Category: Food – Mind

Why?

Why?

Cause I can, cause it’s fun, cause I was made to, cause I want to.

The question of why was asked. I’ve heard from some pilgrims that they knew why they were walking the Camino: to find God and to maybe change. Well what if that person doesn’t look for God? And what if they don’t want to change? Is that really their “why” then?

If you don’t chase a goal is that really why you’re here? If a man loves a woman but doesn’t pursue her does he really love her? If Jesus sent earth a text message saying, “Hey, btw I <3 u.” Would we still be celebrating Him? If you want something don’t you seek it? If you love something wouldn’t you give your life for it?

The Camino isn’t over and neither is life. Asking why everyday is an opportunity to be someone different. “Why?” Is like opening my eyes and seeing an exit off of the road I’m on: I can change or I can stay the same – no pressure. To say I want to change and not take the exit, not do something different, is to stay in the same lane. The turn signal is on but I drive on by.

I have two legs. I am young and physically capable. These are resources. I believe in using my assets to their full ability. Walking brings a rush of natural dopamine; especially after a large hill. The sun feels good on the skin and I read somewhere that the best way to bond with a new friend is to busy yourselves with a shared task. I’ve never been to Spain or a country with another language. I’ve never walked for miles across cities and countryside and lived as a pilgrim. I wanted to try it.

Because I can, because it’s fun, because I wanted to.

I was made to. A microwave has a purpose: to heat things. If the microwave tries to behave like a food processor then there will be many broken plates. In the same way I have a body and mind for a reason, I can use them or I can not. The Camino is my attempt at using both. A wise friend of mine told me that time will either promote me or expose me. I sincerely hope that after all this work I am promoted as a man who learned and not exposed as one who missed an opportunity.

The Cathedral

The Cathedral was full of people. People in the pews, people standing under the arches, people painted on the walls, sculptures of people hanging in the rafters and holding up the golden artwork. Hundreds of statues depicting saints and cupids climbed up and down the two gigantic pipe organs high up on the walls. 

“Catholics have the best churches” breathed Aidan quietly.

The mass began and we sat. A nun sang and led us in worship. Only Anne Domínguez understood the Spanish so the rest of us worshipped in our own ways. I bowed my head and prayed, others did similarly, some sang, others observed patiently. I tried to spy the person playing the organ but couldn’t find them from my vantage point in the back rows of the sanctuary. I’m still not sure if the music was recorded or not.

The priest would say something and then everyone would chant back in unison. The only words I could catch were, “Y con su espíritu.” – “and with your spirit.” The priest would often raise both of his arms when he spoke and there were several other priests standing around at the altar wearing red robes and nodding agreeably. 

As the service continued I thought to myself that if Jesus were to come to church we might have to teach Him how to do it. He would have to learn about ushers, confessional booths, tithe baskets, hail mary prayers, etc. 

As our way of worshipping God has evolved some very unusual things have been developed. We all were very excited when they swung a giant incensor across the room and any oddity was basically lost in the wonderful slapstick of the thing. People kept sneaking up behind the statue of James and hugging him mid-service. The priest carried the cup of communion wafers down the isle and myself and others lined up to receive it. 

As the paintings and sculptures showed, people enjoy being a part of things. The cathedral in this case was a building dedicated to God full of people and depictions of people. People come from far and wide to see it; and most people seem to get a kick out of it. Maybe it isn’t narcissism though, maybe people just love celebrating their role and connection to their faith. If you’re given a gift why not be proud that it’s yours?

The gang and I left the cathedral quietly. The service had been pleasant and we decided to go and celebrate our completion of El Camino and each other with some gelato. A new tradition of celebration beginning.

Church at Sobrado

Annie had been gone all afternoon. Aidan and I had done our laundry, gone to the supermarket and were unloading our groceries when we finally saw her again. 

“Where have you been all day?” I asked.

“In the cathedral, you guys have to come check it out!”

There wasn’t much else to do so we followed.

We entered in through the bead curtain that lead to the back of the chapel. Instantly the temperature dropped 15 degrees. The sunlight faded away in the hall behind us. 

It was dark like a cave. Shafts of light from the windows showed clouds of dust hanging between the building’s arches. Vines were in the rafters and on the walls along with patches of moss and green algae. 

There was no ornamentation. No relics. And therefore no tourists. Only Jesus, nailed to the cross, looked out at us from the gloom. He hung in the center of the building; alone.

We became silent. After fifteen minutes, I left. 

Annie Landis and I sat in the sun for a while thinking. 

“I was hoping you were going to sing.” 

I turned to Annie, surprised. “Really? Why?” Annie shrugged.

“I don’t know. I was just hoping you would.”

