Burning Through XII – Jesus Turns Sand into Water

What a strange scene with the morning sun on my huevos rancheros. Those palm trees across the street don’t jive with where I am – right in the middle of the Baja. I know Jesus turns water into wine, but can He turn sand into water?

San Ignacio is more than a catholic mission I learn, it’s a true oasis. Life giving water bubbles up from deep below the Sierra de la Giganta. It cracks the surface creating a series of lakes in the centre of this wide desert valley. Desert palms rustle in the breeze beneath scorched volcanic hills topped with cactus.

The mission and it’s village are a long walk from Jorge’s Rice and Beans, the travelers hostel where I spend the night and where I inhale my morning eggs. The magnificent church with its blossoming jacaranda and the shaded central square are also an oasis for me, my body absorbing the tranquility. And inside the church, I see that Jesus really suffered. He’s always so brutalized in Mexican effigies. It’s like they need a graphic reminder that it can always get worse.


This is a lazy town. Old men play checkers in the street side pub where I enjoy a frosty Corona; tourists laze about wandering from buses to the church then over to a café; children laugh as they play a ball game in the zocalo (square); a wizened old couple sort dates in the warm sun, vultures cruise overhead and all around the ever-present craw of roosters.

I seek a higher perch, scramble up a scree slope to the top of a ridge overlooking the valley. On top I find a maze of volcanic rock and cactus. I have my moment of Baja bliss. Warm sun on my face, overlooking the oasis below and rusty hills for backdrop. Church bells below carry a sweetness to up to me, lightening my mind and body. A wispy thought tells me to suck in this moment, fill myself up with it. I know that once I leave this perch, I begin my long grind back to my couch in Kitsalino.

I know then that I have had my peak moment. Jesus created a miracle in the desert, turned the unexpected in to 5 minutes of bliss. Every bus terminal debacle, every bad meal, all the twists and turns that have led to this are worth it. I have a profound feeling that my whole life led up to this moment, but then isn’t every moment like that?