Cyclokairos

A long term – the longest? Tired pupils, tired staff. Running on fumes, on my knees – any of those expressions. Teaching feeling like a young person’s game. A tiredness so deep, it’s in the bones. The skies leaden, the days short – rain, grey, drab. The term went to the wire – once finished, Christmas Day came soon. A day to get over and done with. With no religious faith, and a child on the brink of adulthood – a day of little significance. I felt exhausted that day, the mind squeezed by that ever looming existential vice. Another crank on the arm, one more rotation. Reading ‘Dartmouth Park’ by Rupert Thomson, a reflection of current thoughts. The protagonist has some sort of breakdown – a mid-life crisis perhaps, he’s unsure – a nausea of the Sartre kind. His solution, escape – from London to Cadiz, then Crete. 

Escape came to me too. A surprise from my wife, “Be ready to leave the house at a quarter to eight on the 26th. Pack shorts”. Very her, a contrast to the order I so easily become enslaved by – chaos, but fun (at times). She kept me guessing, our son in on the act. First a plane to the lunar landscapes of the Canaries. Then a shuttle bus, a rental car picked up. To the accommodation? No, first a ferry. Boat, second only to bike in the travel hierarchy? Crystal clear sea, the sky too – warmth, winterlight. Joy – that vice tossed in the Atlantic. I don’t use social media, and I never enable notifications for email and messaging apps. I have to open them to check, and open them I don’t – dislocation to living now, in the moment, the distractions of the quotidian gone. Great food, indulgence in seafood. Prawns at €7 per kilo from the market. Not Palamos standard, nor those ones we once bought from the fish market in Alghero. A lot eaten, skin flamingo pink, or is that the sun? My skin optimised for northern climes, brief bursts of sunlight enough for a deluge of vitamin D. And plenty of activities to keep the son from complaining (he’s getting to that point where going on holiday with mum and dad does not appeal). The best of them all – a bike ride, naturally.

We collected the hire bikes from the quayside and then a short boat ride to Isla de Lobos. The bikes were not Cyclokairos approved – aluminium framed mountain bikes with suspension forks, and heaven forfend, indexed gears, badly indexed gears. But the spirit was very much that of Cyclokairos. Just riding the bike you have, just stopping and not riding the bike you have. Stood, staring. Lost, yet completely aware.

Disembarking at El Muelle, we headed to the Faro de Martino, keeping Montana La Caldera to our left. The bone dry trails a sharp contrast to the submerged lanes back home – no danger of wading across swollen brooks.

Then on to Las Lagunitas. Some variation in the trails, a little rockier than before.

After passing through the fishermen huts at El Puertito, lunch was taken at Playa la Concha. A snooze, and before catching the boat back, exploration on foot to see just what flora grows in such arid conditions.

Travelling back to the UK a few days later, we found the aftermath of Storm Gerrit and the dark, cold, wet reality of the West Mids at year’s end. When’s the next plane back? I’m joining a commune, and you can call me Moonbeam.