Sudden Grace

Traveler
has always wanted
to walk the Camino.
And now she is traveling -
a 500 mile pilgrimage
to the center of her soul.

She readies her kit bag
of memories,
to sort through,
one by one,
at the base of a tree
come nightfall.

She has marked the places
where she will stop
to find water
and shelter.

She has chosen the finest
walking-stick,
to companion her journey.

She has prepared for dark places.
She has prepared for pain.
She has prepared that the journey
will be difficult,
might be terminated,
that night might find her 
still with miles to go,
but a shortened path.
She has prepared for 
sudden endings.

What she has forgotten
to prepare for,
what she could never have anticipated,
is sudden grace
and the removal 
of her burden.

Kids, I am home,  resting and recuperating, too tired to be online very much. But everything went wonderfully! The aged hotel we stayed at in English Bay was perfect. From my bed on the 17th floor I could watch a strip of beach, and admire the lights after dark. 

The last words I heard as the anaesthesia closed in were: "Imagine yourself in Tofino, walking along the beach, listening to the sound of the waves....." I did, and then I woke up in recovery. To my astonishment, I am largely pain-free. It is like a gift. I was prepared for everything but Easy! 

I am happily home and resting, and now waiting only for the magic words: "it was benign", to liberate my spring.

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