yes, it did!!! It's like when we moved into our house, I told my wife we would renovate the 110 year old barn right away, and I told her the sabbatical would last six months---oh well---
at the bottom of this email (way down about a mile or kilometer!!!) is the link to my Camino Photo book---you should be able to go to it by clicking, but we'll see if this all works--
Second, the Camino "songlist" of songs I cited on my Camino blog will be up on the blog at some point soon, and if you'd like a copy of that songlist and disc just let me know--
OKAY---the FINALE FINISH NOTE---
The TommyT Sabbatical Advisory Service is up and running---and it appears that more people than I know are currently finding themselves on a sabbatical (either through their own doing or someone else's--like someone who lost $$$BILLIONS OR THE PEOPLE WHO MANAGE those that lost $$$gabillions) !!! and squandered the reputation and market-cap of some seriously large companies whose well-being a lot of people who go to work everyday depend on--). Anyway, I don't charge anything for sabbatical advice so if you need it feel free to call on me.
So where did we leave each other??? Some of you I left announcing my Grand Finale (El Grand Finale), but some of you decided the adventure was interesting enough to follow and went to my blog (that's where this email came from--it's published on my blog) during my trek through Spain once or even went blogging everyday. I certainly didn't know I would be writing as much as I did when I left, but looking back on it I'm very glad I was "called" to walk the Camino de Santiago, Spain and I'm also glad I shared it with those who decided to peek into one man's mind on an adventure of a lifetime.
So on Thanksgiving morning, 2007, I started out for Santiago on the last day of trekking. After a beautiful morning sun (the last picture on the blog)and the rain and hail that came at midday, I actually did make it to Santiago and walked into the final destination, the Cathedral where the statue of St. James resides as well as his remains.
And there you have it, I did it !!!!!!!!! I walked a little over 500 miles over 36 days, mostly alone but on the Camino I met all kinds of people from all walks of life who found their way there for equally unique reasons as I did. And that capped off a one-year hiatus from the hustle and bustle of Wall Street.
Conclusions?? Observations?? Insights? I think I covered most of it where it was best covered, on my blog during the trip on the Camino. How would I sum up an experience like that one, the one where you walk 500 miles through mountains with a backpack and sleep in bunk beds next to total strangers and take warm or cold showers (depending on which Ritz!! you are staying in that night)--showers that last about 80 seconds if you're lucky!!!!. Sum that up, TOM!!!!!!!
Okay, I will.
TOM's summary!!!!!
It's quite simple. "ONE never knows how fast life is passing one by until ONE slows down enough to see". That's my quote, so cite me if you use it!!!!
I talked about my three kids (kid's---hah---21, 18 and 14!!). And this May, 2008 I will be celebrating 25 years married to the same woman I met in a bar in Seaside Heights, New Jersey (I think she will be celebrating too, but understandably she ended up with the shorter end of the stick on this trade).
When one goes 3 MPH (miles per hour) while walking for seven hours a day for 30+ days in row---well that certainly changes the pace of life, of thought, of everything, at least for a little while.
And things happen that wouldn't have happened if one were traveling at 70 or 80 MPH, or on the subway train rushing to work, or on a plane getting to the next destination---THERE BARELY ISN'T ANY TIME TO DISCOVER WHY the person next to you is on the plane, let alone the other 199 people. When you walk, there is always time, unless you don't allow for it.
And when one slows down enough, things do happen. Good things, magical things, mystical things, holy things, sacred things---THEY JUST HAPPEN, right before your eyes, and you get to see them up close and realize you are PART OF THE MOMENT, not passing it by.
And somewhere in all that slowdown mode you really can, if you are open to it, see the face of God in all the things and people you meet.
I was (open to it) and I did.
There, that's my summary. I saw God's face in the smiles of a few people I hadn't seen in weeks since I lost them earlier on the Camino trail, only to see them that final day in Santiago at the Pilgrim's mass in the Cathedral. I also saw and felt an emotion quite rare, as if sent within me from somewhere else, that I had just had an experience that will never be recreated by anyone at anytime again---with these people and they with me--my community of Pilgrims--we know what we went through to get here (Santiago), the discoveries we made about each other, but oh so much more the discoveries or revelations that we uncovered within ourselves. AGAPE!!!
It's as if two people who did this walk together don't NEED words to understand each other, and speaking to someone who didn't do it leaves one at a LOSS for the words to describe it.
BUT, I GAVE it my best try!!!!
It's all in the blog in some way shape or form!!!!!!
AND THEN I SAW BRUCE!!!!!!!!!!!
After Santiago I went to Finisterre, the most western tip of the continent of Europe just so I could see it. Then on Sunday, November 25, I flew to Madrid and did the European priceline.com and stayed in my first hotel on the trip and went to the Palacio De Deportes and caught the Bruce Springsteen show in Madrid. Of course the first person I see inside the arena, right next to the stage, is a fellow Pilgrim named Pablo that I had never met on the Camino but I was told by Fabio from Brazil that "Pablo lives in Madrid so look for him at the show". And sure enough, since I was moving slowly enough (I could have just gone straight home to New Jersey), I ran right into Pablo and both of us were pretty amazed. It's all in photos in the attached storybook. I enjoy Bruce and his concerts, but I felt a little in awe of the Spanish zest for a Bruce concert--it was as if they considered this not too different than their favorite Football (soccer) team and this was, by a decade mile, the most enthusiastic and joyful crowd that I have been part of for a Bruce show since....... okay, since 9/24/99 at the Spectrum in Philadelphia (Bruce's 50th Birthday show).
