Searching for patience, and I want it now!

I keep saying that the Camino is to life like a model is to an architect: the smaller version can be picked up examined, flipped over, changed and gives the viewer perspective of the big picture.

Well the longer I am on this Camino, the more perspective I lose, the mose liquid my thoughts become and the more I fear I am losing myself. I try to make decisions and I cannot. I find that five minutes feel like a lifetime and that people I just met feel like fmaily and sometimes friends.

Tonight I had dinner with 5 german-speaking people, only one of which speaks english very well and I couldn´t have felt more welcomed to their table (not to mention the food was delicious).

I used to think that I could think myself through anything. My thinking was: God made me intelligent so that I could lead with my brain and solve problems as they came my way. The problem is, he also gave me a heart, and it seems they are always at odds with one another. Why would God create me in a such a way where parts of me could never see eye to eye and I am always finding myself in conflict?

After the city of Burgos, many pilgrims take a bus to Leon, the next big city to try and avoid the Meseta of Palencia. The Meseta is wide, monotonous and very, very long. There is a path along it that is 18k long and there is nothing on the path. When I say nothing I mean no towns, water or even shade. This is known as the most trying stretch for a pilgrim. There was a Bulgarian lady that arrived at the albergue last night and in that 18k had decided to get a divorce. I thought the 18k wasn´t bad at all, but I have delayed reactions to things.

My grandmother was shot dead when I was 11. It didn´t hit me until almost a year later, when everyone else was at that point, functional again. If I were to classify myself as one of the five senses, I would probably be smell. The nose has an automatic self defense mechanism, when something smells really bad or strong, it shuts down and doesn´t smell anymore. When something impacts me, my brain shuts down, I don´t realize what is happening until time passes and I have had time to process things, this is what had been building since Burgos.

The Meseta Castellana is boring. Well, in comparison to the grandeur of the pyrinees and the beauty of Navarra, it´s nothing special, lots of wide open spaces and blue skies which make you marvel at the beginning, but quickly become as picture perfect and monotonous as you Windows screen saver (which I am now walking through on a regular basis). In addition to being boring, it has become commercial. With the high unemploym,ent rate in the country, everyone has done something to cater to pilgrims. Long gone are the days where a pilgrim has to walk for 40k+ in a day just to get to the next shelter, or have to sleep under a tree (if there is one) surrounded by enormous bugs, iguanas and snakes. I have heard nothing but complaints about this from "old school" pilgrims who say that the Cmaino has lost its soul. That´s ok, I now refer to myself as Pilgrim Light same great smell, burning half the calories.

I would like to propose a counter argument to these pilgrims based on Maslow´s hierarchy of needs. The needs look like our food pyramid, with the most important needs that should be met are food, water, shelter, sexual needs, then safety, love and belonging, self-esteem and then self-actualization. When a pilgrim is in need of one of their most basic needs (food, water, shelter...) that is all they can concentrate on, as would happen to any human. This leaves little time for contemplation.

However, when the pilgrim is simply walking, not hungry, not thirsty, not worrying about shelter or safety, it allows him or her to think... just think. Sometimes the perils that pilgrims must face on the outside pale in comparison to those which they must face in their innermost selves. That, for me is the true pilgrimage, not the blisters, sunburn, dehydration, illness or exhaustion (and though I may not do 40km a day, I´ve have them all thank you!).

I have a very hard shell. It protects me from outside forces like pain, illness and all kinds of weather. But like the boots I had to send back to Madrid, a hard shell may protect you from outside forces, but can´t protect you from the destruction that is going on inside.

I finished the 18k at 3pm, my deamons started knowcking five hours later.

I am currently caught in a web between my head and my heart. It´s like I´m standing over a cliff on a cold breezy day and I can feel the moisture on my face and I´m looking to the other side, wondering if I should try to jump to where I want to go, stay where I am, fall into the nothing or build a bridge. The problem is, I´m a writer not a structural engineer, I don´t know how to build a bridge.

Luckily we are not talking about the Grand Canyon, we are talking about the inner me, deeper, a lot more dangerous, but in the end, territory I have some knowledge in. The Secret tells us that all we have to do is ask the Universe and it will provide. Well..

Dear Universe,

I WANT FUCKING ANSWERS!

Sincerely, Veronica

It´s not that simple. What I need to take is what I am not good at taking: time. I am not a creature of patience. But this is one more lesson Mr. Camino, one more of the many lessons you want me to learn on this journey I have decided to take. I have no idea what I have already learned as it´s all cakemix in my head, gooe and sticky all at the same time.

So it´s time for a verdict:

THE BAD NEWS: Truthfully I´m not sure I can handle everything in my head at the moment.

THE GOOD NEWS: I don´t have to handle everything right now. All I have to handle is my feet, my pack, the sun and the path, and barring a few blisters, I´ve almost got those down.