25 Prayers of Christmas, Day 6

This is the first picture Randy ever took of me. It obviously wasn't intentional. I'm just a speck of green next to the stop sign. We didn't even know each other then. He simply had his camera posed to take a shot and I happened to walk around the corner and right into his view.

Neither of us would have guessed that this moment would change our lives. But here we are, 21 months to the day later. Living happily ever after.

God, we always look for you in the big moments, the grand gestures, the most obvious and astonishing ways. But today I'm reminded that you are working even when we don't see it, in the tiniest moments, on days that seem so completely ordinary.

Sometimes we can look back and pinpoint the beginning of these life altering events, a choice or an encounter that changed the course of our steps. But you were working even before then.

I know some of the work but I can't even imagine all of the work you did in Randy's life to make sure he was there on that street at that exact moment. I know some of the work but can't imagine all of the work you did in my life to make sure I was there too.

My prayer today is particularly for those people who can't see what you are doing, Lord. Who have a hard time imagining their dreams will ever come true. Help them to trust that you are working, in big and small ways, and that your dreams will not only answer, but exceed all of theirs.

25 Prayers of Christmas, Day 3

"For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counseller, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace." Isaiah 9:6

In these troubling times, when violence, tragedy and disaster seem all too common, Lord I pray that we would not become complacent or desensitized to these events. And yet, even as we recognize the severity of the troubles of this world, I am grateful that our trust is in you, the Prince of Peace.

ADVICE ON THE OCCASION OF YOUR 3RD MARRIAGE

During the month leading up to our wedding day I started having nightmares. They say that marriage changes things, but for me the simple thought of getting married again was enough to send my emotions reeling.

But the nightmares had nothing to do with Randy, and everything to do with my past marriages.

In my nightmares I saw all of the ways that I had failed my past spouses. And worried that I would fail Randy in the same way. In my nightmares I saw all of the ways my past spouses had failed me. And worried that Randy would fail me in the same way too.

That’s not fair to Randy or to me or to us. This relationship is not those relationships. We will succeed in different ways and fail in different ways, but our commitment is to one another, not to the past.

Marriage is hard enough without carrying around the baggage of past marriages! So if you are considering divorce, I urge you to please, please, please reconsider. Remember the love you had for one another on your wedding day and do whatever it takes to get back to that moment and the commitment you made to one another.

But the reality is that many of us are divorced. And many of us are divorced more than once.

Because it’s so common, I figured I would find a wealth of advice out there to help me navigate this new journey. So, about a week before Randy and I got married, I googled “advice for your third marriage.” And I did find a couple of articles, all of which included the statistics of how likely I was to fail, but none of which told me why or how to avoid those pitfalls!

So I wondered, what advice was I hoping to find? What advice would I give others in my situation?

1.  If your past divorce was all your spouse’s fault – DON’T GET REMARRIED!

Have you heard of the 5 stages of grief? Well, these aren’t just for when you lose a loved one. These apply to so many things we face in life, including divorce.

The five stages are: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.

After my first divorce I was in total denial. I traveled to another country, moved to a different state, changed jobs and friends, bought a house and got a dog and acted like the whole thing never happened. Denial seemed easier than grieving the loss of my relationship with not only my spouse but with the step-son and in-laws whose lives I would no longer be a part of. And it was easier at first. Until I started dating again, and 3 years later remarried, and all those feelings were still there, unaddressed. After 3 years! And we had only been married for 2!

It was a huge reason why my second marriage didn’t work, though I wouldn’t have admitted that at the time. I wanted to dwell in the stage of anger during that divorce, blaming him and “his problems,” because that was easier than admitting I’d had any part in yet another failed marriage. And if I could blame him, then I could justify all of my wrong actions.

Which leads to bargaining. Bargaining is such a strange stage. It’s amazing what the mind will come up with. Things like, “I can make this right by convincing my first husband to marry me again” or “God if you forgive me for this divorce I promise I’ll never get married again” or “If you can convince him to go to rehab I promise I’ll stay in this marriage forever.” The “what ifs” and “if onlys” are endless.

Depression of course is the stage we are all trying to avoid and is why we want to jump into a new marriage without going through all the other stages. If we meet someone new while in the stages of anger or denial we can easily focus our energy on the new, prospective spouse and pretend that everything is going to be puppy dogs and rainbows. After all – it was their love we were missing all along.

WRONG!

Getting to the stage of acceptance BEFORE getting remarried is the healthiest way to give your new marriage a chance. If you are thinking, yes, but this new person is helping me get through all these stages, then you are probably in a codependent relationship. Ouch, right! Well, truth hurts. This is why we have platonic friends, family, and God – to help us through the stages.

