Day IX: Cirueña -> Belorado; 18.5.

🛏:Albergue El Corro; 8€.

🍴:

“There are things you do because they feel right & they may make no sense & they may make no money & it may be the real reason we are here: to love each other & to eat each other’s cooking & say it was good.” – B. Andreas

Hostels with kitchens have become a group favorite. Tonight we all chipped in and the result was the above picture and more – salad, pasta, chocolate fondue, ice cream and approximately one bottle of wine per person.

One of my Irish friends described el Camino as “a giant game of hide and seek” and it was the perfect explanation. Each morning we all start at different times and then spend the day passing each other on the trail or walking past someone eating lunch at a cafe and decide to join them. And then without fail (and typically with a tiny bit of help from whatsapp), we all end up in the same town, often at the same hostel and then we start all over again the next day. “You can’t stay hidden even if you try,” he said.

🎒:

These travel organizers have been a life saver on this trip and the cactus pattern is my all time favorite (of twenty-four choices).

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B076HS6N2W?psc=1&ref=yo_pop_mb_yo_pop_mb_pd_t2

Today I walked 18.5 miles in chacos and socks. It was strangely invigorating. I hadn’t planned to wear them all day, it just happened. I also hadn’t planned to spend all day talking to a lawyer from Hawaii about faith, organized religion and authors I used to read or walking into cathedrals along the way, that just happened, too.

Aside from a mouth-the-words-to-carols Christmas Eve service, I haven’t set foot inside of a church in months before today. If I’m being honest, over those same months the only people I haven’t tuned out at any mention of church or God are Nichole Nordeman, a dear friend I recently road-tripped to California with, my cousin and my cousins’ husband. Today I unexpectedly added a lawyer from Hawaii to that list.

I’m not trying to be stubborn or closed minded, I just needed to take a step back. I told my lawyer friend that over the past few years everything I thought I believed had been cracking in the places I let unanswered (and unasked) questions sit. And then it inherently began to crumble.

It’s hard to put a puzzle back together when you have no idea what the picture is supposed to look like complete. And I don’t want to make the mistake of forcing pieces to fit or putting them where other people tell me to put them. I’ve done enough of that.

I don’t want to sit here forever. I’m not choosing to be lost and confused, but I want to look for answers because I want them (and feel ready for them), not just to say I asked.

🎧:“.. sitting in the rubble, I can see the stars.” – Nichole Nordeman (The Unmaking)