Number 6, Diary entry of travels to Paris! Entitled: “Saturday and the Senses of Self”

It seems I have to cut and paste for folks to read this. I originally thought I would write for my own purposes and then it seems that it works for everyone!! If I write for me and my details to capture my trip, and I send it out to loved ones, we both get the enjoyment and I keep in touch with them. I hope this brings the joy and excitement of the trip to those I love as well as keep me present and capturing the moments and thoughts of the journey.

I miss my family and friends and yet was excited to come on this trip alone. There is something that says “independence” to me of travel alone. Camping alone, driving alone, travel to Europe alone. It is different than other forms of travel – other forms which require discussion outside … words of sharing and delight with another person. I like both. I spent a great deal of my young life, the first half, in not wanting to be alone. Oh I had other issues as well, like not wanting to go to bed first, like not being very conscious of my own life and decisions I made. I won’t dwell on that now (says Scarlett O’Hara!)

Unveiling and unpacking the issues of youth — where did those little likes and dislikes (and the NOT so little ones) come from? Genetic? Not likely. Choice? Probably – but why? What is it that makes me this way, liking or choosing one thing, one way over another. Value put on one item, one color, one way of doing things – not on the other? What is that? Habit? Familiarity? Where did it start?

I think the key to my opening up further and further in my discovery of self is asking key questions and then sitting with it – the openness and unknowing. Sitting with whatever might come up. Not always grasping. Not always wanting to know and to fix, or to discover and to seek.

Sitting and being. Sit, or walk, or stand. At one point today I stopped (well, actually I did it many times – but I wanted to write about a few particular moments). And there on the ground among all the hundreds of people walking, were a few pigeons eating crumbs of pretzel off the ground. I would stop still and just stand to soak in the view of the stone buildings rising up from the street. The cars parked in streets far too narrow for parking. The different kinds of breads for sale everywhere!

People were everywhere … as busy a place as I have ever been .. like the Calgary Stampede!!! Like the subway station in a big city like Vancouver. That many people in the afternoon streets of Nuremberg Germany! Wandering, shopping, sitting and having beer. Beer so freshly poured that the foam is still pouring down the outside of the tall cool glasses, outside tables under umbrellas. People watching. Couples shopping together, line up of men sitting in straight back chairs outside change rooms (called something else here!). Sale signs indicated by “%” written everywhere, in store windows, hanging on clothes racks, signs hanging overhead.

I was bombarded (a judgment word, not really meant to be a judgment). My senses are full as I recall the sights, sounds and scents of the day. A few times I was truly able to smell my surroundings. Mostly my head is still full of sinus congestion and so my sense of smell comes and goes ever so fleetingly. My eyes were so full of sights, unfamiliar sights makes it easier to stay conscious, I think. The more I was out there the more I found myself lost in the activity – harder to stay present in the moment. Early morning first walk was the clearest and stays the longest in my memory – it was fresh and new, not crowded with people.

It is almost midnight here, moments before Sunday morning in Nuremberg. It is morning there, on Saturday. How bizarre it seems to be traveling through time in this way! Thanks for joining my journey!! I send my love out and so I also receive the same …. many many times over! Thanks!