And the truth is, you are not the same person you were before you were married the first time, and you never will be. Acceptance is not about being okay with divorce or being glad you got divorced, it’s about accepting your new reality and becoming the person you are now. Which you can’t do when you are all caught up in someone new. (And if your friends are saying this new person is your soul mate and you have to snatch them up before someone else does – see #2!)

2.  If your friends tell you to move in together to “test it out”, or you are having an affair and your friends say he is your “soul mate”, or any other advice that if you were in your right mind you would know was ridiculous – GET NEW FRIENDS!

One day during a high school gym class we were sitting on the floor watching a tutorial about how to keep score in bowling. Obviously not the most exciting day we’d ever had, so some of my girlfriends were chatting and giggling, as high school girls are wont to do. The gym teacher started calling off names, giving out detentions. He called each of my friends and then called me. I was outraged! “But I wasn’t talking!” I said. “It was my friends!” He quickly replied, “Get new friends!” And off to detention I went.

I didn’t take his advice. And I kept getting detention.

While it seemed harsh at the time, the wiser I get the more I see the merit in what he said. I wouldn’t trade those friends, but nor was he asking me to. He didn’t tell me to ditch my friends, he simply told me to get new ones. Because we are influenced by the people we spend time with.

I think it’s important to have a diversity of friends, but when it comes to making huge life decisions like moving in together or getting married or staying married, we have to be very careful about which of those friends’ opinions we listen to.

The temptation is to listen to whomever agrees with you and what you want, and to distance yourself from those opinions that tell you that you might be (or definitely are!) wrong. But this isn’t hurting them, this is hurting you. Because you are the one who has to live with the consequences of your actions.

Moving in together is a serious commitment! Not one that should be used to “test” the relationship. Affairs are selfish and cowardly and if your friends tell you otherwise – GET NEW FRIENDS! The consequences of marriage and divorce are life-long, and it’s important to surround yourself with people who will help you see clearly.

So, as hard as it may be to hear, it’s important to have friends who you can go to when faced with major decisions who will tell it to you straight. And if more than one of your wise friends is telling you the same thing, you’d be wise to listen!

3. If your divorce was pre-Facebook – IT NEVER HAPPENED!

A friend of mine told me recently about a girl he is crushing on, but this girl is “disillusioned” about relationships because of her past divorce. My first thought was, ‘I know this girl and I had no idea she’d been married before.’ Or maybe I did and I’d totally forgotten?

As Randy and I were talking about getting married my instinct was to worry about what everyone else would think. Like my life is a scene out of “The Runaway Bride” and my entire community is talking about all my past failures. And that they would certainly judge me if I were to put on a white dress and have my father walk me down the aisle of a church.

But as we got closer and closer to our wedding day I realized that “they” weren’t the ones who were worried about which marriage of mine this was. It was ME who was feeling unworthy of dress shopping with my mother and having bridesmaids and flower girls and a first dance.

That’s when Randy told me to stop calling this my “3rd marriage” because “this is OUR marriage.”

While some people will judge, most people will forget or maybe never knew. In fact, some of you are probably reading this thinking, “with all her world travel, when did Katie ever find time to get married and divorced, not once but twice?!”

4.  If your relationship is like an audition for the Fast and the Furious 8 – SLOW DOWN!

In my experience, one person in the relationship is always “ready” before the other – ready to get married, ready to move in together, ready to change their Facebook status. But it’s important to be true to yourself and when YOU are ready.

In our relationship Randy has always been ready before me.

He invited me to move to California after we’d known each other for less than 2 weeks. I was ready 7 months later.

He proposed to me after we’d known each other for a year. I was ready 5 months later.

We still ended up moving in together and we still ended up getting married, but it happened when we were both ready.

Folks, this is forever. There is no reason to rush it. If you don’t trust your partner to wait, then you have bigger issues. If you don’t trust your partner to love you once they’ve seen all of you, then you have bigger issues. If you think you are so in love that you can’t wait another minute to be together, you definitely need to wait another minute!

Something about dating as an adult makes relationships progress at warp speed. But remember when you were in high school and you dated the same person for 4 years and YOU DIDN’T GET MARRIED during any of those years?! Well, this is one time when adults should take the advice of teenagers. We can enjoy a long courtship too!

5. Even if you know the secret ingredient to her banana bread and how he likes his socks folded – YOU STILL HAVE A LOT TO LEARN!

On about day 30 of our walking the Camino together across Spain, Randy asked me, “Why do you always give me the heel of the bread?” And I responded, “Because it’s your favorite!” And he said, “What gave you that idea?”

We had spent over 700 uninterrupted hours together – more than most couples spend in their entire courtship – and the whole time I thought I was taking care of him, meanwhile he thought I was selfishly taking the softest parts of the bread and leaving him the crust!

