yo camino

There is thing I have definitely learned from walking across the Iberian Peninsula: I love to walk.

I have always been envious of friends who have found their sport, the form of exercise that doesn´t feel like exercise--running, tennis, yoga, bicycling. I have wished that I had some similar type of play. Now I do. It´s not going to raise my heart rate a whole lot. It´s not going to make me amazingly fit. It is going to make me happy.

I loved getting up and putting on my boots and wandering around. I love moving my body.

I can only think of one time on the Camino when I wanted to quit walking before I got to my destination. I was just outisde of Leon when I got lost (I was thinking of Bush at the time.) and had to wend through a really yucky urban area and it was hot, and I just wanted to take the damn bus. I didn´t like walking then.

Usually, though, even when I was miserable, I was glad to be walking. When I was going through an industrial strip outside of Burgos, I was glad that I was outside, even in the pollution. I felt superior to the people in the cars.

There was a day that was so rainy that my boots and socks got wet. I didn´t mind walking in the downpour and the rivers of puddles, but I was afraid I would get blisters and wouldn´t be able to walk anymore. The prospect of not being able to walk was the worst part. That´s the worst part when I think about going home now--not being able to walk, having to be the person in the car.

Sometimes, though, I´ll be the person walking, walking.