There it was. Early this morning. After a cold sneaky stay in somebody elses caravan awning. The big question. Why? It drives me crazy at times. I try to stay away from it but it always comes back. Why am I doing this?
I was happy I took my gloves. An early Sunday morning. When I sleep in 'unusual' places I always make sure I am gone when the sun starts to rise.
I walked through woods again. I thought about the 'why'. But I know it doesn't make sense to try to answer it. I know the answer isn't in my head. It is in my feet. The walk is the answer. It is the question and the answer at the same time. But I haven't walked far enough to really know it.
I aimed for a campsite. I walked through woods again. I collected dry pine cones. Birch bark. Things that burn well. I hadn't used my woodstove yet. It was windy. I mentally prepared for a cold night.
While walking I realised I have to learn all the things I learned last year as if I never knew them. I forgot. I forgot how much time everything costs when you are living outside. How organised you have to be on the one hand (always put all your things in a fixed place) and how flexible on the other hand. A daily routine doesn't work. Not when you're on your own, not when you don't know where exactly you'll end up and what the weather will be like. There is no use to plan to start your day with yoga exercises and finish them by brushing your teeth. To eat your breakfast in the morning and your diner at night. To write a blog every evening and embroider your suit during the day. You do things when the circumstances are right. You do yoga after you made sure you left your illegal sleeping place and walked until the sun is strong enough to keep you warm during your exercises. You might eat your diner at lunch time. You write your blog when you pass a cafe with free wifi. You forget about your daily shower. If there is a tap somewhere, drink water. If there is a toilet, use it. Carry as little food as possible. It always shows up at the right moment, there will be coffee when you really want it, fruit trees when you need your vitamines, a shop when you were getting worried about your empty stomack. Although when you count on it too much it might not happen. But then something else might.
Things never go the way you expect them to go. That is what I like most about doing this.
So I arrived at the campsite with my pockets filled with pine cones. The owner of the campsite showed me where to put my tent. The field was empty apart from one mobile home. She told me there was a space I could use if it was too cold outside. She pointed at a door in the far distance. "The showers are there" she said, "and I will open the shed for you".
I pitched my tent. I walked to the shed.
I opened the door.
I took my first shower since I left Amsterdam. A long one. The water was hot.
The shed wasn't a shed really. It looked more like a 4 star conference room in a hotel. It had floor heating, sockets everywhere to power my equipment, a kitchen corner with a watercooker. Stylish wooden benches with soft pillows, leather chairs, big windows opening to a garden with three donkeys.
I found a small bottle of wine in my bag. Some cheese from Amsterdam. I played music on my Ipad.
Happiness.
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