El Camino: Jitters

 

I've been plotting this El Camino trip of mine for the better part of a year. With an underlying sense of adventure and anticipation, I've delved into tour companies (aka: luggage schleppers), the best gear to have when undertaking the trek, and how I could get there and home.

My sense of adventure was abruptly replaced by "WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING???" as soon as I made the final train reservation, put the last piece of the travel puzzle into place. Seemingly out of nowhere, I began to face the trip with trepidation and heightened anxiety. (My reaction left me a bit confused, because anxiety is not a staple in my coping strategies catalog.)

You'll get lost. You're going to miss your plane. You don't speak the language. You're going to miss your train. You're not going to have the right cash on hand. What if you forget/lose your passport? Jet lag is going to make you miserable. Covid is still out there, you know! Your feet are going to hurt. What makes you think you can walk 14 miles in one day, then get up the next to do it again? 

Never mind that I'd considered each of these scenarios in the planning process. (Google Translate and my credit card take care of many of them, no?) My heart's been pumping a bit too quickly, my brain is alert and on edge. It's unsettling, to say the least.

Knowing such reactions don't really appear out of nowhere, I began to dig a little deeper. I didn't have to dig far - this is the time of year when I set off on my original camper van journey, and my subconscious tracks such things. Now it all made sense. 

With all that's happened since the abrupt and permanent detour that ended my trip before I'd found whatever it was I was looking for, I'm pretty sure I've not completely dealt with my feelings regarding my change in direction. By the time life settled down enough for me to process what had happened, those feelings were already buried under the pile of my reactions to the other big life crises which followed in relatively quick succession. It was a decade, that's for sure.

No wonder I'm worried this new trust leap will end in crisis. The precedent is there.

Which is all the more reason to make the journey.

Back to my rocking chair analogy. When my years are drawing to a close, and I'm sitting in my rocker on the porch looking back over my life, when I think of this moment, will I be glad I took the leap, or will I wish I'd stayed home?

For me, the answer is clear. Even if I run into trouble, I'll have done it living my days, not hiding in fear.

Onward!

El Camino

 

Late last fall, after one of my tone classes at Woodside, I was talking to the instructor for a bit, just chatting about our lives. I told him about my camper van journey, and he told me about the trip that had most impacted his life - a walk on El Camino, the pilgrimage route in Spain. The trek has several start points, but all roads converge in Santiago de Compostela, where the church is said to house the remains of St. James.

As he spoke of his journey, I felt a little nudge. "Pay attention," Someone said. "Perhaps you want to consider following in his footsteps."

I try to listen to that voice when I hear it - it doesn't speak often - and started looking into what it would take for me to make the trip. I asked around, found several someones who'd walked the ancient paths, got recommendations on all the travel ins and outs, and started making reservations.

I'm going to be gliking this trail (like glamping is to camping, my walk won't be a hard-core hike). I don't think my feet, still touched by neuropathy from my cancer treatments, would take kindly to carrying an extra 25-30 lbs across Spain. I'd probably make it, but I'd be miserable. I've also decided I don't need the hostel experience - sleeping in a room with a bunch of strangers who are "snoring and farting in seven languages" (per an experienced pilgrim) has little appeal. So I've worked with a tour company to arrange places to stay (I will have my own room, with a private bath, each night), breakfasts, dinners, and importantly, luggage transfers. 

I will get up each morning, eat breakfast, and set off for the day's trek carrying just my day pack. I will carry my water, my lunch, and my weather layer. The bulk of my luggage will get picked up and driven to my destination-for-the-day. How cool is that?

I will walk from 11 - 23 kilometers (7 - 14 miles) each day. As I write this, that sounds like a lot, but I will take it one step at a time. I'd planned to train at home, to work up to the distance, but my hike last month in Bryce Canyon taught me my biggest challenge walking this trail will be the neuropathy in my feet. I can't train the nerve damage away, I can only aggravate it, and so decided to just continue my daily pattern of activity, and bring lots of Advil. (My watch tells me I walk +/- 5 miles a day anyways, so I'll ?probably? be ok.)

My journey will cover the last 100km of the French Way to Santiago, but rather than stop there, I will continue on another 100km to Finisterre (or Fisterra), on the coast. Finisterre, which translates to the "end of the land", is the western-most tip of continental Spain. When people started walking this route in the 900's, they knew the world was round, but didn't know of the existence of the Americas, so when they stood on this point, as far as they knew, they had reached the end of the land. I read about this, and thought, "how cool would it be to follow in those footsteps and walk to the end of the world!"

In a few weeks, I'll get to find out!

(I don't know how much I'll be able to write along the way, but I'm going to take my iPad and will do my best to post a few words and pictures most days.)

Road Trip

'Tis the season, so last week I went back up to Minnesota, one niece was having her high school graduation party, followed by another niece's wedding (conveniently scheduled for the following weekend).

There was a lot of traffic on the way up, and I found myself grumbling a bit - the freeways are supposed to be wide open, aren't they? Aren't they???? Reality check: Yes, the freeways were wide open when I started making the Kansas City to Minnesota drive, but that was forty years ago. And perhaps, just perhaps, like all the other areas of my life, I am being a bit delusional if I expect things to be as they were forty years ago.

Once I harnessed my irritation, I whiled away a good hour of the drive reflecting on the ways the scenery had and hadn't changed over the years.

The peaceful looking little white Lutheran church, with its simple spire, that has welcomed me to Minnesota on many a winter evening is still there. *whew*

Sadly, the old farmhouse that someone did a great job of painting the first two stories of, before never finishing the job by cleaning up the third story dormers, now has boards over all the windows; a visible sign of the vanishing Iowa family farm.

The quirky gas station and accompanying motel in Boondocks (not an official designation) is lonely and abandoned. Its empty sign frames are decayed and rusting, its traffic has been swallowed by the Flying J which went in on the other side of the freeway about fifteen years ago.

I've reluctantly abandoned my Ankeny coffee/food stop - the quick on-and-off access I used to enjoy has been replaced by clusters of too many cars trying to drive in too little space. Instead, I've started going to a Kum & Go about ten miles up the road, which has a decent selection of bottled caffeine and fresh sandwiches. (I still HATE the name of the chain, I find it offensive, but my boycotting the place has not seemed to make much of a dent in their overall profit structure and expansion plans. They do make a valiant effort to keep the restrooms clean, a major plus when on the road, so I've decided it is time to swallow my indignation and move on.)

My original Ford LTD station wagon, baby safely buckled in her car seat in the back, has been replaced several times over. The car seat is but a distant memory, and wouldn't fit well in the back of the Mustang anyways. Nor would the kids.

No longer, on any part of the drive, does one hit the seek button on the radio (yes, I still listen to the car radio) and have it scan the entire dial (sometimes I miss radio dials) without landing on a music station. However, the assorted preachers are still there on the bottom edge of the dial, and I occasionally still listen in for a bit. Arguing with the empty air, outlining the many ways I disagree with their message, helps to keep my mind engaged and awake.

Unlike the days of yore, when I called from pay phones or not at all (because of the expense of the long distance call), I have my cell phone charged and ready. As I drive, I can easily update those waiting for me at the end of the road, so they know when to expect me. I like that part. 

I still can't quite grasp how many years have gone by. I mean, I know the numbers, but I guess I somehow always thought I'd get older on the inside, just like I do on the outside. This inner time-warp limbo, where I'm still somehow in my early adult years while simultaneously gray-haired and retired, gets harder and harder to reconcile with reality. Probably because it's not reality-based. 

It does make for interesting conversations with myself - I have SO many more perspectives to bring to a situation these days. Perhaps reality is overrated, no?