Blisters

I stood in LAX, my backpack clingling to my shoulders, my hair grabbing my neck while I watched a man with a handlebar mustache graze a boy cuddling a lap dog. Millions of footsteps pattered into the air and walls, the clicks of heels and taps of sandles meshing with the sweat beading its way to the travellers´white knuckles grasping a bit too havy suite cases. The owner of the stroller beside me meekly walked from the bathroom with a Bambi eyed boy plotting along behind her. ¨Tank you.¨ Her broken English seemed to leap from her eyes. Eyes that know pain. Eyes I will remmeber. Eyes I will probably never see again. But eyes that connected with mine for a brief moment in time. I am now at my fourth hostle on the Camino de Santiago. Last night there was a thunderstorm. I lost at spoons with the other pilgrims... six times. A trilingual elderly lady at the last hostle dressed my eight blisters while juggling paperwork and stamps and while giving in french. I ate fish in the same diner as Hemmingway. My skin is darker. My knees are scraped. I ate white asparagas for the first time. I lost my walking stick. My heart is full. My God is good. 

My hat has a logo that says ¨live simply.¨ I think living simply can be one of the most complex concepts to grasp. I walked and talked with a middle aged pilgrim named Maurizio on the first day when we were crossing the Pyranees mountains. He smiled when I bought sheep cheese from a vendor. We explored an old shepherd´s hut. We talked about God and brothers. About ¨sheeps¨ and shoes and hard boiled eggs. I spoke the limited Spanish I knew. He spoke the limited English he knew. It was simple. But it was some of the most memorable communication I have ever had.

I asked Maurizio what life advice he would give. He laughed. ¨Take it easy¨ he breathed through fainted laughs and calculated breaths from climbing with a pack. ¨Follow Me.¨ Christ´s words are simple. We are the one´s who make it complicated. It´s taken me flying to Spain and carrying my life on my back to even start to grasp what it means. It´s taken eating apple cores and packaged almond butter instead of home cooked meals. It´s taken living with a nail clipper as a luxury. It´s taken washing the clothes on my back with the shampoo from my hair, the smiles and nods of a language barrier and the card games and the feeling of fat rain drops to see what matters in life. When everything is stripped away, the things your beaded, sweaty fingers are desperately clinging to, that´s when you know what your life is founded on. That´s why this trek is already life changing after only four days. My foundation is Christ, and when everything is brushed away, a dirt path and blistered feet can be the most powerful direction a person can take to realize it.