I wake up at home in Calgary on this first day of May—
where fire meets bloom—
the sun filtering gently across my yard
as I sip my morning coffee and remember the last forty-nine days.
Forty-nine days of movement, of edge-walking,
of living out of a van named Vanessa
and driving 6,790 kilometres around the coastlines of Spain, Portugal, Morocco, and back again.
A pilgrimage of sorts.
An experiment in joyful too-muchness.
A stretch of time soaked in story, song, and soul.
Twenty-four of my loved ones joined me—
friends and family weaving in and out of the journey,
meeting me in train stations and apartments and coastal towns,
bringing their own music, laughter, and rhythm to the road.
There was joy in the greetings—
and, yes, joy in the so-longs too.
The beauty of coming together for a time,
and letting it be enough.
The first half of the journey was heavy with rain—
wet mornings, slick stones, clothes that never dried,
and a strange sense of being cleansed of something I couldn’t yet name.
And then came the sun,
and with it: golden beaches, blooming relationships,
and small miracles that arrived daily.
I think of the cafés.
The pavement ones.
The ones tucked into alleyways or hugging cliffs above the sea.
And I think of the coffee-stained sugar cubes—
soaking on saucers, glistening slightly, slow to dissolve.
And I think of my dad.
Whenever we had tea outside the house, there were sugar cubes—
sugar lumps, he called them.
After plopping a few into his own cup,
he’d push the bowl toward me,
invite me to dig in,
and say I could crunch as many as I liked.
As many as I liked.
It was delight,
it was permission,
it was a quiet passing on of joy in small, sweet things.
And this journey—what began as something that felt frivolous in the planning—
turned out to be entirely necessary in the doing.
Each day held a rhythm of invocation—
my body buzzing with the Gayatri Mantra most mornings,
offering prayer to the sun, receiving it’s warmth in the wind, into moving stillness, into presence.
And then:
the meetings.
The arrivals.
Train stations. Apartment doors. Narrow streets.
I was the only one who knew everyone—
until, suddenly, they all knew each other.
There was driving and walking,
so much walking.
Dancing. Splashing.
Missed trains. Closed museums. Spilled wine.
Sunset rooftops and bumpy sea roads.
Smelly clothes. Too much wine. Not enough sleep.
Laughter that didn’t care.
There’s a rhythm, a rally, a surge—
terminal lucidity, some call it—
a clarity before an ending, or maybe before something new begins.
That burst came early in the trip and hasn’t quite left me.
And now, I’m home.
Still.
The movement behind me,
something rooting gently in the soil of my being.
I hold it all—
the shadow, the sweetness,
the ritual, the rain,
the sugar cubes and the sunshine,
and the quiet knowing that presence is the real pilgrimage.
And for now,
that is enough.
There’s a rhythm, a rally, a surge—
terminal lucidity, some call it—
a clarity before an ending, or maybe before something new begins.
That burst came early in the trip and hasn’t quite left me.
And now, I’m home.
Still.
The movement behind me,
something rooting gently in the soil of my being.
I hold it all—
the shadow, the sweetness,
the ritual, the rain,
the sugar cubes and the sunshine,
and the quiet knowing that presence is the real pilgrimage.
And for now,
that is enough.