Never alone

Paca was absolutely right.  The hardest thing about the Camino is letting it go.

When I got to Valencia, I felt numb.  It was disturbing to me how badly I wanted to go home, but all I could think about was curling up in my own bed, turning on some music, and tuning out the world.  I didn't want to be traveling anymore.

I allowed myself a day and a half to be mopey, but then it was time to wake up and face reality: the Camino is no longer my reality. It is a world of its own, and it exists in a tiny little bubble that eventually you have to burst. I love traveling more than anything, and the fact that I was considering booking myself an earlier flight home was upsetting.

I am incredibly lucky that I have friends all over the world, so I was able to ease back into traveling alone.  Abi, who I met in London in September, came to Valencia to spend a few days with me.  If he hadn't been there, I think I might have forgotten to eat.  When I got to Barcelona, Anton was there to meet me and let me stay at his apartment.  I met Anton a few years ago when he let me couchsurf at his place.  And the next day, Ungüento Jim drove to Barcelona from Madrid!  I went from feeling hopelessly lonely to being surrounded by people I love.

When you travel alone, you're never actually alone; you meet people at hostels or you make friends with the people you stay with.  You always have someone to talk to, someone to make sightseeing plans with, or someone to eat dinner with.  What traveling alone typically lacks, though, is that circle of support that keeps you going.  You form fast friendships because it's necessary, and you might even become Facebook friends, but you don't have anyone to share the important things with.  I feel so blessed to have been able to spend the last week with people who care about me instead of having to face this unique transition alone.  

One night in Valencia, I told Abi I had a headache and was feeling really sad.  He told me to take a nap, and when he woke me up he had cooked dinner for us.  We spent a few days wandering around the city at a leisurely pace with no agenda.  Having someone walk me to the train station and wait for me to turn around and wave one last time... there are few better feelings in the world.  It's the feeling I get every time my dad battles a snowstorm to drive me to the airport in Detroit so I can travel the world, or the feeling when my best friend Matt takes me to the airport and hugs me for a full minute, telling me he has watched the movie "Taken" a few times to refresh his memory on how to save me if something goes wrong.  It's the feeling I got today when Jim woke up at 4am to drive me in his rental car to the airport so I can fly to Prague, and it's the feeling I have right now knowing that my mama is meeting me near Chicago in a few weeks to take me home.  The people who love me and support my wanderlust by making my travels possible... I owe them the world.  Literally.

K

Barcelona, Spain