Well, we all passed kilometer post 0 in the middle of the Cathedral square. The walk is over and we wound our way back home. In some ways the trip home (3 airplanes, 5,700 miles and a couple of crabby Spanish airport security people) felt longer than the walk. I hope everyone feels recovered and rested by now. It took a couple of days, but my left ankle is back to its proper shape and I can see the tendons in my foot. Obviously, one learns to appreciate simpler pleasures after something like a pilgrimage, but that is part of the point of all of this!
As we walked, we learned that there were a lot of reasons for walking down this trail - thanksgiving for something, penance for something, searching for self, because it's there, to see if you can do it, etc, etc, etc. I wanted to be there with a bunch of people I liked, to share the experience and participate in something millions of Christians have participated in over 1,200 years. I suspect, though, that as each of us thinks about this over the years to come, we may find different reasons and different understanding to what we did and what we may have accomplished.
In a world filled up with intense business, there are few things simpler than just walking. And for a week, that is all we did, and we found out that that simple act was enough for a day. We will all remember the people we met along the way and the stories we heard. For most of us living out here in the suburbs, there was a certain earthiness to what we did - the paths were not prepared like the Nolan Trail, you smelled cows and rotting hay, the native people might be missing more teeth than is acceptable in proper suburban society, the world isn't as neat and tidy as we like to make it out to be in our neat and tidy houses (it never is, but we like to fool ourselves into thinking it might be).
I had a chance to read of someone else's experience and this is what they said (much of which sounded familiar...)
| Perhaps the greatest change is entering a world with few choices – there will be two items on the menu (maybe) in the village's single café, one place to stay, and one church to attend. |
| Friendships made there will always stay with you, even when you lose touch completely. As we walked, a small perambulating village, we realized how lost we really are, and were driven to look out for each other. I do not yet understand how the Camino affected me. I came away with a great respect and affection for the feet which carried me so far, and an awareness that we must travel as lightly as we can. It confirmed what I was, but taught me lessons: time spent watching the sky is well spent; staff meetings are blasphemous wastes of time; café con leche in the morning is good; wine at dinner affirms the unity of creation. The blessing of our pilgrimage is that it all doesn't have to make sense at once or immediately. Marco Polo didn't make sense of the orient the moment he came home, either. But we set out to do it, and we accomplished our goal. Everyone made it to the end. On their own power. But with the aide of everyone else around them who supported them through the journey. One thing is for sure, though. We are all part of a unique little fraternity who have done this. We have seen things not everyone has seen, and that affects our lives. All of us are thankful to all of the people of St. Mark who helped get us to the pilgrim trail and who supported us in this endeavor. All of you traveled with us in ways you probably don't quite understand and you all were among the things I remembered there in front of the bones of the Saint. Thanks for helping to make our pilgrimage possible. And now, now the mileposts aren't going down any longer, they're going up as we wind our way through our lives here at home. Peace, The St. Mark Pilgrims |
