...but instead it comes from being here, alive, and willing to walk on tomorrow. That in itself is a miracle. Now, after a three hour plus nap, my body is angry but at least compliant, my spirit a little stronger, but my feet. Oh God, my feet. So many blisters. My left foot is one big blistery pulp--in fact the entire little toe of my left foot is one big blister. It was hell today out there, beautiful wonderful hell, and I am beginning to get very scared--these blisters will only get worse, and I don't know what else to do other than to take pain killers and walk on, grinding my teeth and limping. And discussing it with other pained pilgrims now and then. Many Estella peregrinos have come to my aid already, with compeed blister plasters (check the new vocabulary) and ointments and the like.
But anyway. I left in the company of Sabina again this morning. She is a little intense, but I did in fact appreciate the company, especially because I feel I am still learning the ropes here somehow. We left late again though, after another extended breakfast with Dormian, the German-Scottish guy from yesterday, a nice Scottish girl with a smile like Keira Knighty whose name of course I no longer remember, and a few others.
The beginning of the walk was steep but beautiful, with wooded trails winding slowly around sheer rock faces full of morning sunlight. I even had the tenacity to try running up one of the hills, just to beat it into terrestrial submission--no wonder I am so freaking sore, teaching land forms lessons.
Eventually the terrain flattened out into rolling hills of wheat rustling uncapturable in the breeze under a perfectly blue sky complete with white fluffy clouds and, always, mountains in the distance. But the pain. Oh the pain. Pain like I've never in my life felt before. For the beginning it was almost a twisted blessing. The pain in my foot kept me focused. All I could do was streamline my thoughts into a mantra of putting one foot in front of the other at a slow... steady... pace. It was almost a meditative state. No distractions, no thinking about people or places or random details, just a purifying pain. Pain and the path and fields of wheat and a blue, blue sky.
Stopped for lunch in a little town on a hill that was most beautiful. And as a picture is worth a thousand words, here are two:
But after lunch the pain got worse. Until it wasn't helpful anymore. Not even the Roman road on which we were walking was interesting enough to take my mind off the pain. And one by one everyone I recognized passed me by. Then others I had never seen before, from earlier towns even. And so I guess I am beginning to really learn some humility here. My mind, so used to racing, says speed up speed up speed up! And my body, out of shape but so alive and invigorated by the exercise agrees--says yes! speed up! do!But my feet. Oh God my feet. They say die! DIE DIE DIE!
And so I trudged slowly, limping more and more slowly toward Estella. Things got a little better in Villafranca, the last real town before Estella, after they had gotten much worse, of course. Sabina had finally come to her senses and left me behind. And I was limping at a snail's pace, whispering at one point under my breath "I can't... I... I can't. I just... I can't. I can't." But just when I was convinced that I could go no farther, I looked up mid-mantra, and there hanging in the rear window of a car was a logo from what I now think is a Spanish bank or something. All I knew then, though, was that it read "Can".
So... I could. I took the hint and it got me to the town square where I found a bench and promptly collapsed, temporarily of course. After a bit of a hobo snooze I swapped out my sneakers for flat leather sandals, the kind that are all the rage in Paris. They, of course, offered no support and were painful in other ways, but at least they left my many blisters alone. Thus clad I was temporarily invigorated again and limp/jogged the next few kilometers, eager to get to the finish line like the last marathon runner coming in at last. For some reason, my joy was high--how could it not be though, walking in the dust as Christ and the desert fathers did, in flat leather sandals.
Of course, unlike the last marathon runner, my finish line was still far, far ahead by the time my joy ran out. And there was no encouraging crowd cheering me on--I was very much alone. And I was on the verge of praying for a miracle (me, praying) when the little church in the distance became the little church just off the path. There were so many little hermitages and shrines and crosses on every hilltop--if I had the time and the energy I could spend years visiting them all. But this one actually connected to the path almost, after hours and hours of nothing but fields, a little shed here and there, and every few hours a town.
Even with the situation so dire, I took the hint and began to limp up the gravel path toward what I found out was the Hermitage of Saint Michael the Archangel. The sign was in Spanish, but I gleaned enough information to know it was Romanesque and that all the sculpture had been carted off to a museum long ago. Even so, it held a strange allure. And after a mess of picnic tables, with trash strewn about most irreligiously, there it was before me, stark and mysterious. Just solid gray stone without window or ornamentation.
I don't know what I was looking for, the sculpture long gone, but I limped around the back.. and there I found a door. Or rather, a door-sized opening in the stone. And yeah, I admit I was kind of scared. The hermitage was welcoming me, and yet part of me feared, what.. brigands or something, who knows. Rowdy gangs of angsty Basque adolescents hanging out and waiting for solitary female pilgrims, too exhausted to put up a fight. No, that fear would almost make sense. What I was afraid of was ghosts.Almost delirious (apparently), I stood just outside and asked aloud.. Hola? I admit, I feared a ghostly response--some medieval hermit still tending the altar perhaps. Unfortunately, there wasn't one. So I stepped inside.
The change was immediate.. dark and quiet and cool. No gold at the altar this time though. In fact, all there was was an altar, who knows how old, and on it flowers both dead and alive as well as notes and messages I did not read out of respect. I was blown away by the humility of the place, but still rather frightened. I am not used to being so alone, and maybe that made me assume I had company of another sort. So, feeling it was best, I knelt down, pack and all, and curled up into a sort of ball like a turtle in her shell, the pack over me, my forehead nearly touching the floor.
