Steve in Public : Day 67: The Pilgrimage Begins

The Pilgrimage Begins

Travel Day 67

March 5

Camino Day 1: St. Jean Pied de Port to Roncesvalles

Daily distance: 25.6 km (15.9 mi)
Total distance: 25.6 km (15.9 mi)

“The way to God is paved with tears and blood and love.”

Physically, I was well prepared for this journey. Since deciding three years ago that I wasn’t going to let chronic injuries from my Marine Corps Infantry life stop me from living the active lifestyle I wanted, I took control of my physical health through sports therapy and yoga, getting well enough to tackle treks like Mount Zirkel in Colorado and the Huemul Circuit in Patagonia. Spending the last two months on my feet, mostly outdoors, and not chained to a desk has done wonders for my knees and back; I was more ready than ever for the demands of the Camino de Santiago: walking across Spain for a month while carrying everything I need on my back.

The night before the Camino began, Claudia stayed in a nearby albergue while Michael and I stayed in the municipal albergue. Michael and I began walking the Camino together at 8:00 AM. The included breakfast at the alberbue was miniscule, and I was happy to take up Michael’s offer of food. He said he packed too much, which I believe. His 65 liter pack was filled to the brim. In the back of his pack sat a book about the Camino. I’m not one to read travel books, as I usually prefer to figure out my travels while they happen; planning ahead too much takes the fun out of the adventure. “Anything interesting in that book?”

“Yes, many interesting things. Most of it is about where to stay and eat, and there is history about certain sites. And it also talks about the Laws of the Camino” My eyebrow raised, and he continued. “There are three Laws of the Camino. First, you must always tell the truth. Second, you must either take-up a good habit or give-up a bad habit. Third, you must cry at least once, and it has to be real.” I asked if I could read it in the book, but he said that I couldn’t understand the language it was written in. So I was doomed to take his word for it.

The Camino de Santiago (The Way of Saint James) is a pilgrimage to the shrine of the apostle Saint James the Great in the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, Spain, the mythical burial site of Saint James’ remains. It is a Christian pilgrimage, but religious predisposition is not necessary for one to complete it. But I knew that if I was going to do the Camino properly, I had to give up some of my pretentions about religious authority. I decided to follow the Laws from Michael’s book. The last one I can do, but I have little control over it. The second, I will have to figure out. But the first, I can start doing today. And I can start by saying why I am here and what I believe.

“The purpose of a pilgrimage is about setting aside a long period of time in which the only focus is to be the matters of the soul.”

-L.M. Browning

Today is the first day of my pilgrimage, but what is it that makes me a pilgrim? Surely the piece of paper and scallop shell I received yesterday aren’t necessary or ultimate in determining this designation. Surely it isn’t my religious views. A traditional pilgrimage is a meaningful journey to a sacred place. I have little regard for the sacred, and Santiago de Compostela is no exception. It might was well be a pilgrimage to the 7/11 in Galicia. But a pilgrimage also offers an opportunity to step outside of the non-stop business of my life and reflect on the past and future while learning from others along the way. This latter purpose is what I am seeking.

In my last two years, yoga and meditation have provided me the space and the mindset to reflect on my past life and sort out my future life. I would have never sorted out my wartime experiences and reframed them into my current pursuits to empower veterans and build legs for people with lower-limb amputation if I never took the time to silence my mind and listen. Meditation and yoga are invaluable parts of my daily routine, but a whole month to contemplate this type of clear-minded reflection is not a common occurrence in my life. The Camino will give me a chance to commit to long-term listening.

But to whom am I listening?

I am not a religious man, so my answer will not be the name of any deity. Others will say this voice belongs to “Jesus” or “Allah” or “Karma” or “Vishnu” or “Krishna” or “the Holy Spirit,” all answers with which I don’t agree. I am not a deist, but I am a spiritual man, and I do believe there is some power out there that speaks to us and connects us and inspires us and shows us our life path and burns passion within our hearts. I’m just content with calling this thing “the unknown.”

“Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.”

-Martin Luther King Jr.

“Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.”

-Matthew 4:4

My belief in this “unknown,” like any belief system, requires faith. Many years ago, when I lost my Christian faith, I went through one of the hardest spiritual trials of my life. What is life without belief in anything? Through that, I learned an important lesson: I cannot live without faith. It was killing me to live a purposeless life. In the midst of this personal spiritual revolution, I went on my first pilgrimage, although I did not know that’s what it was at the time.

“We never grow closer to God when we just live life. It takes deliberate pursuit and attentiveness.”

-Francis Chan

“Faith is not the clinging to a shrine but an endless pilgrimage of the heart.”

-Abraham Joshua Heschel

After Christmas in 2016, I hitchhiked along the Pacific Coast Highway from Los Angeles to San Francisco, taking only a small backpack and a cardboard sign that read “You’re Awesome.” I made it to San Francisco 13 days later, safely in one piece, and with an experience that taught me a lesson in the interconnectivity of people. We want to help each other, we need to help each other, and we only need to be given the opportunity and the means to help each other for these desires to manifest into reality. I believe that all religions get the gist of this but miss the point by giving it a name. The whole point of God and Heaven and Enlightenment and Salvation and The Eight Fold Path and living a “godly life” is to interconnect people and show us how to live a good life together.

“Let us make humankind in our image.”

-Genesis 1:26

“None of us comes into the world fully formed. We need other human beings in order to be human.”

-Desmond Tutu

“The creatures that inhabit this earth are here to contribute, each in its own particular way, to the beauty and prosperity of the world.”

-The Dalai Lama

“You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.”

-Mahatma Gandhi

“Love, hope, fear, faith - these make humanity; these are its sign and note and character.”

-Robert Browning

I have been blessed to have had my life experience and to have been gifted with my talents, and I chose to use my position and ability to make a positive mark in human history. Whatever this unknown thing is that connects us together, it has grasped me, spoken to me, and guided me towards this path I am on. This is where my faith now lies.

“Faith is a passionate intuition.”

-William Wordsworth

“Faith is an act of a finite being who is grasped by, and turned to, the infinite. Faith is the state of being ultimately concerned. Religion is the state of being grasped by an ultimate concern, a concern which qualifies all other concerns as preliminary and which itself contains the answer to the question of a meaning of life.”

-Paul Tillich

In this sense, I am a religious man, but one who belongs to no religion. “Religious” is merely the adjective to describe the pursuit of my “faith.” To find out where the unknown will take me next, I have set aside the next month for this pilgrimage. It is a time of reflection, a time of meditation, and time of soul-searching, and an active practice in the utility that religion plays in teaching me how to live a meaningful life.

“Think while walking, walk while thinking, and let writing be but the light pause, as the body on a walk rests in contemplation of wide open spaces.”

-Frédéric Gros

Five kilometers into the day’s walk, I stopped to take a break, and Michael went on ahead. He left me with these parting words: “It is best to walk the Camino alone.” I’ve heard from everyone that day one is the hardest day. It is the most physically challenging with the highest climb of the journey, but it is also the day that pilgrims are the least mentally prepared for the Camino.

I stopped for no food along the way, fueled mostly by the adrenaline to reach the peak. As I neared Roncesvalles, the climb steepened, and the sound of the river below that divided France from Spain disappeared. The trees at this elevation resembled Aspens in Colorado; I was out of the woods and in a different microclimate. Remnant from last week’s snowstorm, a light snowpack still spotted the ground. At the peak, the unobstructed winds blew frigid air that my eyes squinted to block. Two kilometers later, I was in a bar in Roncesvalles, toasting wine glasses with other pilgrims who were just as happy as I to have endured the first of many days of our pilgrimage to Santiago.