What no one likes to say (especially those of us in the Christian sector) is that, if you’ve been married a couple times before, chances are you are living with your partner before you actually tie the knot. The temptation then is to think that you know everything there is to know about being married to this person. Which is not even close to being true.

While driving home from our ocean-getaway where we went the night of our wedding, Randy and I talked for the first time about what we wanted his and mine and our relationship to look like with his children, who are all adults. And even though his 19-year-old son lived with us for 6 months and we had to navigate boundaries and other things with him, decision making is different than relationship building.

There will always be new things to learn about our partners. And we can either be fearful of this or excited by it.

I love how well I know Randy and how well he knows me. I love that he knows I need time to transition from one activity (work) to the next (being together). I love that I know coffee makes him sneeze and bread gives him the hiccups. But I also love that every day I have the opportunity to know him more and better.

We would do well in all of our relationships to approach them with the mindset that there is always more to learn.

And my final bit of advice on the occasion of YOUR marriage is: make it the marriage and the wedding of your dreams. If you want to get married at the courthouse or in Vegas or in the park or in a big church wedding, do it! If you want to wear a white dress or a pants suit or jeans or a tuxedo, do it! If you want a big reception or a quiet escape, do it! YOU DESERVE IT! Because whether this is your first or your fifth marriage is irrelevant to the fact that this is YOUR marriage and YOU are responsible for making it the marriage of your dreams.

CONGRATULATIONS!

From a Chance Encounter to a Surprise Wedding!

The evolution of my relationship with Randy has been unexpected and unusual, at least for a girl with Midwestern values.

We met 19 months ago today on a tiny street in the southwest of France, and out of necessity spent our first night together in a tent. Over the course of the next 23 days we became more than walking partners – we became best friends, confidantes, and eventually fell in love.

On day 22 we met the mayor of Grañón, Spain. He offered to marry us in the town square the next morning at 8 a.m. But as we often did on the Camino, we overslept. We walked to the town of Rabé de las Calzadas that day, where we had a communal dinner over which we became best friends with our bunk mates. They quickly saw the value of our relationship and desire to make a commitment to one another and we all stood together as Randy and I made our vows to one another.

Over the course of the next 6 months, we had what you might call a “courtship,” dividing our time between California and Ohio, getting to know one another’s families and a sense of what real life might be like together. At the end of those 6 months, I packed up my house and my dog Jovi, and Randy and I spent the next 3 weeks visiting family all the way to California.

Four months later we returned to the Camino, to walk the final 300 kilometers together. But our first stop was that tiny street in southwest France where we first met. It was there that Randy got down on one knee and presented me with a ring he had designed special for me, a ring he had asked my parents’ permission to give to me. And I said yes.

I should clarify – I said yes to Randy, but I did not say yes to a wedding. We determined that once I was ready for wedding talk, I would propose to him!

Five months later, on August 29, I got down on one knee in our living room and, with a bread tie from a loaf of wonder bread in my hand, asked Randy to marry me. And he said yes!

Did you get all that?

• 19 months ago – we met
• 18 months ago – we said our vows
• 11 months ago – we moved in together
• 5 months ago – Randy proposed to me
• 1 month ago – I proposed to Randy

Do you see what I mean by the “unusual” order of things!

But the fun doesn't stop there! On August 29, when I proposed to Randy, I told him I thought it would be amazing to get married on September 29, because it was 18 months to the day that we said our vows in Spain. That way we could celebrate our wedding anniversary every 6 months! Plus it was a Tuesday and we’d always said if we were ever going to get married again it would be in the middle of the week.

He laughed at me and we went on about our lives. We traveled separately to Anaheim for work. We traveled together to Oregon for vacation. We spent a day in San Francisco. My brother came to visit from Texas. We went to a baseball game, took on the care of my mother-in-law's dog... Every day an adventure!

But little did I know that he was plotting and planning the perfect wedding for me!

On September 28 at 4 p.m., Randy gave me a note that said “Tomorrow at noon will you come to the old Auburn courthouse and marry me??” And this time, without any hesitation, I said “yes!”

From there we delivered a week’s worth of meals to a family in need, and then went to Nordstroms to buy our wedding attire. The next morning we went to the nail salon for mani/pedis, went to the county office to secure our marriage license, and made it to the old courthouse with 20 minutes to spare!

Randy’s entire family and a couple of our friends were there to meet us and my heart was so full! We met briefly with the judge, another family friend, who was to marry us and he said, “Do you want to get married in the courtroom or outside?” Randy said he’d been told that it was a 6-month process to get married outside so he assumed we’d be in the courtroom. The judge gave us a wink and outside we went!

Which is how we ended up getting married in the most beautiful outdoor wedding, surrounded by friends and family, on September 29! 

