An Excellent Trip

Now that the wireless is stable again, I can report that the trip home was uneventful.

We spent most of the time in silence - each, I suspect, treasuring his own private reflections upon the experience.

And, unfortunately, we still didn't catch the Old Fisherman at home. I wanted to hang around for a little while to see if he showed up, but monks told me that he is sometimes gone for days at a time. The case of St. Godric's Ale we had left was diminished somewhat, though, so I suspect he was just out for the day.

In reflection, the trip to the City was an excellent antidote to what could happen to someone out here in Ithilien. Father Joseph was right.

The ecstasy I experienced upon approaching the city and the joy and delight I felt wandering around the next day were all the evidence I needed after three months here in my valley that 'real life' is not the exclusive domain of Seekers. Though we do represent a vital dimension of the human spirit, we are not the whole of the human spirit - nor do we even exist apart from the City. On the contrary, we exist only in relation to the City. I suspect I will have more to say about this soon - perhaps in relation to my reflections from some time ago upon Rilke's "The Solitary"

While in the city, I did purchase several more books and a CD

First was F.A. Hayek's The Road to Serfdom, which I will be finishing soon in order to further my conversation with Brother Palgrave.

I also picked up the Ames / Hall translation of the Dao De Jing (with commentary) , Marilyn Robinson's Gilead and Ben Folds' new CD, Songs for Silverman.

So far, Hayek's book is enlightening beyond what I expected from a 60 year old treatise on economics and society, the CD is exceptional and bears repeated listening, the commentary on the Dao and my journey through yet another translation are going to provide a lot of food for thought, and Gilead promises to be a second Jayber Crow. So all in all, I'm very content with my purchase, though I will have to wait until the autumnal equinox to find out the identity of the Half-Blood Prince.

The garden looks excellent. The zucchini blossoms are in their full glory and the onslaught of the never ending squash will soon be upon us.

In addition to keeping up the garden, Camilla did finish the smokehouse while I was gone. She's really proud of it and it does look great - though I feel weird not having built it myself. She also had a couple of excellent days fishing and smoked about a dozen good size trout, two of which we tried for lunch today.