The spaces in between...

Another earnest snap via Grant Newby

Been traveling. Toasts made, hotels, and hospitality. In times of travel past, a geothermal angst bubbles up. When the salty sea? When a return to freedom and simple, joyful immersion? This time I choose a different path.

"Where's that trail to Del Sur Beachy? It's pretty easy, right?" A call comes from a friend, still at home, still on track for a little surf session. I am in landlocked Microsoft mini-city. My teeth grit. "Yeah, it's easy but keep your eyes peeled for snakes. I saw a few there a while ago. Have a nice session."

The trail is a beautiful piece of coastal scrub framed by a brittle bridge with blue beauty deep beyond. It can be a bit steep, with narrow lanes between barbed plants and the aforementioned underfoot serpents. I always walk it happily. And it's not even because it leads me to surf or offers a change from the concrete footbed of daily life. The reason why it is a special path is because a few hundred yards away a nice, manicured, completely denaturalized cement trail leads to the southern end of the same stretch of coast. I like the scrub trail partly because it is not the paved trail.

So it goes with my landlocked travels. I am on the scrub trail. I will enjoy the nuance and rigor of this trail and return to the coast a little more slowly, but with a perspective of patience and appreciation.