Going Backwards And Moving Forward
“None of us knows what might happen even the next minute, yet we still go forward. Because we trust. Because we have faith.” - Paulo Coelho, BRIDA
It has been said that the day one makes the decision to walk the Camino de Santiago is the day the first step is actually taken. If that is the case, my personal Camino began the day my daughter, Laura Paige, and I stepped out of a cab in Santiago de Compostela 12 years ago. She had just finished a summer term studying in Seville, and I had flown to Madrid to meet her and travel with her for a week or so. She had requested that I plan our trip “anywhere cooler than Seville” so I studied various options and came up with two cities- Santiago de Compestela, and San Sebastián. First, we went to Santiago, the capital of Galicia.
It just so happened, that we arrived in Santiago on July 25th, the Feast Day of Saint James, for whom the city is named. We walked to the square where the cathedral is located just in time to see the priests solemnly walking in procession through the throngs of people. On their shoulders, strapped in a sort of wooden cradle, they bore the massive botafumeiro which swings from a beam spewing clouds of incense at the end of Mass on special occasions, but always on July 25th. Needless to say, there were thousands of people in the square, most of them carrying backpacks after walking, in many cases, hundreds of miles, to be in the square on this most special day for Catholics worldwide, and for pilgrims, in particular. The bones of Saint James are purportedly buried beneath the Cathedral. This place is secon only to the Vatican in importance to Roman Catholics. I am not a Roman Catholic. I was completely ignorant of anything involving Santiago de Compostela except that people made pilgrimages to the site and Shirley MacLaine had written a book about her journey to the city. In the next few days, I fell in love with Galician culture, food, music and people. I was fascinated with the stories, mystery and romanticism of The Camino and Saint James. I knew I would have to come back, and it would not be on a flight from Madrid.
Seven years later, my neighbor and dear friend, Bridget Hyde, and I began walking The Camino from the town of Ponferrada. We had dreamed and schemed about this trip and were overjoyed to be walking the last 200 km. , (124 miles), of the Camino Francés. Of course, we actually logged over 300 km. because we walked lots of miles sightseeing in and around all the towns along The Way. We met some wonderful people from all over the world as we walked. Our self- guided tour group included a darling woman, Chita Troxel, from Pensacola, Florida. It turned out Chita and I had several friends in common from Pensacola, and Bridget, Chita and I became the three amigas. Walking miles every day for thirteen days is an opportunity to have deep conversations and build relationships. I am sure the experience is as individual and varied as the people who walk the various routes to Santiago. For me, there were times I walked with my friends laughing, singing, chattering, or just listening to the click, click, clicking of my trekking poles. Sometimes, I walked several miles entirely alone, with my mind floating dreamily from the past to the present with an incredible sense of well- being and connection to God and the beautiful scenery. Every day was different, every day I woke up with a feeling of excitement and anticipation of what I would see, what I would learn, what conversations would unfold. It was blissful.
Chita and I had lunch together in Aspen the following two summers when we were both in Colorado. She died in February, 2017, before we could go back and hike over the Pyrenees from St. Jean, France, to Logrono, Spain, “Just because we need to see that part”, we would tell each other. I still miss her. She was a blithe spirit, a talented, artistic soul who loved her family and friends freely and fiercely.
Returning to Texas, I learned within a few days that Ed’s cardiomyopathy had spiraled into congestive heart failure. Thus began the medical and spiritual odyssey that culminated in Ed’s receiving a new heart on July 2nd, 2015. Life takes on new significance when it is restored in such dramatic fashion, when you think there is absolutely no hope. Our joy was, and is, another family’s intense sorrow. We never forget them.
Walking through vineyards, through eucalyptus groves, up- and- down hills can be tiring, but is usually doable, given enough time to prepare and train. The difficult path is one that is not planned for, not anticipated, when no preparations were made. This, my friend, is The Camino of everyday life. Coelho was right. None of us really know what might happen in the next minute. The choice to move forward, to walk by faith is imperative to having a productive, joyful existence that glorifies the gift of life. Do I live like that every day? No, not even close, but I am striving for improvement knowing I will never attain perfection.
I had an ankle fusion in early February this year. For over ninety days I was on a scooter, my left leg in 2 different casts over the first 8 weeks, then in a boot, always suspended at a ninety degree angle on the scooter while my right leg pushed me around. The only person who liked the scooter was 5-year-old Eleanor who would commandeer it every chance she could and go flying around at breakneck speed. I hated it, but it was my only mode of locomotion. I was a terribly grumpy patient, but a compliant one. I followed my doctor’s instructions religiously, if not happily. Finally, the last couple of weeks of the 90 days I could start putting weight on my booted foot. At first, it was very slow- going. Did I mention my toes looked like Vienna sausages, my ankle was as big as my pitifully atrophied calf and I despaired of ever being able to wear a real shoe at all? It is incredible I still have friends because they had to take me to any and all places that required car travel. I could drive, but there was no way I could load my scooter in the car hopping on one leg. Thank God for good friends!
Then, one day about a week before going to see my doctor in Fort Worth to see if I was going to get out of the boot, I opened the entry hall closet, looked up on the shelf above the hanging clothes, and saw my straw hat I had worn on The Camino four- and- a- half years before. In a split second I had made a decision that flooded my soul with indescribable happiness, resolve and delight: I was going back to the beginning! I was going to cross the Pyrenees from France into Spain, just like Chita and I had planned. Not only was I going to do it, but I was going to do it in the Fall, in about 6 months! I knew exactly who I was going to take with me, too.
First, I called Ed at the office to tell him what I was planning, Bless him, the first thing he said was, “Paige, I promise I will not be in congestive heart failure when you come back.” Of course, I think he was so elated to not hear me being grumpy and forlorn he would agree to anything. There was one condition: Dr. Cook had to approve my plan. Well, duh! I was not going to undo three months of post- surgical misery by going against my doctor’s orders!
My next call was to my sister, Caroline. My sister is remarkable. She is beautiful, brave, faithful, smart, self- deprecating and the funniest person I know. I said, “Caroline, I don’t care what you think you have to do on the dates I am about to give you, whatever plans you might have, you can change them. You and I are going to Spain to hike the first part of the Camino Francés. We’ll go back another time to do the last part so you can get your certificate at the Pilgrims Office, but we will never walk the meseta, which is the middle, because it is flat, hot and we grew up in Midland and don’t have to subject ourselves to that. “
Caroline : “OH MY GOSH! I am in! This will be just like that book, the one they made into a movie. What was it? Sister Britches?”
Paige (laughing so hard I am choking): “Clearly, you did not read the book, nor did you see the movie. You are referring to THE SISTERHOOD OF THE TRAVELING PANTS. The girls did not travel, a pair of pants did.”
We are going to have a fabulous time. We are going to laugh and cry our way across some beautiful country because, in spite of the sorrow, disappointment and difficult times in the past that all God’s children have faced and that we don’t know what might happen, “even the next minute, yet we still go forward. Because we trust. Because we have faith.”
Love and Grace,
Paige