Return to Wisques? No!

I've decided to stay on the train, which has reached Amiens, to Boulogne-sur-Mer as I can get to Calais from there and then Saint Omer. I think I will be there in good time to get to Wisques Abbey de Notre Dames. It was very difficult to use the system designed to get you from A to B regardless of changing trains in the opposite direction to eventually get to the desired destination. It's a bit like a three point turn. They don't know I am coming, but if the is no way to rest back there then back to Calais, etc. Perhaps it is an illogic of computerised search engines? The conductor will find me shortly to get me to pay the ferry man his demand!

Blessings of the day! He's allowed me passage to Boulogne-sur-Mer gratis. He says I will need to pay at Boulogne-sur-Mer only. Maybe it is better if I get it from this generous smiling French conductor? I recall that with my delayed train from Saint Quentin that SNCF would provide a taxi to Laon if the other train had departed already from Tergnier. As it happened they held back the other train for us to connect.

Another doubt enters my mind. Should I just ditch those trivial possessions in Wisques? An old (but warm) sleeping bag, Goretex bivvy and travel pillow. Obviously yes! There are really quite unnecessary currently, and it is a distraction from getting back to the UK. Long as it is short. The gift of free passage to Boulogne-sur-Mer should not be forgotten. Back to Canterbury I think. When I get online I will write to Sœurs Lucie and explain the straights I was in at Péronne. Mayhap I pick them up when the weather improves, I go to Péronne and continue again. Tomorrow never knows.

No matter how many times I get out of that box called Yorkshire I always sprint back as I am quite fond of it really, warts and all.

As a number of refugees joined our train I new a kind of fear I should not have had. They asked me if this was Calais, but I felt threatened just then and could not pronounce Calais properly. This was at the final stop. But I still walked to the ferry port. Arriving with twenty minutes to spare we leave the continent as a gale blows a south westerly. Now the ferry is crowded with returning school trips so I turn to Amon Düül II for a form of bulletless silencer!

Oh! To be an Outlier. It is actually becoming a nice feeling! To be an introvert is not a fault. The last two days have used all my resources physically and mentally, but I am here. Alive and kicking. Why didn't I smile at those heroic individuals who see England as the promised land? Any day is a good day to die. There can be no fear of death because it is inevitable. Last night I dreamt the devil had found a way through peoples thoughts to take them into hell. I went willingly and smiled at It and we then became friends. It became a weapon I could use to extinguish all the barbarism in other people's minds. The Ego must be used as a force for good: as the tool it is. It is not in control, no matter how powerful it appears. Beneath the vile exterior beats a heart that only seeks true love, but has forgotten where to find this: I still had to die atom by atom in eternity, but this would deliver me love. Nothing here matters at all. To see school teachers troughing the same nutritionally empty food stuffs, while battling seasickness, and staring at my bootless feet relaxing on the space I had resolved for my self on this sinking ship, was another means of displacing the now. Did they ever arrive at where they were going last week? Or has the whole task been about returning to the cave to be chained up again?

Those two days passed in the blink of an eye. France has receded over the horizon, but I am not left stranded on the northern shore. Three brothers took me in at eight last night. So I could wash away the grime of Paris and sleep in down, surrounded by books unread in many years; pages dried and ready to increase any fire to engulf mankind in this hell I walk through (Canterbury, Saturday night around eight; a drunk loiterer shouting for 25 pence in the face of every misericordia. What would you actually do with 25 pence ... If you need this to survive why are you absolutely drunk? Do you only believe your own lies? Peace! Try peace instead: I am back to the Master's Lodge.

Briefly bid good morning to Micael and a short conversation with Austin as they go for morning prayers. This house on St Peter's Street is calm. It resonates with their being. Nothing is hurried. So unlike the Abbey St Paul at Wisques or St Benoît d'En Calcat: Benedictine orders are like strict cane ready school masters and Franciscans are like liberal humanities teachers unprepared for any lecture.