Love Doesn't Keep Score

Last night while we were watching the finale of Last Comic Standing, I got a cramp in the bottom of my foot. I was tempted to ask Randy to massage it for me and then I thought, "I should give him a foot massage."

When we were in Spain it was an everyday ritual for us to massage one another's feet. A necessary ritual, because 20 kilometers a day, with 40 pounds on your back, day after day (this sounds like a joke we'll tell our grandkids one day -- ending with "walking uphill in the snow with 5 euros to our name") takes its toll. But the foot massages since that trip haven't been nearly as frequent.

This is the part of the story that is important though -- I not only thought I should give Randy a foot massage, I actually gave Randy a foot massage.

How often do we think of nice things to do for our loved ones, or nice things to say, and never follow through? 

So without a word I grabbed Randy's foot and began to rub. He made some appreciative noises and said, "What did I do to deserve this?" And I responded, "Nothing."

Which is both true and not true.

Randy does special and ordinary things for me every single day. Which makes it easier for me to do special and ordinary things for him every single day. But the things he does aren't the reason I do the things I do. And the things I do aren't the reason he does the things he does. If they were, then they wouldn't be born of love, and the one of us would stop as soon as the other of us failed to follow through.

First Corinthians 13 says, "Love keeps no record of wrongs." Another version says, "Love doesn't keep score."

Some of you may have a chore chart on your refrigerator where your kids earn stars or smiley faces for following the rules, getting good grades, doing their chores or simply being nice. 

But sometimes I think we have the same kind of chart in mind for our partners. Each day we "keep score" of the things they did to make us feel loved by giving them smiley faces, and each day we scratch out those smiley faces with permanent markers when our feelings get hurt or we don't get what we need or think we deserve. Then how we treat our spouses at the end of the day depends on whether we've given them more smiley faces or more black marks. And our charts are nothing like Verizon where your minutes disappear at the end of each month, but more like Sprint where those things carry over for the lifetime of your marital contract. 

This way of loving is completely out of line with our Bible verse above. We may not agree with the new rules in tee-ball where no one keeps score and everyone wins. But that is exactly how God tells us to treat our marriages.

If you've found yourself attached to this idea of a chore chart for your marriage, I encourage you to do this: imagine (or create one if you are a visual person!) a smiley face next to your partner's name. Not just today, but every day. And don't wait until tomorrow to put that smiley face on his/her chart. Fill in that chart for the rest of the year with a smiley face, because love doesn't keep score, love is not easily angered, love always believes the best, and love never fails.

Today, as we remember 9/11/01, we are especially mindful of how important it is to tell the people we love how much they mean to us. But let's not relegate the lessons of that day to once a year. Let us honor September 11 by asking God to help us love our partners in this life every single day.

100 Yards of Faith

Last night Randy and I went to the movies to see "A Walk in the Woods," about two old guys who walk the Appalachian Trail. There were so many moments that brought up memories of our Camino, walking across Spain, 18 months ago.

The movie was hilarious. If Bill Bryson and his walking companion were anything like Robert Redford and Nick Nolte, it must have been a real trip.

SPOILER ALERT. Skip down to "My friend Mark" if you don't want to know how the movie ends!

But the ending seemed a big abrupt. And more than abrupt, a bit disappointing. Why? Because they didn't finish. After all they had been through, the mountains they had already climbed, the fears they had overcome, one day they just pack up and go home. And as an audience you feel let down. You were fighting for them, these two old, out of shape guys, and you wanted them to make it all 2,160 miles. Because if they could do it anyone could.

But the moral of the story was not that to win you have to finish. Maybe the moral is that to win you simply have to start.

My friend Mark began his walk across Spain in mid August, but had to return two weeks later to deal with some issues at home. Before walking my own Camino I might have seen this as a failure. But not today. Today I can see that he took the leap of faith needed to begin. And he learned so much in just two weeks! In his own words...

If I had to write a story about my Camino, the title would be "Do You Have 100 Yards of Faith?" Several times I was convinced I had taken a wrong turn and either backtracked or waited till I saw others for my answer. One time I was walking thru a forest and suddenly realized I was all alone. I stopped for at least 15 minutes, listening and watching. I heard nor saw no one. As soon as I started to go back, two guys came down the trail and I asked if this was the way. They said it must be, it was the only way they could see. So I started again in the direction I had been heading and not more than 100 yards down the path, at a bend in the trail, was a signpost. Wow. I stopped dead in my tracks. Overwhelmed by the realization that all He was asking of me, when I thought I was lost, was to have 100 more yards of faith. - Mark Kirkwood

We are rarely able to see the end from the beginning. In our marriages, our careers, our health, or other opportunities. For some, that is reason enough to quit in the middle, or to never even begin. For others, it is reason enough to look to friends, family, the world, even strangers to tell you if you are going the right direction.

