A Most Circuitous Route
“You can’t go back and change the beginning but you can start where you are and change the ending.” -C.S. Lewis
Inglesia parroquial de Santiago - A Coruña - aka Igrexa de Santiago
“Knock and the door will be opened to you.” Well maybe not in Galicia. I just needed to get that bit of cynicism out of my system. My Camino would begin with several trips over several days to the church where I needed to get my credential passport stamped - my first stamp in Spain. This stamp was the most important one next to the final one in Santiago de Compostela.
On this day, the priest finally arrived for my send-off. He spoke no English but was full of enthusiasm. After he applied his stamp, which felt like the church’s permission to begin, he paused. He got up and gathered a few prayer cards, the ones with Saints or the Virgin Mary on the front and a prayer on the back. They were in Spanish so he struggled to find a few words of English for me, something about the woman being the Saint of Nursing Mothers as he pointed to my breasts which had dried up three decades earlier. I wasn’t sure if I should feel offended by his referral to my bosom, so I took the blessings for what it was worth, lit a candle, and left.
Locked doors would be a running theme with churches that I’d hoped to visit along the way, a disappointment felt by many fellow pilgrims as well. It’s due in part to financial cutbacks. Priests now have many small parish churches to oversee, not just one. It’s also due to a high rate of vandalism and theft as Catholosims wanes. But I’d hoped to light candles along the way as I prayed for loved ones and myself. It is a nostalgic experience for me, like giving my Catholic-raised inner child a comforting hug.
In high school, I’d sometimes feel the need to take the long route home to the outdoor Grotte de Lourdes, in Vanier, Ontario. I’d light a candle when I could afford one and, when I couldn’t, I’d just sit and pray or cry. I even lit one without paying once, my need felt so great. I always imagined that the smoke from a candle lifted my prayer higher, closer to Heaven, and would lift my spirit with it. Like talk therapy with a counselor who’d listen intently to my woes, who just gave me the safe space to find my voice. Even though my beliefs have shifted to the left, lighting a candle lifts sorrow and worry for a while.
Most of the Camino’s churches, I would discover, were often closed on arrival. They didn’t keep pilgrim hours. Something that young Dora, in my screenplay Wayward, would take great offense to on my behalf. Her father, Liam, is Irish Catholic and her mother was on her way to becoming a nun before they met and married. He started a tour company for those coming over from Ireland and the UK to do the Camino Ingles and his groups would stay at his in-law’s casa. Dora would be conceived on the Camino. Actually, the idea of her as a character was.
30 km accounted for, 72.8 left to go - plus a few for detours.
After leaving the church, I found the first of the signposts of my Camino in Spain, with the scallop shell and the arrow. And I used a selfie stick for the very first time.
My youtube video link is under construction, but please check back sometime! The one I’d posted on Facebook during my trip died today along with my access to the photo collages set to music, including the one of me getting lost in a loop that passed this bus terminal three times!
The kilometer-and-a-half loop went something like this… Through the arch, through an alley of the shop near the Galerias, followed by a myriad of stores and offices. Crossing busy streets and ducking under the yellow construction site tape around a playground area to get to the shell symbol on the other side of it. More shops including one where a male person of small stature was puffing on a cigarette. A food court with a much-needed bathroom. Not necessarily all in that order. There were shells and arrows galore. By the third time around I figured that maybe all the city parks weren’t under renovation. And that the smoker wasn’t ducking into various doorways to get out of the rain while magically getting in front of me. And that A Coruña couldn’t possibly have three bus depots. Finally, I went into a small bank and asked for directions. It turns out that many pilgrims have gone in circles - most asked after the first loop. The city was going to do something about it eventually. This would become the place where Dora meets up with Farren for the second time and walks by saying “This way, idjut!”
Want to find out more about the screenplay and its cast of characters? Check out the Wayward pitch deck on the main page. Link to come when I get that bit figured out. This spot would be the beginning of a meaningful relationship between the two women. Life was creating art. I’d done over five kilometers at this point, too early to pack it in, even soaked through, so I kept on going because it was something Farren would do.
There was a surprising amount of graffiti along the way, some of it interesting or appealing, but there were places where it was offensive, or used to degrade places of worship. I guess accepting the good, the bad, and the ugly of it, letting it go, is all part of a pilgrim’s journey.
When I arrived at the road overlooking the water, I thought it a beautiful sight to exit my Camino for the day even though I hadn’t made it to Ponte do Burgo, but I didn’t want to push through and have it be a slog. My stages would involve commuting back to hotels and casas I’d booked along the way, using buses or cabs for the shuttling. Today, I took a cab back to the hotel for a hot bath and some hot chocolate.
Before turning in for the night, I wrote about the circuitous route in my journal, circled it, and labeled it “a must-have scene.” I also made a note to connect with the mayor and suggest better signage - something Liam would do for me in Wayward. Sometimes the trials provide the best rewards, as a tourist and as a writer.
This setback was an adventure in disguise and great fodder for art.
You can’t invent stories like this without authenticity. Well, maybe you can.
What setbacks can you use as grist for the writing mill? - And I’m not just talking about travel.
How comfortable are you with writing about your spirituality? Do you cater to your story or your audience?
What line do you draw between humor and comedy in your writing - or viewing - and why?
Ultreia! - Forward, together!
