Pulaski day Mass and parade in the city. I recall, before setting out on the present peregrination, going over to the altar of Częstochowa at St. Pat's, also with the icon of Kolbe to the side. I envisioned a trip to the ancestral homelands, meditating with the icons in the churches in the afternoon, working and reading in the mornings and evenings. And a peregrination did, or perhaps has, come to pass. But circumstances took me much further south, in the contested regions, with peoples very different than my country and my ancestral background. The circumstances have not always been idyllic, but I'd like to think that I've made as much use of the circumstances as I could. Instead of the country churches, kefir above the market while reading philosophy on the Kindle. Instead of the chandeliers of the theatres of northern Europe, rooms in which a different sort of work was going on.
But destinations, and this is very important, have the character of being a different sort of experience. You must expect a transposition of things when you arrive. The truths and places in which you began will seem to be at a distance, and a different vision will be set before you. Enter upon the event.
Some years, especially before the high-security pens arrived, I would find a place opposite the cathedral for the Pulaski parade. I would watch the faces of the marchers as they arrived at the cathedral, with the prelates arrayed in front and flags waving. The expressions on their faces were quite remarkable.