But faith isn't knowing how it is all going to turn out. Faith is not knowing, but being willing to keep moving forward anyway.

So... Do you have 100 yards of faith?

Saying "Yes" to God

"Who gets up one morning and decides to walk 800 kilometers? Who does that?" Randy said, incredulous. And yet that is what we did.

Had we not, who knows where either one of us would be today.

That's the beauty of saying "yes" to God. Even when it sounds crazy. Even when it doesn't make sense. Even when you know it is going to be hard. Even when no one else around you is doing it. You say "yes" and your life changes in such beautiful ways.

"Have you ever noticed that two-thirds of God’s name is G-O?" -Christine Caine

Today I am so excited for my friend Mark who is on his way to Madrid, where he too will make his way to St. Jean Pied de Port, France, to begin a very long walk. Mark showed up for the first time at Xenia Friends Church in Xenia, Ohio, while I was finishing my first Camino, and we met together several times over the next year, the last time being this past April, just after Randy and I had returned from our second walk. It was something he had wanted to do, and hearing my enthusiasm for it pushed him over the edge. (We've come full circle, haven't we, from the woman I heard speak about the Camino which pushed me over the edge, to now my story encouraging someone else to go! Read: Do the Thing.) This is just one of the many beautiful things about the Camino. It's not something you want to keep all to yourself. You want others to experience it for themselves.

I'm excited to see what Mark allows God to do in his life. How he will be challenged, what new things he will embrace, where the road will take him, the stories he will come home to share. And if you think of it, please remember Mark in your prayers for the next 34 days or so, as we wish him a "Buen Camino!"  

Every Day an Anniversary

Randy and I celebrate anniversaries all the time. That is just one of the amazing parts of our story. Because we walked together across Spain for a month, every day is the anniversary of something.

The anniversary of the day we met. The day we went to the wine fountain. The day we picnicked in a cave on the side of a mountain. The anniversary of the day we walked 50 kilometers together. The day we only walked 5. The day we met Ramon the chef. The day we met Ernesto the hospitalero. The day we got kicked out of the cathedral when the rooster wouldn't stop crowing. The day we got kicked out of the hostel when we didn't want to get out of bed. The day we had french toast. The day... the day... the day... You get the idea. Every day is worthy of a celebration.

To keep these memories alive we immediately started celebrating. One month ago today we met... Four months ago today we bought rings in Burgos... Eight months ago today we had breakfast in that little place where you had to go down the stairs to get to our table and the waitress dropped an entire tray of food in front of us... A year ago today we met mysterious John from Australia... Thirteen months ago we met those French guys in the Pyrenees who told us we would have to sleep on top of each other to keep warm and we had only known each other for three hours...

And yesterday we celebrated 16 months since we stood up in a little bar, surrounded by friends, and promised to love each other forever.

To honor this special day we got dressed up and went out for dinner.

 

We don't celebrate every day with gifts and fancy dinners, more often with conversation about our journey or text messages saying "I'm so glad we stayed in that apartment in Espinal 15 months ago." But because we had just taken a week-long road trip with two dogs, his mom, and a dozen crates full of "stuff" (anyone seen the new "Vacation" movie??), we definitely needed to honor one another and our relationship with something special.

In addition to our fancy dinner, in honor of our 16 months of love confession, I gave him a $16 gift card to Starbucks. And he gave me 16 roses.  

What I love most about these roses is that he bought a bundle of 24. Scratched out the 24 and wrote in 16. And gave the "extra" 8 roses to random people who were also shopping at Sam's Club. I love this because it is so true to his nature. And one of the reasons I fell in love with him. Because serving is such a natural part of who he is.

Amazing Grace on the Camino

There were 3 people that Randy and I really connected with at the start of our Camino last year, Jeff ("North Dakota"), Aloys ("Holland"), and Sophie ("Frenchie"). This week we discovered that all 3 of them, plus Randy, have birthdays not only in May but within a 10-day span. 

To honor each of their birthdays, I have posted pictures that I have of them from our walk together. In response to one of those I received the video below. It was taken on one of my favorite days of the entire journey. It was a day filled with conversation, french toast, church bells, and a really long walk. It ended with dinner and more conversation and our very first shots of pacharan.

When we returned to the monastery that evening it was already locked for the night (even though 4 of the 7 of us who were staying there were all on the outside!). The proprietor let us in after a few knocks and took us the "back way" to our bunks, leading us through the balcony overlooking the hall of worship.

It was so beautiful. My heart swelled with this verse:

"SERVE the Lord with gladness:

come before his presence with SINGING" (Psalm 100:2). 

So when Holland asked me to sing Amazing Grace, my heart was already filled with the words.

Do Likewise

While getting a pedicure at the airport yesterday (because it is in the 80s here and I needed to fix up my "Camino feet" to get them flip flop ready!), it dawned on me that my technician was doing for me what Jesus did for his disciples.