Later that night we returned; Aidan, Anne D., Annie Landis, and I. The atmosphere was the same. Again we stopped talking and sat quietly. For a long while we all sat, praying and thinking. I felt Annie’s eyes on me. I breathed in deep and sang.

I’m not sure what my friends believed in that night. But as I sang out the words of my favorite worship song it felt like worship wasn’t coming from me alone but from all of us. My last notes echoed out and we fell silent again. After a while we left quietly.

We had church in Sobrado in a thousand year-old building dedicated to Christ. I realized later that the church felt powerful because of it’s lack of extra fixtures. The cupids and saints in other churches are pretty but the message of the gospel will always be as simple as Christ alone, hanging there for humanity. Annie told me later that that night was one of the highlights of her Camino.

On Switching It Up

When my uncle drinks he falls in love. With me, with the world, with the cat – you name it. The smell of Stella Artois on his breath always makes me happy because it means I’m about to be bear-hugged and smothered by his bristling beard still reeking of cigarette smoke.

When Bill Arney drinks he lacerates my writing.

The cup slammed down on the table empty.

“See this? – ‘When I called my father a few minutes later I almost cried telling him about the kindness the lady showed to me’ – this is all about your feelings again!

“Ah.”

Bill was not amused. He glowered as he poured over my document now ignoring his wine completely. I sat around at the table trying not to look sheepish.

“Forget words like ‘presently.'”

“Got it.”

“‘I had been reading my Bible in the sun…’ Who cares?”

“Okay so what should I do?”

Bill frowned and leaned back, exasperated.

“How about instead of asking me questions you go and play around with your sentences.”

I nodded. Bill shook his head.

I returned to my study, which also doubles as the couch in the hostel kitchen. I wiped clean the half-finished blog post I had been working on and stared at the page for a bit.

“Mistakes aren’t funny.”

I was a rookie again standing on stage getting chewed out by my band director.

“You have to play like a pro.” Said Hector. “There’s always somebody younger and better than you who wants your spot. Be consistent.”

The drummer twirled his sticks and looked away. The rest of the band shifted their weight uncomfortably as Hector continued to lay into me.

“Just don’t play so white man. You’re not grooving. Find the groove.”

That’s what I needed. The groove.

How do you make words pulse?

“Click, click, click, click.” The bass comes in.

“T-tiss.” The snare starts to snap while the hi-hat sizzles.

“Mmmm.” The keyboard gets poured into the mix like cream into coffee.

“Wrr-wicka.” The guitar plays in the pocket like icing on the cake.

Instinctual. Primal.

I learned to make my hand loose, my wrist relaxed. I slid into notes and crept into solos instead of nailing them exactly to the wall. The new kids can’t do what I do or how I do it. Only easy when you don’t think too hard and just play.

Wasn’t that what Bill was saying? Play. Don’t write. Play. Don’t perform. Build the words like blocks in a preschool classroom. I-see-spot-run. Spot-gets-hit-by-a-bus. Flip it. Bus-gets-hit-by-spot. Bus-is-hospitalized. Adult sensibility screams, “But that doesn’t make any sense!”

Who cares? It made me smile. Okay. Now I’m writing again.

Finished. Maybe not great. But definitely different.

“Definitely warmer.” Bill emailed me two days later. Warmth. Writing that has a smell and a temperature. Writing that remembers my drunk uncle singing David Bowie louder than the record. Warmth. If I can’t smell the sun tan lotion and feel the wind in the palm trees then I’m not there yet.

I slid on to my bunk in a Santander hostel and picked up my pen.

As easy as falling in love. With the world, with the cat, with Stella Artois, with whatever you like as long as the pen keeps moving. Two German girls sitting in their bunks giggled and said something looking at me, but I was too in love to notice.

 

Stealing

Annie D. Asked, “What’s the one thing you like here that you don’t like at home?” That’s hard for me because home is somewhere I like more than anywhere else. It took some thinking. 

As I started in on my second package of salami in a sitting the answer dawned on me. Food!

Roció took me out looking for food one night in Pamplona. The menu was all in Basque-Spanish. Roció did all the talking. When our feast arrived everything looked disgusting.

Blood sausage in a bowl. Rocío thought I needed some meat on my bones so that was what I got. Octopus wedges was the first choice of our friend Esterr. Roció received a steaming plate of black goo.

After gulping down as much blood sausage as I could stomach I became desperate to try anything else. “Want to try my squid?” Asked Roció.

“HUH?”

“Oh don’t be a child.”

Roció passed me the plate of black goo.

“Why’s it black?”

“That’s the squid ink that they cook it in.”

Yuck. I bit in. 

