The wind blowing through the grasses by the River Sado yesterday evening.
Monday May 27, 2024 Newsletter letter
Sunday, May 26, 2024
Monday May 27, 2024 Dear Friends, It’s early morning here in Alentejo, the region of Portugal that our house is in. Outside feels fresh and cool, but that won’t last for long. After some cooler weather last week, summer appears to have arrived in Portugal and the days are heating up. Clear skies and sun. I have said it elsewhere, but there is a quality to the light here that I have not seen elsewhere.
🤫 After just under two weeks of visitors, everyone has left. I sit here this evening in silence. I can feel my body and mind settling, like the snow settling in a shaken snow globe. And with the settling I can better touch my inner life, a place where I rest well.
I miss maps, old paper maps that you could spread out over the floor to plan your route. That you could fold up to hold on your lap with the section of the map that you were traveling through. I loved looking over them to see all the details they hold - thinking here especially of the British Ordinance Survey maps. Maps that you could stick pins in of places visited and draw out roads traveled.
The Sado estuary.
Another photograph of Cais Palafitico da Carrasqueira, the ramshackle, zigzagging, interlocking piers on wooden stilts, near to Comporta in Portugal. There have been other photographs of the same area here on my website. It’s a very photogenic area.
🌡️ After a cool week, the temperature is starting to rise again. Clear blue skies and warm sun outside.
I believe that we all have our safe spaces. Those places in our mind and body where we feel comfortable. Part of the practice for this life is, I believe, to stretch those boundaries. This is not a challenge, not “a who can stretch furthest?" dare. Rather it is path through life of seeing if I can grow larger my potential, in what I can embrace than what I might be doing now…a path that I can chose to take if I wish to, and one that I do so while caring for my own well being - not jumping further than I feel is safe to do so.
And then those times happen when I am caught completely off guard and find myself out of my comfort zone. In such times my safe boundaries just collapse, disappear from around me, and I am left standing naked and exposed with nowhere to run to. Whether other’s see that in me, I don’t know, but for me in that moment it is a very real feeling.
Such happened to me last night. People visited, new friends. We engaged in conversation, and the ground just opened up underneath me. Nowhere to run to. I could feel the discomfort in me, I felt exposed and I had nowhere to go. I was left just being where I was - talking, listening, engaging - but that engaging was cutting through me. I wanted to get up and leave. There was discomfort in my body and mind - scratching, itching, tension. With nowhere to turn to, I was left just being present to the feelings, to the experience. Breathing, allowing the felt experience to be there, not pushing it away. Just seeing it as not personal, passing through me, real and at the same time not real, holding that paradox.
Afterwards I found a safe and comfortable place to be, like resting after a period of strenuous activity, allowing body and mind to rest and settle. And next time that challenged comfort zone will be a little more familiar, probably still uncomfortable, perhaps still scary? For all of that though I can breathe into it again, let it pass through me, and learn that little bit more from the experience. For in all those scary, uncomfortable places there is also wisdom.
Barrosinha, Alcácer do Sal.
📯 There was one hell of a lot of honking car horns outside just now. That and a faint sound of horse hooves. I have no idea what was going on, and it stopped before I could get outside. There is a festival happening in the area this weekend, and so I wonder if the noise is related?
Images of Design Week in Lisbon.
Some of welcome relief from the hot sun yesterday afternoon in Lisbon.
Checking out the wine.
😮💨 I am completely exhausted. Just too much going on over the last week, regardless of the good time had. I could spend this evening in and have an early night, but that is not going to happen. We have an event to go to. Maybe this weekend?
Monsaraz - one street of maybe two.
🗺️ Well I have just managed to drive around a part of Lisbon without the aid of Apple Maps, or any maps for that matter. It was not big achievement, I did not travel that far, but I could not have done that a year ago. I’m getting to know my way around.
At Barrosinha nr, Alcácer do Sal
Monday May 20, 2024 Newsletter letter
Sunday, May 19, 2024
Monday May 20, 2024 Dear Friends, Well I am getting this letter written by the hair of my chinny, chin, chin! We have family staying with us right now and have been busy entertaining, driving them around, showing them the Portugal that we know so far. I am aware of life, business that is passing me by at the moment and will need to be taken care of on their departure tomorrow, and at the same time I am trying to track what needs to be done while they are here.
Everyone has gone for a walk. I am staying at home to rest tired bones and a tired nervous system. We had a lovely couple of days in Lisbon with my sister in law and her husband. However, I did not sleep well the night in the city, and spent a lot of time on the move yesterday. By the time that we got home, I chose to spend some time to myself while the others watched a movie.
Today we are heading east towards the Spanish border. Just a day away, but a lot of driving, walking and socializing. After a while my body and mind just needs the down time, I can feel it. The HSP in me can only be on for so long, and then I need to bathe in some silence and alone time. Right now I am taking such time as it becomes available. Maybe next week they’ll be more time to recharge?
👨🌾 We spent some time this morning at the Farmers Market in Príncipe Real neighbourhood of Lisbon. I enjoy the community atmosphere of these markets. I also just enjoy stepping back from the market, sitting down and people watching. Families, individuals, couples even the pet dogs. Interacting, buying, chatting, playing. We are all so varied in looks and personalities (as well as one can know a personality from a face in the crowd). I find people fascinating.