Arrived in Jersey for a couple of days and then went to New Orleans with H.E.A.R.T. 9/11 and we spent a week helping the folks down there get back into their homes for the holidays, and I met even more great people there. And they had bunk beds, so i was right at home--and COLD SHOWERS at Camp Hope in St. Bernard's Parish.
And now I'm home. Holidays are over, kids are back to school, we've all said our HAPPY NEW YEAR's, and now everyone is back to doing whatever it is they do----except ME!!!!!!
I've had plenty of dinners reacquainting and meeting people and talking about the future and what I will do, and it appears there is light on the horizon in this awfully dark financial markets world. Some people even told me that all my blog writings made sense and that they ENJOYED reading about my adventure!!! I am grateful that a few of my musings mights have had a positive or uplifting or simply entertaining impact on a few souls, so thanks for reading.
And NOW I am trying to find my next mountain to climb among all the litter we call the CDO/SubPrime/SOCGEN_FRAUD/leveraged loan/OUT-OF-CONTROL Risk POSITIONS toppled mess.
As the saying goes, WITH ALL THIS MANURE IN THIS PILE THERE'S GOT TO BE A PONY IN THERE SOMEWHERE.
WELL, that is what I am going to find---I'm going to throw that manure on every wall and splatter it near and far until I find that PONY!!!!!!!!!!
What kind of PONY will I ride?? A Technology pony, with e-trading focus? A trading desk pull up a chair, grab a book and start Trading 'em pony?? Maybe both!!!!!!!! Now that would be fun.
or Something brand new????
So I'm in search of my next perfect job---I am not in search of a perfect retirement!!! I KNOW I found the PERFECT SABBATICAL!!!!!!
So where does that leave me with MY CAMINO????
UNPACKING, of course. Each day, in some, shape, or form, I find another layer of experience that folds into my world here. And I unfold it and let it out. I am hopeful, and I sense it is really all up to me, that I keep unpacking forever.
"YOU'RE never lost" when you're on the Camino, and you're never "unpacked" after you've finished it---the CAMINO is constantly coming from within--especially when you slow down and let it come.
Trials and tribulations---more and more it is clear that one of the challenges we face, as we get older is the challenge of taking care of and caring for our parents, if we are so inclined (I'd call it duty, but I know many people don't). Surrounding us this holiday season were many stories of elderly parents of both near and far family/friends who were dealing with health issues/hospitals/death. It is becoming an important part of our life and I truly believe we can do a better job of educating and enlightening those who are thrown into the crisis moment and then have to start looking for answers as to what to do, what kind of healthcare is available-etc--I don't have an answer but let me know if you know of some and I will share them.
I just read the obituary of a man I knew distantly but knew his children as well and I knew it captured their dad incredibly well but it also reminded me of the Camino, so I will share the line that caught my eye with you...
"Throughout his life he believed faith, family, honesty and integrity were the cornerstones of his success"---
Although incredibily saddening to know of the passing of a loved one, it is truly a blessing to have a memory of this nature and the love that has been shared. To think someone THIS good was part of one's life.
We all have our cornerstones, and the foundations cited above are among the highest ideals anyone can have, in my opinion.
What are YOUR cornerstones???? That is what the CAMINO, your Camino and mine, are there for---to take a moment to explore, discover, uncover or define one's cornerstones--one's life.
So, where does that leave us???
Well, the blog exists, so if I have something to say I'll likely throw it up there.
When I find that next mountain, I am sure you will hear about it one way (this way) or another, so you'll know where to find me.
And that leads me to a FINISH---the next time you hear something from me it won't be from my sabbatical!!!!!!
I will be employed---doing what and where is still to be determined, but determined I am to find it.
On my walk, during one of those days I was going slowly enough, I happened upon a conversation between two people--and it lead to books and favorites. I was introduced to a book that day that I noted and read upon my return. As simple and short as this book is I found it equally incredible that I waited till this time in my life to read it---which was fortuitous because had I read this book at another time in my life I might have been traveling a little too fast to catch it the way I did this time.
I became fascinated once again with the coincidences of coincidence---things seem to happen if you let them, and books seem to mean something if you're open to their meaning--and the time is right--etc
The book won a Pulitzer in 1927--
The theme, or question, of the book, according to the author, "is there a direction and meaning in lives beyond the individual's own will".
Sentences just jumped out at me--
Deep
"Now he discovered the that secret from which one never quite recovers, that even in the most perfect love one person loves less profoundly than the other"
The story is of a missionary priest, Brother Juniper, trying to "prove to his converts that our destinies are controlled by God and "everything"--even the apparently random accidental collapse of a bridge, has a divine purpose"
And of the five people on that bridge that day who lost their lives when it collapsed, the last lines of the book go on to say---
"But soon we shall die and all the memory of those five will have left the earth, and we ourselves shall be loved for a while and forgotten. But the love will have been enough; all those impulses of love return to the love that made them. Even memory is not necessary for love."
And the last line of the book reads;
"There is a land of the living and a land of the dead and the bridge is love, the only survival, the only meaning"
from the "Bridge of San Luis Rey" by Thornton Wilder.
May you love and be loved, in your work, in your walk, YOUR CAMINO, in your life. Fill it with love. Let that be your cornerstone.
-------------------------------------I pray it is mine.
Peace,
Tt
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Sent: Sunday, December 23, 2007 1:22 PM
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