We’ve stopped in Vicksburg, Mississippi — at a hotel directly across the street from the Battlegrounds.  The sky is gray, the wind whistling; it is pouring down rain outside.  It will rain like this for hours, the forecasters say.

We are in a high place here, so no danger of flooding where we are – though the “blue-highway” route we took from Meridian yesterday included some disturbingly high water.  I’ve never driven over bridges when the water was rushing just beneath them before.

I know they’ve seen more than their share of rain here.  But I am strangely grateful for the weather.  It provides a welcome excuse to pause in our journey for a time.

There’s an expression I’ve heard that speaks to me now: “waiting for our souls to catch up.”  This pilgrimage along the Civil Rights Trail has been powerful, sorrowful, inspiring and deeply sad – all at once.  Right now, it’s hard to imagine ever being able to speak about it with any real facility.

So in the meantime, I am waiting for my soul to catch up.