Arguably the most vivid image of Jesus serving that we have is him kneeling before the disciples with a basin of water and a towel. Including the disciples Judas, who would betray him, and Peter, who would deny him three times. (See John 13.)

But Jesus doesn't just serve his disciples. He tells them -- and, in turn, us -- to go and do likewise.

As my nail technician and I discussed Alzheimer's disease, how vacations have changed since we grew up, studying abroad, and the remnants of my Camino blisters, I wondered if she didn't have a corner on this whole notion of "serving". Was she, as well as podiatrists, shoe salesmen, massage therapists, etc., being more obedient to this call to serve than the rest of us?

There are certainly jobs that require people to directly serve one another -- and not just those involving feet -- but I think no matter what your profession, we are all given opportunities to serve in the workplace. Whether that be at home, in the office, at the salon, or in a classroom.

Some serve clients. Living with a chef, I certainly see Rand serve others through not only delicious food but also the way he cares for all the details to make a person's event everything they dreamed of. Some serve students. Others have the opportunity to serve their co-workers, bosses or the people they lead. Some serve at home, through taking care of household chores, maintenance issues, loving our spouses, getting the kids ready for school or helping them with their homework. Others have the opportunity to serve people they may never actually meet, through words, music, or art.

The point is, we are all called to "do likewise", and when God calls us to do something He always gives us opportunities to do that thing.

Madrid

Reflecting back on our last few days in Spain, I've wondered why I wasn't able to write a final post about our journey. 

Yes, we had a myriad of emotions swirling around us. From exhaustion after our long, final days walk, to exhilaration that we had completed our long awaited Camino, to sadness over leaving this beautiful country, to relief that we didn't have to walk anymore. 

Yes, we had head colds due to the drastic change in weather, from cold, rainy days to overwhelming sun. And body aches due to all the walking and carrying of our packs. 

But more than that, I think it was the overwhelming busy-ness of Madrid that prevented me from being able to go anywhere worthwhile with my thoughts.

Madrid has more street performers than a theme park...

The Plaza Mayor was host to the traditional Easter Sunday drum band...

People watching at its finest...

Shopping is their drug...

The food is all the size of finger sandwiches...

And you get charged based on how many toothpicks are left on your plate.

Don't get me wrong. There were places of beauty. Like the park across the street from our hotel...

And the many museums...

But mostly we felt like Sisyphus, always ending up in the same place, with the same crowds, and never actually getting anywhere.

After weeks of nothing but small town hospitality, wide open spaces and solitude, Madrid simply made us long for the Camino. So much so that Rand even conceded after a few days that maybe, maybe someday we will go back and walk the final stretch (approx. 90 km) from Santiago to Finisterre.

And I am reminded, now that we have returned home, that it is more important than ever to make space and time in the midst of our crowded, busy lives to breathe, to think, to pray, to write, to smile, to love, to serve.

Thank you once again for walking with us! Good journey... Buen Camino!

Spain by Train

After our day in Santiago, we asked ourselves: “What’s next?”

Many pilgrims stay and spend several days in Santiago. Others travel to Finisterre, “the ends of the earth”, on foot or by bus or taxi to burn their boots and watch the sun go down over the ocean. But we had nowhere to stay in Santiago and had both already had our Finisterre experiences.

Our flight home is Tuesday out of Madrid, and neither of us has spent any time in this city, so we thought, why not go a few days early and see what the city has to offer?

“The only train available to Madrid on Saturday leaves at 8 a.m. and arrives in Madrid at 3 p.m.,” the woman at the ticket sales said. “All the other trains are full.”

We asked her for a few minutes to think about it. An 8 a.m. train meant getting up early and we hadn’t yet caught up from our all night walk. We could go to Finisterre after all, or look for beds in an Albergue early in the day on Saturday and stay another night in Santiago. But in the end we decided we would rather go to Madrid and enjoy the city.

“Two tickets for the 8 a.m. train to Madrid,” we told her.

She started typing in the information. “I’m sorry. That train is full,” she said. In just a few short minutes we had lost our way out of this town. I had taken the overnight bus last year and had vowed to never do that again. 

“What about Sunday?” I asked.

“It’s Semana Santa,” she said, typing and shaking her head ‘no’. There would be no going anywhere on Easter Sunday. She kept typing as we sat there, wondering what we were going to do.

Our friends that we had met in the woods had said they were going to walk to the airport after arriving in Santiago, but we didn’t have that kind of time.

“There is a train tomorrow at 10 a.m.,” she said. “But it goes through Leon and doesn’t arrive in Madrid until 9 p.m.”

“We’ll take it!” Rand said, before this train too was sold out.

