Episode 6 – El Burgo Ranero to Mansillas de Las Mulas

The Camino from El Borgo Ranero to Mansillas is really beautiful but monotonous in a way, its 22 km of soft dirt path, distant from any major highway, very little up or down with beautiful shade trees spaced evenly apart every 10 or so meters all along the way.

I was out walking by 8 AM with a cool breeze and, like the day before, never felt tempted to bring out my earbuds.

After 2 or 3 km, my thoughts turned inward. I thought about that afternoon the third week in June of 2015 when Cary was very unexpectedly diagnosed with a very rare and very deadly brain cancer. I remembered being almost in a state of shock. I had never in my life felt more scared. Her first surgery was immediately scheduled for the next morning at 7 AM.

I was up all night reading about brain cancer and I knew from her diagnosis that if the disease ran it’s expected course, my time with Cary and the children’s time with their mom would be limited.

By the time she was out of surgery I knew what I had to do. I knew I had to show Cary more love than I ever had before which wouldn’t be difficult because I loved her more than I ever had before. I had to appear brave and courageous because it wouldn’t do the children any good to know how scared I was. I had to make the best decisions that I could about her medical care and treatment and I had to do the best I could to hold together the family that we had made together.

I was so scared but I didn’t feel lonely or alone. We had so many wonderful family and friends who were with us and I didn’t feel lost or confused either.

10 1/2 months later when she passed into memory, I wasn’t scared any more. The worst had happened, what else was there to fear? And if there’s nothing to fear then courage and bravery aren’t even an issue.

I did begin to feel a sense of loneliness even when I was with my closest family and friends. I was grief stricken and profoundly sad but I still didn’t feel lost or confused.

Again, I knew what I needed to do because Cary had expressed her final wishes. I needed to make a beautiful cemetery on the farm in Vermont for her so she could rest peacefully. I had to find a beautiful stone and an artist who could make her a monument as beautiful and special as she was.

I didn’t begin to feel lost or confused until a little less than a year ago after the unveiling of her headstone. I’ve tried since then to keep busy with one project or another so that I wouldn’t feel so lost and to distract me from the sadness and sense of loneliness.

I thought about a lot of things as I walked. I thought about the first person plural pronouns; we, us and our. For months after her passing, I paused when I would use one of them because it reminded that there wasn’t any more we or us, that I had lost her. For a while, I made a real effort to use; I, me and mine but it wasn’t any better.

Many times,  as I was walking on the Camino toward Mansillas, I don’t know how many, someone would pass me and I’d rush to wipe away the tears as they wished me Buen Camino.

Thoughts, feelings, memories, emotions and my own voice asking and answering questions, all inside my head and I just kept walking.  At one point, I heard my own voice with my own ears because I was talking to myself out loud.

As I kept waking, I gradually began to realize that I wasn’t feeling so alone. I can’t really say that I felt Cary walking next to me (which would have been a wonderful feeling) but I wasn’t feeling quite so lonely.

About 7 miles after El Burgo Ranero there’s a built up place called Reliegos with a couple of places with tables out front where people were stopping to rest. I had been walking for well over 2 hours non stop so I decided to stop and sit and have a coca cola and water.

I was sitting there feeling pretty good, shoes and socks off tending to the blisters on my feet (a common activity on the Camino) relaxing and hydrating when two women walked up and set their backpacks and poles down at the table next to me. They were clearly a lot younger than I am but older than most of the younger crowd on the Camino. Like me they had booked places to stay in advance so we had something in common and we struck up a bit of a conversation.

They were from Toronto and had been friends for 10 or more years. They had met and become friends when their sons were in the same grade school class. Their sons had started college this year so they were both empty nesters and they were both making career changes. They hadn’t been big walkers but they heard about the Camino, trained for a few weeks and decided to go for it on an impulse. I believe their names were Sonja and Jennifer.

They had started in St Jean and had walked together for 18 days. I asked them, really tongue in cheek, how the friendship was holding up and they both said it was stronger than ever.

They were very nice and easy to talk with and we decided to walk along together toward Mansillas.  We talked about families and careers, health and wellness, sickness and death. We exchanged stories and laughed some. They told me that after the Camino they were flying from Santiago to Rome where they were meeting their husbands. The four of them were going to vacation together in Abruzzi before they headed back to Toronto.

They were clearly devoted, loving wives and mothers. Their husbands were as lucky to have them as I was to have Cary. At one point one of them took a selfie of the three of us. I wish I had but I have this picture of them when we met up in Reliegos.

They were very nice to talk and walk with but after a half hour or so I felt a real yearning to return to the place where I had been earlier in the day, walking alone but not feeling lonely.

So I bid them Buen Camino thinking that I’d see them again. That’s what usually happens on the Camino.

As I walked on, now alone, I speculated about why they had come to the Camino and whether there would be any profit in it for them. They didn’t tell me in exact words why they were on the Camino but it seemed to me that their lives were in a transition period, they were good friends and needed time to think. I had no doubt they would profit. Their bond of friendship had already strengthened and I thought of the reunion they would have with their husbands in Rome and the fun the four of them would have on vacation together. I felt genuinely happy for them and I do hope I see them again.

I then turned the question on myself. Why was I here? Why had I come to the Camino? Would there be any profit in it for me?

The truth is I had come, just because. Just because it was something Cary and I had thought to do together one day. I knew that if Cary and I had come together it would have been a fun adventure for us to share, like the adventures we  had riding Lusitano stallions in Portugal or the adventures we had with the kids in the rain forests of Costa Rica.

I think I was figuring that since we couldn’t go on this fun adventure together, I’d go on the adventure alone and try to have fun by myself. I also thought it would be good to be some place far away, away from the constant reminders that I had lost my wife.

I’ve never thought of myself as much of a spiritual person. I think of myself as being more practical than spiritual although those two things are not mutually exclusive but before I reached Mansillas de Las Mulas, I began to get the inkling of an idea that my time on the Camino might evolve into more of a real pilgrimage.

I was again walking alone by myself but not really feeling lonely and at least for a while I wasn’t feeling so lost.

I was feeling a little bit like I kind of knew where I was and kind of knew where I going.

I was on the Camnio. I was heading to Santiago.

I was in really good spirits when I reached Mansilla de Las Mulas. It’s a delightful medieval town with an intact 12th Century wall and fortifications, a Museo Etnografico and ancient churches. And I had dinner at an amazing restaurant called La Curiosa.

Next stage Mansillas to Leon.

Buen Camino