“I’m pretty sure I can taste its brain.”

“Oh shush it’s good.”

The squid tasted like what a fish’s butt must taste like. I informed the girls that I would not be trying any more squid.

“Come on let’s go out to the bar!” said Roció after finishing off the last off the squid.

“But I’m in my pajamas!”

The girls were already walking out the door.

A Spanish gay bar at 11:00 in your pajamas is only a good situation if you’re a certain type of person. The naked man on the wall with a telephone chord wrapped around his junk could have just been modern art. The holographic penises hanging from the ceiling were the dead giveaway. Loudly dressed Pamplona locals jostled up against us and Roció and I grinned at each other as I asked her what on earth we were doing there.

The answer to Annie’s question is this: everything here can be a little adventure, even the food. At home my Friday night pizza rarely leads to a night on the town in a medieval city. Roció is hosting me in Madrid in June and our first adventure together began over a plate of black goo.

Hard to Reconcile

There are moments in one´s life that are hard to reconcile.

When I was on my knees puking into a hostel toilet bowl at 1 in the morning, I thought that maybe this would be a night that I could salvage as an excuse to sleep the next day. At three in the morning however, I realized that it was just a bad night.

I wasn´t drinking that evening. I had decided to leave my European friends behind in Pamplona that morning in order to spend some time with my American classmates. We roamed Puente la Reina a bit and then I asked a Spanish man if there was a pharmacy availible on Sunday. After some discussion he kindly led us to the pharmacy and asked the owner to open it up for us. We ate some candy and then we all went to dinner at a cafe that sported a €6 paella sign out front. We went in and for some reason there was no €6 paella so I ordered a greasy-looking pasta with mushrooms. I didn´t drink any wine with the others, because I don´t like the taste, and instead spent dinner scarfing down my pasta. At one point my friend Twan from Holland wandered in and he joined us for a relaxed and friendly meal.

I went to bed tired but ready to face the day tomorrow.

At midnight I awoke with a lump in my stomach. At first I thought I was dreaming but as a burning sensation grew in my chest I sadly realized that I was not. I recalled with bitter irony the conversation that I had just had with Harry before dinner that evening about my fear of throwing up and how I hated it above all physical ailments. Finally I decided that the feeling wouldn´t pass and I hurried to the co-ed restroom of the crowded hostal.

I spend an hour at the toilet dry-heaving and then finally throwing up. It was awful and as I finished I had the suspicion that I had one good one left in me. I couldn´t face it so I went to bed.

At 3 AM I ran to the restroom, no longer sad or worried but full of animal instinct to do what must be done. I grabbed the toilet and puked harder than I´ve ever puked in my entire life. The force of it was such that I lost my grip on the toilet and shot back across the floor continuing the stream from my mouth. I rolled on the dirty floor spewing vomit and gasping. I crawled to the toilet in the next stall over and began to throw up into that one. vomit matted my face and hair and the entire floor of the bathroom was covered in the stuff.

Finally it was over.

I sneezed out the last of the cargo and stood in the middle of the room, gasping in shock from what I had just experienced. At that unfortunate moment the door began to open and a poor old woman stepped into the restroom. I yelled ¨Don´t!¨right as her foot stepped into the massive puddle on the floor. She looked up at me in terror as I flailed my arms yelling in Spanish that I hadn´t had alcohol, it was just bad food. I realized a moment too late that the woman spoke neither Spanish nor English.

The woman walked into a stall shakily. I stood there having no idea what to do; not even a good guess. No hospitaleros were still at the hostal this late, and I was afraid of the woman waking up the whole dormitory and everyone seeing the terrible mess. The woman finally came out of the stall. I said something weakly in English but she just shook her head, pointed to a mop in the corner, and left the room. I conceded defeat and nodded.

I spent the next twenty minutes mopping up my sea of puke. The time was extended a bit since, in my weakened condition, I ended up tipping the full bucket back over again on to the floor by mistake. After my second time mopping up my vomit, I sighed and went back to bed.

I spent almost the entire next 24 hours asleep in a hotel room that my father bought for me. I do not take the privilage of this recovery lightly, generosity from my father and kindness from the lady at the front desk who checked on me in the morning was enough to raise my spirits far beyond where I thought they could be after such a blow. My European friends caught up and made sure I was okay, offering to bring me anything that I needed. We all ended our day together in Estella the next day.

I am now once again healthy and walk happily with Flo, Maria, and Rocio each day. I sincerely hope that I have suffered the worst that El Camino has to offer me because my night of sickness was truly miserable and I hope to never have one like it again. In the end it was indeed redeemed because I got to walk again with my new friends. I have learned my lesson and now stick to their sides and to eating mainly salad.