And I just sat quietly for a while. Listening to my heart beat and hearing my aching muscles cry out. I tried to listen to my mind as well, but it seemed to be moving too fast. I am not so good at sitting still inside, especially when expecting to open my eyes and see a tonsured 12th century monk kneeling beside me. Although we all know that would have been the best thing to ever happen to me. At the time though, I really didn't want it to.
After a few minutes of huddled repose I stood again, very slowly, and left respectfully, speaking Gracias into the silence before I stepped outside into the sunshine--still no response. The entire event seemed kind of like a gift to me personally. The place was built by who knows who in who knows when for who knows why--I'm certain it is a lovely story. And the place has been there saving pilgrims from the mid-afternoon heat for almost a millennium. But even so, at that moment it was like it had been built for me alone. And I was grateful.
The remainder of my journey today was long--much, much longer than I expected--and I was very much alone. It was long and rocky and I in flat sandals, and though I thought it to be impossible, walking was growing steadily harder. Like I said, Sabina had left me behind. Hell, I had left me behind. Sorrow. Defeat. I didn't literally think to stop. I mean, I was going on. Where else would I go? I would have to walk to Estella just to tell someone that I didn't want to walk to Estella. So at least that part of my endurance was untouchable--I wasn't going to quit or anything. A part of me untouched by mere physical fatigue remained calm.
But then... even that began to give way. And I became sad--so, so sad. So hurt and hurting. So afraid suddenly of infection, of injury, and with no end to the pain in sight, even if I did reach Estella. One hill led to another, one stony descent to another stony descent. Then buildings began to appear and I thought--I am so close! But then I realized these buildings weren't part of a town, they were just there, hanging out, scattered in the river valley for one reason or another--but mostly to fill me with false hope. Even the graffiti in this stretch was unfriendly: TOURIST! it read in English, YOU ARE NOT IN SPAIN. FREEDOM FOR BASQUE COUNTRY!
Then cars began to come out of nowhere on this country lane and to pass me one the dusty road, spitting up clouds and choking me with exhaust. A poor horse stood tied up in the sun, flies clustered around his eyes, and there was nothing I could do for him but to pat him on the nose. A few late coming pilgrims passed me. Sabina, who had stopped for lunch, caught up and then left me behind. And then there was no one for a very long time. I sat alone for a time on a metal rail and watched two mares and two foals frolic in the field below--and they seemed very far away.
Eventually the two non-English speaking German women I had met the day before came along, and I honestly don't know if I would have ever made it to Estella if it weren't for following them. They didn't do anything, even. But I managed to force myself to keep going as long as they were in eyesight. And at last I was in Estella. I saw a sign for the albergue I though I heard Sabina say she would probably choose (they were staffed by an organization for the mentally handicapped, which seemed a good cause). I managed to make it to the front door, take out my credencial, smile weakly, pay the fee, follow the man into the bedroom, and to bid Sabina hello before I collapsed into oblivion for well over three hours.
I woke up only twice, once after a man came in to offer us what turned out to be the best straight-from-the-oven doughnuts I have ever eaten. The taste lingered pleasantly in my mouth for hours. And you know, I have no idea what was in that doughnut, because the second time I woke up I was cured. Well, not physically. I'm learning the hard way that no one is ever in perfect health on the Camino. But spiritually I was and am okay. And the fact that I am okay, actually looking forward to another crisp and cool morning, made me so happy then. I found myself smiling into the pillow, the stale taste of doughnut in my mouth, even with Sabina groaning miserably in the bunk below.
Actually, I should differentiate between happiness, which is what, a pleasant feeling? A nice euphoria? But you can be happy without doing anything to deserve it, no? I could be happy without ever having done the Camino. But if you do the Camino, it seems you bypass happiness and go on to joy. A happiness you've earned for yourself. And there is a difference. I had been through so much pain--enough to make me think I couldn't possibly go on. But in fact three hours and change later I was somehow ready to go again. Humans, or at least this human, are such strange and masochistic creatures. The best time of the day on the Camino is between seven and eleven in the morning, when it is still rather cool, and I look forward to leaving tomorrow... even with the blisters.
Eventually, the afternoon long gone, I got up and showered and Sabina and I went to find some dinner together, the only rule being it had to be within a five minute radius of the albergue, for I could walk no farther. Fortunately, just down the hill we found Michael the Austrian, who I don't think I had met before but who Sabina knew, again, from her two days in the mountains. His travel companion went home today with severe food poisoning from some mysterious source, apparently he fell and gashed himself open real good, had to be rushed to the hospital, and is now on his way back to Austria. Knowing that he was feeling sad and lonely because he was to make his Camino alone, Sabina asked if we could dine with him. And we did.
The entree was delicious, the main course alright, the service terrible, and the conversation wonderful. We talked about life and what have you in English and German, enjoying the simple pleasure (now put drastically into perspective) of a nice tall glass of red wine. I wasn't overjoyed, not pain free, but it went well enough. And then we limped back up the hill to the albergue, which was staffed by friendly doughnut-offering people, even if it was kind of icky and lacking any real character. As I mentioned at the beginning, there were a bunch of people sitting around talking about various aches and pains. I saw Stephanie from London there again--and her blisters were worse than mine if you can believe it. Put things a bit more into perspective. Why do bad blisters happen to good people? Why?
So that's where I am--pain and joy and pain. And it's real joy--for once in my life I can give myself over to it without feeling foolish because hell, I have earned it. The pain, though I don't know what to do about it and wish it were long gone, well it at least makes the joy real.
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