We leave in 3 days. 3 DAYS! For so long this camino journey has been very academic. This is what we're going to do, and this is how we will train, and this is what we will prepare, and I find that now that the time has come, I'm freaking out a little bit.
The guidance counselor where I work just had a baby (like 1:00 yesterday). I was talking to her about the baby coming and about my camino. and we realized that we were in the exact same situation. She'd had 9 months to prepare for this baby coming, and now that her due date was approaching, she just wanted it to be there, even though she felt totally unprepared. I have been planning this camino for almost 2 years, and all through the last quarter of school I've been saying, I just want June 8th to be here. And I find that now that it's June 4th, I'm scared. But a good scared. A "this is the most important, most exciting thing I've ever done" kind of scared.
My list of "shoulds" is a mile long. I should be packing, I should make certain that I have everything I need, I should be out walking, I should be doing this or that, or the other. But I'm not I'm taking an evening for me.
It's so hard for me to believe that next week at this time, I'll be less than a day's walk out of Pamplona. PAMPLONA! I've wanted to go there ever since I started studying Spanish. Of course I'll be a month early for the running of the bulls, but that's ok with me. I will have to get a lot of good pictures for all of my classes for when I return.
I'm finding that the hardest thing for me to deal with, isn't the walk. It isn't anything physical about the trek. It isn't not seeing my parents for 7 weeks, because I'll be able to talk to them on the phone (skype whatever). It isn't leaving the US for Spain, though I'm seriously doubting in my Spanish abilities (don't tell my students). The hardest part of my whole camino trip, is being away from my baby niece. She'll be turning 1 this summer and I'll be missing it (though if all goes according to plan we'll reach Compostela on her birthday.) I can't talk to her on the phone, and I'm sure that my brother and sister-in-law will forget to e-mail me any new pictures. She's going to change so much and I'm going to miss it. I know that she wont realize I'm not there for her birthday, but I'll realize it. She will have many more birthdays and many more years for me to take her picture and squeeze and love her to bits. I can give-up 7 weeks for a worthy cause. Sorry this got so emotional, I'm just kind of rambling.
Well to everyone reading, wish us luck. We board our plane to Paris on Tuesday. I hope we'll be able to update a lot along the way.
Buen Camino
Carrie
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All the best- in no time you will be on the plane and it will all be starting.... I think I remember hearing that the albergue in Pamplona gets closed during the running of the bulls, so it is probably just as well you are missing it. Buen Camino!
ReplyDeleteCatalina just think in a couple of years you can bring your niece with you when you return to walk it for a 2nd/3rd time! A Camino friend of mine took her nephew and niece (11 & 12 years old) from SJPP to Pamplona(via the Route Napoleon) last Autumn and they had a great adventure.
ReplyDeleteBonne route
Nell
I already have a friend that wants to come with on the next one. I told her I want to do the Via de la Plata. She said "Just tell me when"
ReplyDeletegood luck carrie. i cant wait to see the new you when you get back! babies might change a lot in a couple months, but you are going to change too! ! !
ReplyDeleteim going to miss you like crazy!