Windows and Doors

At the last of the five San Antonio missions.

Espada is definitely my favorite. Such a sense of the holy here. The last of the five on the mission trail. On my bike today, so it’s a kind of pilgrimage to get here.
The last time I was here, perhaps because it had been a long ride and I hadn’t know where I was going, and perhaps because I’d had a deeply and complex few days of emotional ups and downs, I came in the doors here and just wept.
Tears of relief, catharsis, and sadness.

Although there’s also a lot going on in life today, arguably even more than on that day almost a year ago, I am far more calm and centered.

Grateful to be in a holy place, and on this sweaty, sacred pilgrimage.

What is it about doors and windows? You come to old missions like these, and more often than not, what you find are doors and windows or stone and wood.

Yes, the footprint of rooms, for sure. But far more old doors and windows. It’s like we have a special drive to preserve them. Or rebuild them. Perhaps because, even though the original doors and windows at this mission date to 1731, they still are generally know what to do with them.

Now as then, we walk through them. They lead is us…somewhere. The future. The past. Safety Adventure. Home. Challenge. Sanctuary.

Doors and windows are pathways on our journey. And perhaps it gives us comfort to know others have walked through them too…that their very existence speaks a word of hope…they say…

“Someone else walked this path before…sweated through a day like today…and moved into their future too.”