Santiago de Compostela is the road’s end to which all paths lead and to where all Peregrinos and Peregrinas make their way - a city of Pilgrims, with its huge Romanesque cathedral where the Botafumeiro swings and purifies, the Puerta Santa, open to us in this Year of Mercy, the expansive Praza Obradoiro where we would eventually stop walking, find respite and end our journey in this resting place of James, the Apostle. But, Santiago de Compostela wasn’t really the destination that stayed most present in my mind.
Alongside rivers and streams, my journey of 1,000km, on foot, flowed down from the Pyrenees of the Basque region. With the companionship of these waters, I trekked across the top of Spain to a spot near Muxia, on the Galician coast. The singular image, ever-present in my mind, was one of coalescence with the Atlantic Ocean – the rocky shore, soft sand, the moods of the surf, wild and tossed or still and serene… the other side in imagination. The Ocean, for me, has always been a place of peace and sanctuary. The shore a singularity of the union of physical Body, moving and fluid Soul and encompassing Space: Earth, ether, ethereal.
My Pilgrimage, my Camino, this prolonged outside wandering of inward travel, was really just a long walk to the coast. Whatever I would find at the shore of my Self, Water and I would be there together.
I could not really get lost on The Way – there were folks who, with a sweet “Buen Camino!” would point the direction of the path and there were many roadside maps showing route and location – “Usted estoy aqui”, “You are here”. Early on I learned that I couldn’t be lost if I opened my eyes and my heart in each step, in each place, in each moment as I walked, because that was where I was going just then. My mantra became, “Right foot. Left foot. Repeat. Look around you. Jo estoy aqui.”
Some months prior, among my YTT class at Kripalu, I sat crossed-legged on a floor listening to a talk on yoga philosophy. Helping us to understand the separation of “Self and Brahman”, one of our teachers spoke of an Infinite Ocean, of which everything is a part, the absolute big picture – all that is real. In the tumultuous movement of surf, a droplet may be tossed up, finding itself as separate and temporarily hanging apart. In this illusion of separation, the drop becomes aware in its own unique way and, in that, becomes a “Self” – “Here I am - Me! I am special and different from all else! I have Meaning! I have Place!” In this Self-ness, the idea of tumbling back into the Ocean, of loss of identity, of assimilation, diffusion and disappearance into the whole, of seemingly ending experience and meaning, becomes frightening and something to avoid. Should it be?
What made me special or different from any other person making their way to Santiago de Compostela, flowing along with this river of Pilgrims, each to our shared endpoints, and individual destinations?
Water, formed or flowing, was more than just a metaphor for Self and Brahman along the Camino de Santiago. This vital element was essential, every step of the way. Fundamental collections of water, drawn from many different sources, became condensed, carded, spun and woven into the fluid weft and warp of my Way, threads that bound my step, soul and surroundings into the tapestry of this experience.
In a blasé and basic kind of way, water was a necessary and practical thing. By mouth, in its various forms, it kept me hydrated and refreshed – cool, clear, straight up, and hopefully clean, from a tap or a way-side fuente, or as transformed, by nature or human, into zumo de naranja, golden cerveza frilla, full and warming vino tinto, multiple daily café cortados or soul-comforting Caldo Gallego. Each version of drink had its important function, slaking thirst from heat and effort under an unforgiving sun, or warming and reviving in the cold and chill.
I showered in the usually cold water and used it to hand-wash my clothes with a bar of soap and the ribbed scrubbing surface of a concrete or porcelain sink. In many hostels, those showers were time limited – only 5 minutes to soap up, scrub and rinse. Maybe there was hot water…but often not.
The cold water, in a tub, from a spring or in a stream was often a soothing balm for sore and blistered feet, washing away the heat of deep and superficial pain. It became easy for me to believe in the legendary healing properties of special waters at various holy places, such as from the well at San Bol, said to cure aching feet, or the Fuente Santa at Trasufre, whose waters could cure rashes, warts and other skin conditions. I didn’t have any of those, but I was thirsty. So I drank, and rubbed some of that water on my feet, just in case.
Cravings and aversions around water became regular enquiries for me along the Camino. Long walks under a hot sun drained limited water supplies quickly, leading to occasional irrational decisions and a bit of risk-taking at some path-side fuentes. Thirst took over, as equanimity and patience dissolved at the sight of cool water pouring from an old pipe coming up out of the ground.
That which I craved in its scarcity, though, I also cursed at times of abundance. Days of constant rain turned some trails and rough roadways into sticky, sloppy mud that clung to boots and sucked at soles. Paths turned into treacherous and slippery streams of run-off, gear stayed wet and stinky for days and skin and soul became wrinkled, raw and macerated, all contriving to pull my spirits into a cesspool of self-pity.
Still, as in life, things would always change.
On Day 36 of walking, my fatigue and constant back and leg pain drained away as I ambled into Santiago de Compostela with a few of my Camino family. The water that fell in those moments was from our eyes – tears that washed away the hardness of the Way, relief and happiness at having come through and shared this experience, sadness at the partings of this ending .
For me, though, there was still the coast as my spiritual destination. My pilgrimage was to near Muxia – a fishing village on the Spanish Atlantic coast that was on the same latitude as a little spot in Maine, in the United States, a place that has been a lifelong sanctuary for me. A place, by the shore, where my soul is always at home. Each summer of my life, alone, with my daughters or with others of that special community, I would sit on the beach and look eastward over the Atlantic, wondering what was on the other side. Now, I was on my way to that other side.
When I arrived on a quiet stretch of sand, at the water’s edge, I felt full and light as I dropped my gear, shed my sweat and dust-filled clothing and cast off the trail. I dove into the cold, clear surf, was lifted up by the waves, and let go to float on and to sink beneath the surface.
We merge, we part, like surf and shore, forever dancing in each other’s company. Separate, but still creating a particular Beauty in our togetherness.
Here was my true pilgrimage – to see the other side of my soul and to jump and swim and play and float. To be in this Ocean, to hold both sides of it in my mind, and to dissolve in returning to a place of Home.
Somos como gotas de agua separadas del Océano. Si no regresamos a él, el Océano extrañaría algo.
“We are each like drops of water, separated from the Ocean. If we would not go back to it, the Ocean would be missing something."
Bruce Minnes