameses who were Apostles were James son of Alphaeus (James the Lesser) and James son of Zebedee (James the Greater). So, after all that it is James the Greater who is buried in Santiago and the causer of the Camino. But none the less the Book of James carries a good message and I am sure all the Jameses near and far would put their stamp of approval on it. And we will too.

For the time being we have things straightened out. Onward, love, Felipe.

Went to eight o’clock Mass with Our Catherine as usual this morning. We talked a lot about our fishing expedition as we drove which is happening after lunch but first church. And today’s gospel reading was from the Book of James as in Our Saint James’ book.

I took some notes from Father’s homily so I could give you the scoop. So, Father is pounding on on the pulpit, no that’s a joke, for he is the most mild mannered dude on the planet. His speech is a sort of poetry. It doesn’t have rhyme but it really has rhythm. Sort of a mild mannered rap, he’s black.

Here what he had to say about the spirit of St James’ message written two thousand years ago. “To have faith is to do faith – noun flowing into verb.” St James message is that we are the hands and feet of God. “Making visible, making tangible”. We make God visible and tangible by our actions in the here and now. Yup.

So true to form Felipe is fixing stuff as the Padre is speaking. I had a malfunction with my rosary and I got my Leatherman out when fingernails and teeth don’t do it trying to get the links in the chain refastened. Read up about PFJ’s comment about fixing things yesterday. You and the Padre are so right on PFJ. So yea, we fix stuff a lot and make God happen that way mostly and grow corn of course.

Yup, I have to go dig up a useable fishing rod from some dusty corner. The silver salmon are coming in the Sound now and some swimming by the shore not a half mile from here at this minute. OK, that’s it for today, gone fishing, love, Felipe.

Yes, a carpenter without his hammer is like a haystack without it’s needle. Something like that. Funny because just yesterday before I lost it I was thinking about getting buried with it, sort of a representative of all my tools. Kind of cool that the darned thing disappeared in such a timely fashion.

I was trying to get my job finished or close. Just replacing an old window for a friend. And my hammer disappears. But just driving on Vashon today and getting to the job is problematic. Town is clogged up with tourists visiting the Farmer’s Market. Right around the corner from the ranch are the now a little too famous Sheepdog Trials and the traffic from that. Then the clincher is the back roads being filled with bikers racing in this 70 mile race (on a 14 mile island) called, ready, Passport to Pain, yea. OK people, out of my paradise please.

Now just a little story about the new us and the old us that this Passport to Pain is reminding me of. A friend of mine here had a great friend who was this old cowboy. I think his name was John. So, John is riding shotgun on a little trip here on Vashon and they pass this jogger running on the side of the road. John gets excited and wants my friend to pull over and help the guy out. What do you mean help the guy? Well, he obviously lost his horse, why else would he be running?

The more I think about my idea to get buried with my hammer and then promptly loosing it, the more I have to laugh. Goes to show, quit trying to think too much about the darned future. Maybe I got more life to live, hey? If I find that hammer I’m throwing it in the Sound, love, Felipe.

Yea, Catherine’s first salmon! Well done! I’m sorry I wasn’t there for it. But my excellent tutoring paid off. Haha.

She caught that off the beach but I see that we need to get the canoe out. Maybe Our Jennifer is feeling better, she will want to go. I have to get my work done first.

What else is in the news. My Rebecca was over at Jennifer’s last evening for a food production, for lack of better words. Jennifer’s house has two kitchens. One is really big and open with tons of counter space which was designed and built as a teaching space. People come and give classes there. Anyway, neighbors got together to build a hundred peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I think that they went well over that as they were using up the supplies on hand. They will be passed out to the homeless in Seattle today. How about that? Kudos gang! Angel on!

Well, that’s the news from the neighborhood. Pretty much everyone is scrambling around trying to get their projects done before the monsoons. That’s the basic drill.

Oh, I know, you need an update on Phil’s Camino. We are on our virtual walk through Spain for the second time and we got 42 kilometers logged in. So, we are up and over the Pyrenees, past the town of Biskarreta and almost to Zubiri. I can see it in the distance! Yup, miss walking with you.

If you are local come and help me along. Monday 9-10, Tuesday 4-5, Thursday 9-10 and Sunday 4-5. Need you in the conversation, love, Felipe.

Sometime before noon yesterday our friend flew away. He was surrounded by his family and friends, alperfect. I was outside his door about that time, he saw me there. I left some sunflowers and a note.

But today I want to transition to something, I am not sure what at the moment. This death thing takes too much energy. But before we leave it, it did spark some good conversation between Our Jennifer and myself. We actually talk about this more than usual. Maybe it is a way of preparing ourselves.

I was relating to her a story about the Camino and death that we could reflect on. There in Spain along the trail every once in a while would be a small shire to someone who had died on that spot. There would be the usual pile of rocks and pictures and notes in memory. The thought crosses my mind that millions of pilgrims walking there over 1200 years there had to be deaths all over the place but these few are marked.

I remember standing at these little places and gazing around at the local landscape and saying to myself that this woundn’t be a bad place to die. Of course it is hard to find a spot in rural Spain that is ugly really. So any place becomes a good spot. See the thinking there? Yes, I could die here or here or here, yes. Dying along the trail with my boots on looked like a preferred way. So, yes, no problem. The Camino provides.

OK, tomorrow we will come up with another topic. Something will happen to spark comment. I am walking in a few moments. Have to remember to bring dog biscuits for Scout. She really thinks I am lame since I forget most of the time. Maybe our friend will be there with us today as we walk. Yup, and so it goes, thinking of you, love, Felipe.

Fortunately it is not everyday that we have to deal with death. Well, I mean in our community of someone that we may know well or not so well. A few weeks ago Jennifer and I went to visit a man who I didn’t know so well but he had walked Phil’s Camino months ago. I was off to some special visit to the hospital that day and wasn’t walking at the regular scheduled time. Jennifer and Catherine walked with him and it created a bond, especially with Jennifer.

So yesterday this dear man was dying at home with his family around him. I had a chance to go but passed. Jennifer went over and left flowers outside. So she has me going over this morning to check on the situation, she’s insistent. I will go in a few minutes and show up there at 0900, not too early.

I said a rosary for him yesterday as I walked the Camino. And I texted Catherine and she said one also. “Hail Mary full of grace. The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.” Maybe you can tell that I am feeling guilty for not going yesterday. I did what I could yesterday without getting too close. But I will courage up here and go this AM. The dear man may have left his body but that doesn’t mean that he can’t see me there. Yes, that’s right.

Yup, maybe I will pick a riot of sunflowers to take over. Have to go, love, Felipe.

ps ~ just back and it seems that our man is still hanging on. I have to make an appointment and I can sit with him for an hour. Later, Felipe.