CAMINO NOTES (2nd day in over the Pyranees)...

June 18th Roncavauex to Larrasona : 

Amazingly easy! Shade and downhill (most) of the way —-but when it did go uphill, especially in the sun, my body rebelled and I could only go a snail’s pace. Took me 7 hours roundabout. Left at 6, arrived at 1pm. Got to the hostel in Larrasona, and felt the beginning of soreness. But so far my feet have been holding up just fine. Went to the “supermarket” to get beer and the guy gave me a toast with red spanish wine to welcome me, and told me where the swimming hole was. Never found it, but the guy was so lovely! The hostel, simple, but nice and quiet! Where are all the other peregrines? I have a feeling some of them didn’t make it this far and stayed in the town just before. It feels strangely empty in the village.  Only 8 Euro. 

Town I wish I stayed: Zubria had a better river coziness

Arrived! 

Left on June 17th —-Saint Jean to Roncaexaux

Hellishly difficult! Some parts felt weirdly easy, but other parts felt like a nightmare…sun spots and uphill, and when they combined=lethal.  Besides that, the views = unbelievable. Low down fog, like you were in heaven and lots of horses, and cows with old-fashion bells that jangled, and free-range sheep.  Took me 9 hours roundabout. Left at 6:15 —arrived at 3pm. Arrived like a zombie; barely hanging on. But even still, it was doable. Arrived at giant church hostel with 300 beds. 12 euro. Talked to an American man inside from Minneapolis and said I was a “rockstar” because he had to complete that trip in two days—he couldn’t make it in one go. Gave me encouragement for my fitness level.  The American man said he was making the trip because he felt “empty inside”. So many interesting reasons why people do such a thing. Another girl was doing it as she’d just been divorced. 

Town I wish I stayed: Orrion, Orrias? So pretty.

I always wondered why the sky (a sunset) can never look good in pictures. One of my last nights, on my lovely balcony, overlooking the faraway Willamette that merges into the Great Colombia whom Lewis and Clark sailed down, toward the Pacific, well---- I have a sunset. I take a picture.


The picture is dull and emotionless. Why?

I think now, sitting here I understand. It's because when you really appreciate a sunset, you develop a relationship with each feathery cloud, with each heavy pregnancy of the thunderbolt too moody to entertain the gold, red and pink. And you watch them as if they are old friends, just above your head, and it really does seem as if gods reside just beyond their edges. Hiding from us. Pebbled paths, melancholy streaks of mortal pinks, and they all seem to fall toward a certain fragile center and a final  understanding.

But this can only be understood through one's own eyesight. Not a camera.




And that's why I so very much rebel, repel and disagree with our relationships with screens. We cannot see what is actually happening with them. Furthermore, they stunt our emotional understanding of what is going on around us.

Learning how to Leave `again

Leaving Portland, even if for a little while is not easy.

Matt (Liz’ boyfriend) said to me the other day, "what are you runnin' from, girl?"  I feel very bland. Milk toast. I wonder what this resistance is in me?  In any case, it’s making my normal excitement period for travel turn into sheer dread because I feel so utterly uninspired by what I’m about to embark on. Will that change the minute I’m out of my comfort zone? Dear god I hope so.  In part, this trip is a prayer to god to help me remember what it is I love and to remind me to feel something. I feel like my emotions are so dulled. 

 But I make choices and I hope I can stick by them; see them through so I can look back and say, “Yeah, see, my intuition was working fine. I knew what I needed to do.” This is the dream now. To say those words a months time from now.  I need a serious bootcamp out of complacency. So I am doing the only thing I can think to do. Walk. Think. Be a little uncomfortable. Have panic attacks. And then get through them.  Get on the other side of them. 

Matt said I could get everything without leaving here.  But.   I need other things Portland can’t always give me. Portland gives me kindness, and PBR, and naps in the park, and people in Northface jackets signaling for me to go first and good decency and comfort. Lovely trees that strike my imagination. But I don’t want to slip into its pocket forever. I want to leave so I can miss it. I also want to get off wifi and pray. Pray for a country I’m afraid for—and pray for a relationship back to god whom I’ve lost somewhere along the way. I can feel myself going doughy in both mind and body. I can feel my initial anger towards trump and everything he signifies happening in this country, turn old and turn over, ready to forget and numb out. Some little spark in me is so resistant to that happening! It wants me to stay “woke” as they say, and not go into the bunker. It wants me to feel and cry and not go easily from one day to the next. Maybe why I do travel so much. This little fire keeps calling to me. But I too am fascinated by how it confuses people. I wonder if they are right? Am I always running away? Will I ever be okay? Settled? Able to be in one place—sticking it out, and making a life, the way others do?

The questions make me second-guess myself. But then I get a moment of peace and clarity, saying: “don’t second guess it. You know what is right for you, otherwise you wouldn’t do it. You already know. Trust in it, and grow a backbone to stand by it. Stand by it! Even if you are wrong—if you stand by it, it won’t even matter. Because at least you had conviction.” 

Letting go is so painful. But. It can be done. And when something inside you says small and quiet, “now it is time to let this thing (this time) this place go”, well, then I guess you let go without being so precious about it. Without fawning over your sorrow too much, and look anew with positivity and hope and conviction that something better lie ahead. Something with your name on it. A return to god. And a return to feeling inspired. A return to yourself. A new one that you have not met yet. And yet, now it is time to meet her. The wait has been long enough. And the lessons you’ve learned here in this year have been sufficient. Now we look to the new horizon and like they say in the airport walk-way conveyer belts: 

“Face direction of travel.” 

In honor of my mom who told me recently to dream something bigger and to believe in it, I’ll believe these things:

That I will have a good trip.

That I will be inspired again.

That I will meet wonderful people who loves others and remind me what people can be.

That I will have made the right decision to even go in the first place. (despite being afraid). 

That I will find what it is I love, and let it overcome me. 

That I will find peace, and a kind of home. 

That I will have turned the page of a new chapter, without self-doubt.

That I will drink sangria in a courtyard late at night, listening to crickets.

That I'll skinny dip in the Portugal sea feeling more alive than ever (the way I used to in Cornwall).

That I will spend a whole day without going on the computer--free from the news. (God, the  miserable news).

 That I will learn how to see things again, without it interspersed with looking down at a screen.

That a lizard darting across a rock will soothe, interest and hold my attention far more than the headlines of the NY Times.   And I will. I will be thankful I came. Thankful I dealt with the fear and worry, and rather than let it sway me, sticking through it—holding fast. Patience. And smallness. Tenderness toward others. Toward myself.

Shaky tenderness toward even my anger, (maybe...)

I remember when I lived in the French monastery. The only song that truly stuck with me:

Stay with me, remain here with me,
Watch and Pray,
Watch and Pray...