As hard and long and exhausting as our walk into Santiago was, it seems like it all worked out for the best. We got the last hotel room in Santiago on Good Friday. And if we had waited to arrive on Saturday we might not have had a place to stay in Santiago or a way out of town to Madrid.  

After the best night sleep of the whole Camino, we walked a mile to the station and boarded our Saturday morning train. The first stretch would take us on a tour of our last two weeks of walking in reverse, from Santiago to Leon. The train didn’t follow the Camino exactly, but we were thrilled when we saw the occasional bridge, path, bar, and Albergue where we had stayed.

Shortly after boarding we received a text message from our friends from the woods, who said it had been a very cold night and thanked us for the hand warmers we had left them. While we had spent our time wondering if we would have been better off staying with them in the woods and walking to Santiago in the morning, they had been there thinking that they would have been better off walking with us. There's a lesson in that, I'm sure of it!

After changing trains in Leon, we followed new territory. The first couple of hours looked like Ohio with its flat farmland and abundance of animals. The latter stretch was through the mountains and forests and was equally as beautiful.

When we finally arrived in Madrid, we took a taxi from the train station to a hostel that had gotten wonderful reviews. Only to find it chained up tight. Our taxi driver looked apologetic, but it wasn’t his fault that it was closed. We assured him we would be alright and set off to walking amongst the streets packed with people, cars, bars, and more. After several unsuccessful attempts we finally landed at Hostal Sardinero. As the man checked us in he said, “Excuse me for a moment. I have to turn off our sign. You have the last room of the night.”

Once again we had found the one available room in town during “Semana Santa.” All seems to have worked out exactly right!

A Day in Santiago

At 8 a.m. the streets of Santiago started to come to life. We were still resting in our storefront when the pilgrim’s office opened. We packed up our belongings and went to receive our certificates of completion.

“How are you?” one of the women working asked. Weary tears streamed down my face. “Cansada, I think,” she answered her own question. “Tired.”

We were given the clipboards to sign in and were the first to register for the day. Dozens of other names would be signed below ours as pilgrims one by one made their way to Santiago. “Congratulations,” we were told, as official credentials were placed in our hands, with our names written in Latin and the date of our arrival.

I had been here before, 11 months and 1 day ago, to receive my first credential. But this time Rand and I had arrived together. 

And then the massive blow, “There will be no Pilgrim’s Mass today. It is ‘Semana Santa’, Holy Week, so there is no service. But you are welcome to tour the Cathedral.” No Pilgrim’s Mass. No hearing our names being read along with the other names in various languages. No ceremony to neatly tie up our Camino. “Processions?” I asked. Remembering all the “parades” that took place last year in Villfranca del Bierzo. “No,” they said. “Semana Santa.” It was Holy Week, and the Church appeared to be closed.

We went back across the street to a hotel café where we had coffee and toast. Earlier I had asked the young man setting up the outdoor tables if they had any rooms available. He said there might be one, with a single bed, available now. We checked with the hostess and she said it was meant for one person, but that she would show it to us and we could decide. It was only available for one night, though. The rest of the weekend was booked full.

The elevator was not big enough for two people with backpacks, so we left our packs at the desk and rode the elevator while she took the stairs. The room was on the 3^rd floor, with a window that opened to a beautiful view of the rooftops of Santiago, had a full size bed and a private bathroom with a bathtub (rare in Spain!). It was perfect.

“We’ll take it!” we said. It was 9 a.m. and we were ready for bed. She handed us our key, and a booklet filled with all of the Holy Week events. “There is a procession?” I asked. “Maybe four or five of them today,” she said. Redeemed!

At noon I went out to the Cathedral Plaza, which as expected was packed with people and vendors, tourists and pilgrims. I found a quiet cafeteria and had a bowl of “Calda”, Galician broth soup, and bought some cheese and bread to take back to the room. I stopped and bought a few souvenirs, checked the times for the post office and train station ticket office, and went back to the room to join Rand for another nap.

We got up again around 5 p.m. and went out for pizza and gelato. We walked through several of the plazas where people were giving out free hugs, having street fairs, going to church, walking their dogs, and getting ready for another round of Holy Week processions.

We bumped into the large group of pilgrims that we had left at the restaurant where we had dinner the previous evening and exchanged handshakes and cheers. We told them it was nearly 6 a.m. before we saw the Cathedral, but that the night walk had been beautiful. They looked weary, and were still carrying their backpacks as they had not yet found a place to stay for the night. It was another reason to be glad that we had arrived in Santiago so early. We may have gotten the last room in the entire city that was free on Good Friday.

