Lent

It's the beginning of Lent. 2nd March 2022. A month of my 50th year has vanished and all the good intentions of January have evaporated during that alternating February.

Back on the 1st January I promised that this year would be different or it would be my last. Some things in Ukraine might make this my last for other - out of my control - reasons, but directly I am responsible for one individual who can change to be a better individual?

The lady I see about my alcohol issues says I don't actually have a problem with the bottle, but that I have no 'Goal' in my life. She sees I have certain commitments - mother, Lola and the allotment, as well as the to-ing and fro-ing on either the X99 or X98 between Wetherby and Leeds, but that except for those 'must do' occupations I have no guiding light or compass to navigate by.

She's correct. Never have I really had any substantial aim to my existence. Even when meditating, walking or becoming 'spiritual' there is no finish line in my mind.

Now, especially with the crisis in Ukraine, I must aspire to more than treading water in the same decreasing pool of water before I keel over and am stranded as the tide retreats never to water this soul again.

But what must this Goal be? Well, luckily, due to mother's operation on the 5th March I've been able to put back the answering of that question another 2 weeks.

So from this morning, because Lent gives me a target to aim at too, I am resolved to strive in another direction. No more walking around Leeds looking at youthful faces in a form of lustful insanity, and going for just one more half in a world I ceased to inhabit 10 plus years ago.

Sat on the John, as the washing machine runs it's course, I ponder the meaning of my life, again, as I once did every morning on the Camino.

The Camino is my Goal - a perpetual Camino as there is so much space to cover in such a short space of time.

The government has given me, since 2014, a golden opportunity to fix my rudder and aim into the sunset, never to return to the past - which I circle about like the Maelstrom is a force I cannot break free of.

Enough with the sea/ocean analogy and time to run a bath...