energized

Back in June, when Ed and I came down the mountain in the Pyrenees of Spain amidst thunder and lightening and sheets of rain, I was so relieved that we survived that if you offered to sell me anything at all at that moment, I would have said yes.

As we pull out and head toward the coast, away from the Pyrenees, I suggest we pause for a quick espresso. Magically, we pass through a town with a café bakery right along our route. We park the car and go inside.

What would you like?

An espresso and a pastry – maybe something typical for this region?

Typical? These cookies are typical.

Okay. We’ll take the pack of cookies. How much?

11 Euros.

11 Euros?? (Shockingly expensive.)
They are very difficult to make...

We buy the little sack of cookies and very quickly we realize that they will not keep well. The crepe like coating hardens instantly and as we take out one cookie each day, we gnaw mightily at it so that it will break into manageable pieces.

Today, we finished the last cookie. Was it good? Yes, even as it was very very stale.

And yet I was reminded – of mountains, of peaks to climb, of danger and of the sheer joy of stopping for an espresso and a sweet treat.

It was surely the most expensive sack of cookies I ever bought and it was almost certainly one of the best sacks of cookies I ever bought. Before they went stale.

Things do grow stale. Ideas, projects, cookies.

But if you can keep energized, inspired, hopeful...





...then they don’t.