We then went to the post office where weeks ago we had shipped our new coaster set that we'd "won" in Burgos while visiting a fundraiser, and the luggage bags we had used to bring our backpacks on the plane. The “vigilante”, as his name tag described him, and the office worker, told us that the post office was closed until Monday. “It’s Semana Santa,” they said. We were well aware that it was Holy Week. But these two guys were there and our package couldn’t have been that hard to find. Rand and I had a quick conversation about whether we were willing to stay in Santiago until Monday. It would cut it close, but we could still make it to Madrid for our Tuesday morning flight back to the states. “Wait,” the office worker said. The vigilante gave him a dirty look, but he shrugged his shoulders, disappeared for a few minutes, and then came back with our package.

While he was searching, an older couple from New Mexico who we had met on the Camino came in. They told us that they had made reservations at a hotel for the night, but when they hadn’t arrived before 3 p.m. to check in, the hotel had given away their room. “Semana Santa,” was the explanation they were given. Holy Week. “It was a longer walk to get here than we thought,” they said of the last 12.5 kilometers (21.5?!). We agreed.

The postal worker frowned when he came back with our package and saw our friends waiting with us. We thanked him profusely for helping us. “Secret,” the vigilante said to us before we left, and we promised not to tell any more of our friends that the post office was only “sort of closed” for Holy Week.

We ended the evening at the Cathedral where we gave thanks and saw thousands of others doing the same. Pilgrims and tourists hugged the statue of the apostle, visited his tomb, and stood in awe of the swinging incense diffuser.

And we bumped into “our family”! Who we hadn’t seen in over 40 kilometers. “You made it!” we all said. And somehow seeing them here in Santiago on Good Friday seemed like the perfect way to wrap up our Camino.

      

Why Walk So Far in One Night?

Continued...

Day 14/15 of walking: Boente to Santiago, 47.5 km (or was it 56.5?!)
Total for Camino 2015: 321.2 km (330.2 km?!)

During our stop at the 12.5 km mark, Rand duct taped a flashlight to his walking stick. I nicknamed him “Macgyver” during our first Camino, because he was always coming up with these kinds of innovations. Despite the full moon, we were glad for the extra light. The path was often through trees, small towns, on rough terrain or with potholes. And after meeting our friends in the woods, we were prepared for the unexpected.

It was a cold night, so we didn’t sit long. An hour break in a café would have been perfect, but that wasn’t available to us in the midnight hour. As we passed through several small towns, we wondered about stopping in a hotel and asking if we could take a rest for an hour. If there was a couch in the lobby perhaps. Or simply somewhere to get in out of the cold and off our feet.

I had heard that the Albergue just 4.6 km from Santiago was open 24 hours. But as we passed by, there didn’t seem to be any way to get to it. Not at all like we both remembered from being here last year.

Before 3 a.m. we had descended the last big hill, the last flight of stairs, and crossed the last bridge into Santiago. But having been here before, we knew we were still a long way away from the Cathedral. So we stopped at a park, pulled out a sleeping bag, and laid down until 4:30. Too exhausted to care about the people sitting in their car right next to us, who also appeared to be taking an early morning nap.

The rest did our feet well, but we were still exhausted, sore, and ready for a place to land. We had to force ourselves to take photos at the “Santiago de Compostela” sign, before walking for another hour across town to get to the Cathedral. Making a short stop at an indoor ATM to warm up.

The Fitbit I’ve been wearing this trip told us that our 47.5 kilometer day had actually been 56.5 kilometers. Where did those extra 9 kilometers come from? Perhaps the guidebook was only giving us the measures to the edge of town, and not all the way. Who knows. Regardless, it was a long, uncomfortable walk.

In those moments as we entered the Cathedral Plaza, where a handful of pilgrims were celebrating and taking photos of themselves in front of the dark, construction clad Cathedral, I wished that I had insisted we take these last 47.5 (56.5?) kilometers “poco a poco”. That if we had walked over 3 days instead of one, perhaps then we would have a positive emotional reaction to this final entry into Santiago and the taking of our last Camino steps together. Instead we were too tired to even care.

We found a covered entryway to one of the many shops nearby, across the street from the Pilgrim’s Office where we would get our official credentials in a couple of hours, and once again pulled out the sleeping bag. It wasn’t as comfortable as a hotel room or even an Albergue bed, but at least we didn’t have to walk anymore.

Despite my exhaustion, I quickly found myself restless. So I walked back to the Cathedral Plaza and sat down in the middle of the now abandoned square. I hated the idea that we might have “ruined” our Camino by walking so far on our last stretch. So I prayed and asked the Father what good there was in this. More would be revealed in the coming days, but the initial sense was, “How else would you have the entire Cathedral to yourself?”

In just a few short hours, tourists and pilgrims and bicycles and street vendors would pack the square. But in this moment, the early morning hours of Good Friday when Jesus and his followers suffered the longest, hardest day of his earthly life, it was mine alone. And for that I was grateful.