Incomplete Projects and the Magic of Giving
I feel so happy and peaceful here and I want very much to write a blog that will share some of that deep relaxation with you. But how?
Every day I walk down to the beach and along the shoreline and slip out of my cotton dress (actually my nighty!) and walk naked into the Libyan sea. The walk is down some stairs, then a steep descent through soft sand, then a path through tall grass, then a short walk in a stony beach and then along two sandy coves.
I don’t really swim. Just walk out a little way, dive into the water, maybe a few breaststrokes, then back. How is it that I feel so restored, almost reborn, by such a simple act? Then I wander back along the shoreline, noticing the differences between higher and lower tide lines, watching for shells and sea glass on the sand, and climb the sand and then stairs, back toward our little studio apartment.
I love coming up the stairs and seeing the apartment units of Fata Morgana (where we have stayed now five times in visits to Crete) and the mountains behind them. I
I love seeing the small family chapel just opposite our apartment. Today we realized we could go in - I had been trying to push the right hand door open and had not realized the left hand door opened with ease. We have loved this chapel with its (in our opinion) museum quality icons since our first visit here.
I have loved our walks. We have averaged over 10 miles a day since we have been here. (My new iPhone soberly informs me I walked more miles this week than last - since of course I didn’t have the phone most of last week so it shows zero miles for most days). It is nice to have my “little pocket god” back who counts my every footstep. Our most ambitious walk was heading up the mountain just north of us on a narrow paved road full of switchbacks. After we got to the top we hiked another couple of miles to a lovely mountain village called Kalikratis where we had a light lunch before hiking down. If you look closely at the photo you may be able to make out the switchbacks up the mountain on the right. On the left is a gorge called Kalikratis (same name as the village near the top of the gorge).
Here are those same switchbacks from above when we were walking down.
I had hoped to hike the actual kalikratis gorge today but the wind was so fierce that I decided to postpone it. I did drive up to the trailhead and on the way I had to stop while a herd of sheep galloped single file across the road.
The wind was blowing so hard it rocked the car and I didn’t feel good about walking up a steep rocky gorge where balance could be challenging in a wind I could barely walk through on the road. So I drive back down to the spartmebt where the wind was gentler. Chris and I took a lovely road walk to the village just west of us, Agia Nektarios. We explored side roads both toward the mountains and toward the sea. As usual, if Chris walked in front she soon was way ahead (it’s true I am more sure footed and have better balance so I do better in the gorges, but ion a paved road I cannot keep up with her). Yes that’s her dressed in black with white socks way way ahead of me.
As we walked home Chris pointed out an adobe colored house she had noticed looking down from the little village we walked up to. All I noticed were the beautiful artichoke plants growing in front of it. Chris and I often joke about how oblivious I am to cars, buildings, and the clothes people wear - but how out in the natural world I start to notice lots of things.
Both of us remember Greek food as simple and good but a little repetitive and boring. That hasn’t been true this time. Maybe we’ve been more adventurous this year in our food choices. We’ve eaten a lot of different foods: moussaka, lamb in wine sauce, eggplant stuffed with lamb, eggplant stuffed with onion and tomato, briam (mixed roasted vegetables including potatoes, tomatoes, carrots, peppers, onions), boureki (layered zucchini, potato and cheese), lasagna, artichoke hearts and potatoes, tomatoes and peppers stuffed with rice, as well as Greek salad, tzatziki, saganaki (fried cheese), fava. And almost every meal they bring us a little raki and small dessert as a gift. We didn’t think we liked raki but one can’t refuse a gift so we end up toasting and sipping and drinking a bit more alcohol than is our custom. We also share a bottle of Mythos beer with every meal. We usually have breakfast in our apartment (toasting the leftover bread from the day before’s meal) and eat mid or late afternoon, then have wine and bread and cheese and fruit in our apartment in the evening.
We have noticed this time as in former visits construction projects that seem to have been abandoned in mid-project, or heavy equipment that seems to have been abandoned for years. I find that these incomplete projects simply form part of the landscape for me and find myself wondering how it would be to look on the unfinished projects in my life (particularly the never completed novels and books) with similar equanimity. In the photo below I was intrigued by the seemingly abandoned (and rusting) heavy equipment, and yet beside it a newly planted row of young cypresses, with irrigation. I found it puzzling and interesting.
Which leads to another juxtaposition I found interesting - this graffiti “God is God” beside a heavy equipment shovel that was moving rocks off the road.
It called up a lot of associations for me: the human urge to be God and how that gets expressed in our technological innovation and hubris, the science fiction notion that machines will replace both humans and our imagined gods, and the story from the Odyssey. That story where Odysseus gouges out the eye of the cyclops, then can’t resist taunting his blind victim just as he sails away(so that Polyphemus is able to sim and hurl a bolder that barely misses the ship)- a cave that Crete claims is near here. As Sicily also claimed. So the machine scooping up rock on a high mountain road makes me think of Polyphemus and also “God is God” makes me think of his father Poseidon who torments Odysseus for the rest of his long journey home because of the injury done to his son.
Enough. I just want to mention one more moment of joy. I was taking an evening walk alone and I passed a small family staying at the adjacent apartment complex. A little girl ran out and handed me a loquat. She was so excited by the loquats just growing a tree in the apartment garden. I was deeply touched by her spontaneous gift to me and as I walked I picked yellow and white daisies to make a tiny bouquet to give to her. I held it out to her on my way back. She took it and handed me another loquat. I was struck that this is the essence of giving: a sense of wonder and gratitude at what is given by the world around us and a desire to share that with others. And the act of giving somehow enhances the wonder and gratitude. It is very much what this blog is about for me.
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