walking the Camino 2

2  Walking the Camino de Santiago?

Shortly after my mom's diagnosis I pondered cancelling a summer trip back packing around Europe with my husband. She said " No, you go.  The world is the best classroom you can enter. Go see it!  Travel while you can!"
 
I so wanted life to go on as usual after the shock of my own diagnosis with PD  had settled.  I wanted to keep traveling as  my mom dad encouraged me over twenty years ago.

When my mother finally  left  this world for a much better place, my husband and I were given the task of removing her personal items from the family home. There was one very large dresser that took up the entire wall of my parents' bedroom. This  dresser we did not touch. It held mementos of her lifetime of travels.  I wanted  time to look through the things she'd saved; to discover what she thought was important to keep.  My dad saw to it  that my mother did a great deal of traveling in the last 6 years of her life, while she was fighting ovarian cancer.  Shortly after my mom's diagnosis I pondered cancelling a summer trip around Europe with my husband. She said " No, you go.  The world is the best classroom you can enter. Go see it! Travel while you can!" 

Twenty four years late I sat down to clean out her dresser as we would soon be selling the family home. Receipts, postcards, itineraries, ticket stubs, menus, napkins and matchbooks revealed a part of my parents' life I knew really knew nothing of...their love of travel.  Although I did not save little moments like my mom, I certainly inherited her big desire to roam the earth.

Prior to my "early retirement" I started a list, a bucket list, of great walks my husband and I would take when our kids were grown and we had the time.   With my diagnosis of Parkinson's Disease a hole developed in my bucket. The list started leaking out. I said to  Charlie "Do you think we can go on one of these walks?"  He replied " Yes, but sooner than later.  What's at the top of your list?"   "Camino de Santiago."  "Get planning".   

The Camino de Santiago is an ancient Christian pilgrimage route that has recently regained popularity worldwide. Walkers find paths leading from all parts of western Europe to Santiago, where it is said the remains of St James, the apostle of Jesus, are buried.  

Charlie, our 13 year old  second child Luke and I geared up for 30 or more days of walking in Spain.  As the planning continued our little family added Charlie's brother Al and our family friend Jeremy.   Nephew Brandon and his mom Yvette planned to meet us in Burgos, Spain.  Al's and Charlie's sister Cecelia, Al' s wife Delora and their son Joshua rounded our " family" to 10 in Sarria.  

I was four years into my diagnosis with Parkinson's.  My medication and exercise regiment had smoothed out.  I felt confident that the Camino was going to be an awesome experience.Yet our first day of walking from Saint Jean Pied du Port in France to the our nights stay at the Orisonne Albergue traumatized me.   I had three major panic attacks, took two medication induced naps, and struggled 8 hours to walk the 8 steep kilometers. I screamed at my husband  "If it's going to be like this, Charlie, I can't do it!"  "Sure you can.  It's just one foot of the other", a phrase we have used with each other all our married lives.

Walking across Spain with my husband's family in the heat of June and July  was wonderful, challenging, exciting, arduous and agonizing all at the same time.  With all the support and encouragement the walk should have been a totally enjoyable experience.  Can I list the events that made it less than enjoyable?  Rashes and blisters and tendinitis and medication challenges and sleepless nights accentuated by snoring pilgrims in the albergues.  Medication misplaced and broken trekking poles and bus rides and taxis  and losing my balance while peeing in the bushes and just wanting to walk quietly with no pain.

No, I was not satisfied with my Camino experience.  

 I didn't write much about what I was going through at the time. It was deeply engrained in me and I knew I would not forget a moment of that agony. Who would want to hear of my misery, anyway?  It didn't match the hopeful and positive Person with Parkinson's disease I appeared to be.  The journey took us over three mountain ranges, across the meseta (a long dusty plateau of agricultural nothingness) through eucalyptus forests and vineyards.  We slept in albergues, dormitory like dwellings with bunk beds and showers, and took out meals at "bars" or with picnic. supplies purchased at small markets.Walking 16-23 kilometers a day in the elements. It had all looked good and fun on paper.  It wasn't.

Returning from the Camino  I was surprised to find that through an impromptu Facebook and First Giving drive, my friends and family donated $7000 in my honor to  research for a cure of Parkinson's disease. My spirits were lifted.

Oregon Health and Sciences University acknowledged the gifts given on my behalf and allowed me to have a display and show some slides at their annual Parkinson's Conference. I had to adjust my attitude to to show the positive  hopeful pilgrim with Parkinson's Disease.

And, as   I scribbled out thank you's for the gifts, I secretly planned a return to the Camino.... soon, on a solo adventure!