Originally the Camino was a pilgrimage path ending at the Cathedral in the northern area of Spain. The distance a pilgrim walks depends on where he or she begins, but regardless for most, it is a pretty long way. For the author of this book the walk was around 1,000 miles.
The historical symbolism of the walk shows a person, a pilgrim, seeking God and asking for direction in his or her life, but nowadays it is a mecca for hikers and others seeking an adventure.
The author, who is a hiker looking for a long walk, shows no religious inclination for his walk, nevertheless does slide into several along the way. Probably his most important, to him, discovery is to not be so focused on getting to the end that you fail to live in the midst of your journey.
Living in the doing of the journey, taking your time to see what is around you, who is around you, and the life that is happening while you are walking....these are his insights for himself.
Life is filled with different journeys. We are moving on several at the same time, depending on the time element.
The journey from birth to death is one that encompasses the entirety of our earthly lives, but many others come and go within that same time frame, several taking place at the same time. That life journey is always running in the background of whatever is going on in our lives at the moment.
As you readers know, or should know, we, at this household, are on a health journey. It is seemingly the overriding one at this point, but I realize that, although it almost consumes our lives right now, it is only a part of the life journey that we are on.
Some days, my ambition is to get to the end of the day, get my spouse in bed, and sit down and read and think and pray and....That is not good for either of us to have that goal in mind as the hours go by, sometimes slowly, in our day.
I like it when I read in that pilgrimage book that there are times in our journeys that we need not to rush, but look for meaning and inspiration as we travel that road. I feel that is true, but sometimes the mind is just too filled with the tyranny of the urgent.
Rushing to the end is not an option.
God has called me to be the loving caregiver that He desires, and that is what I have pledged to do. Possibly I can look back down the road and see how it all fit together. I trust that this is so.
Others have it so much tougher in life, I know that, but I still have the wish that it did not have to be this way for us. I miss a lot of the laughter, the fun times, the interaction over common events. We still have some, but....
So, when you think of us, Pray and then pray some more. Not that it will rush to an end, but that we can both see that Jesus walks the road with us, and He cares.
It is not what the road looks like, it is who we travel it with.
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