Day 20 of the #GrandWalkOut and we’re pushing on down the Grand Union Canal to London. It’s a strange kind of work, not exactly a work out and not something that anyone is going to notice, unlike that long ago heavy work that first made the canal network. I started at bridge 159 and King’s Langley and less than half a mile later I’d crossed under the M25.
It was going to be a hot day and lots of boaters were frantically turning handles at lock gates as they nimbly jumped on and off their boats. Sometimes two boats would squeeze into the same lock. At one there was even a warning about crocodiles.
More common were waterfowl of different kinds who seemed to work hard at paddling up and down and quacking. Grove Bridge, number 164, stood out a bit as being a very fine structure. It seems it was restored by Concrete Bob in the 1980s.
There were boaters and walkers to speak to. At one point we discussed a memorial to two workers who had died making a sewer in the 1970s.
At last I was at bridge 167 at Cassiobury Park, now a lovely public park (it was previously the estate of the Earl of Essex) and I hopped on the miniature train for a quick trip, before collecting the car.
Some miles further on Bob had made it to bridge 177 where a cutely named pub, the Coy Carp provided a good resting and lunching spot.
There was work going on round us all the time, and we were also part of it. Not just passive admirers, our work contributed to the work of others, an interlocking system in which most of the contributors are unaware of each other. When we try to live in community according the Rule of St Benedict we try to increase our awareness of the roles played by others and ourselves. How good it would be to raise that awareness to include all humans and beyond that all living species as we collaborate for the thriving of our shared planet.
From my remembered bible: let everything that has (any) breath (left) praise God.
My praise is in my steps.
From a Friend of Scholastica and a Member of the Lay Community of St Benedict.
Janet Lees, West Hyde near Harefield, 14.05.2022.