The Day of Saints - Day 8, Catching Up with Me

Fiona knew it, and I think I knew it. The presenting evidence was a bad emotional reaction to something fairly ordinary, but that thing was only the most recent example of stuff that couldn't be allowed to fester; I needed to do some cleaning of my interior kitchen, so to speak, and find space to become still again. I needed to get away.

I packed a few things (but eg, forgetting my towel, pace Douglas Adams) I drove to St Just and set up camp. The following morning, having slept badly, I drove to Marazion and tried photographing St Michael's mount at dawn. I thought it was fine, with good pictures, but looking later, despite the light, they all looked drab and grey.

Finding Sanctuary, in Sainsbury's

I went to Sainsbury's to buy a towel, washing up liquid and some bread, but sat on the balcony drinking tea and looking across to the Mount as the sun continued to rise. I read from 'Finding Sanctuary' a quote from Thomas Merton which bears repeating here.

'Many poets are not poets for the same reason that many religious men are not

saints: they never succeed in being themselves. They never get round to being

the particular poet or the particular monk that they are intended to be by God'

- And reading that, that was how I felt, and neither poet nor saint. And that was why I was there, sitting reading. Timothy Jamison's comment on Merton says,

'The real task of being true to oneself is a slow and profound work; it is not a fixed

way but involves search and change. And in the end being true to oneself can only be

achieved by listening to God.'

And that was why I had come away, because I had developed spiritual hearing problems, or, to use a different metaphor, the filters I'd placed over the lens of my camera were gunked up, and wouldn't let the light through. Thankfully, this kind of thing is just what sabbaticals are for, and things were changing for the better.

St Michael's Mount, Marazion