Saturday was a bad, bad, horrible day. Each step was more difficult than the next. With each breeze my sneezing went on uncontrollably due to my hay fever. I had even overdosed on beautiful scenery.
I finally dropped my backpack in the middle of the path. My poles fell beside it and I sat in the dry scrub to the side. There was no shade and so I simply sat there miserably. I dug into my backpack and found an orange from a couple of days ago.
You haven’t lived until you peel a Spanish orange and taste a slice of heaven. My troubles dissipated and I was transported into a garden of eden where fruit is all the sustenance you need. Life would be okay again as I worshiped at the altar of the orange sphere.
An hour later I rounded a curve and viewed a backpack in the middle of the Camino but there was no one around biting into an orange. I flashed back to that book “Left Behind” where the people simply disappeared and all their belongings were left on earth. Where was this fellow hiker? Had she given up and wandered away leaving her heavy backpack behind? If only she had carried a Spanish orange with her!
Slowly I noticed a blue sleeve amongst the tall green grass. I laughed aloud when she told me the grass was simply too soft and too comfy looking to pass up. She had to hide her exhaustion in the peaceful environment she was surrounded.
There is no description that can convey the drudgery of mile after mile of the crunch, crunch, crunch of the gravel path. I’ve heard that by the end of the first week you find a groove and the daily routine falls into place. Now already at day #7 and onto day #8 – I’m sorry to say my stride may take a while longer.
On day #8 we walked 17.5 miles and I hit the wall. Maybe it was the last two nights of Spanish snoring in the hostels. Or it was the dehydration I was suffering. Or it was the three new blisters. Or it was the fact that at the end of day #8 every hostel in town was full due to the weekend walkers from Spain.
I booked into a small hotel and collapsed in my private room. The only metaphor I can render up is one where you are on the way to the hospital in full labor and you stubbornly decide you don’t want to give birth right at this time after all. It is time to take day #9 off (unlike any similar opportunity in my metaphor) and re-group. I spent the day in my bed tending to my blisters, had a shower I didn’t have to share with 30 other people and used a real towel that wrapped all the way around me.
Tomorrow will be a bright day.
This post is dedicated to the grit and determination of the students we support in high school. The picture was taken on one of my first trips to Kenya and our girls were playing a soccer game against a school from the area. I didn’t notice it at first but many of our girls didn’t have soccer shoes like the opposing team who was well suited. I was amazed at the level of play and the fierce kicks from the bare feet. I so admire what children of poverty must overcome. They don’t play on a level playing field but that doesn’t stop them from playing.
No comments:
Post a Comment