I feel it. An inkling. A stirring. Or maybe it's just the double shot of espresso I had earlier this morning with a friend. As I walk the outdoor fairgrounds in preparation for my pilgrimage on the Camino Frances, I have a tickling sensation of the need for this long walk, the need to continue these long walks even after my camino is finished. Wait-what nonsense am I talking? I haven't even started this crazy trip! I hate walking. Not fast enough, not aerobic enough, not mentally challenging enough. How did I even get to this point?
I'll tell you how I got here-a friend casually mentioned watching the movie The Way, with Martin Sheen. Great. I'm living a cliche, getting ready to walk 500+ miles from France, across the Pyrenees and Spain, to reach the Cathedral of St. James, and I'm not even a Catholic ("not that there's anything wrong with that"), all because my friend suggested we watch a movie and do this same trip sometime (did I mention in the movie someone dies while walking), and then she got married and that ended that...for her. My mistake was mentioning this movie to my husband. Last time I mentioned something off-hand to him, "You should see this beautiful house on the market that's so cheap," we were moving three months later into a house that is now lovingly referred to as "ye olde money pit." Cheap it was not. On top of all this, I'm BLOGGING. OH. NO. AND WRITING IN ALL CAPS. PERIODS. GALORE. But I digress. My husband is the real hiker. He has the equipment to prove it. Me? I'd rather get my heart rate up for 30 minutes and be done with it, all in the comforts of my own home and preferably while hyper-watching something on Netflix. Nevertheless, for the past few months I've been walking, most of the time with a 12 lb. backpack, getting in my camino mode and trying ever so hard to ready my body for this little over a month-long trip. "Those Who Know" say a person must walk walk walk to toughen the feet, strengthen the tendons and muscles, and acclimate the pack to the body. Well, some say this. Others say there's not really anything that can be done to prepare adequately. And toughen the feet? Nooo, one must slather them with special balms and oils. Shoot, I even read they should be soaked in a vinegar solution. Or was it a urine solution. I'll talk more about this whole camino preparation thing later, but really I want to go back to my coffee.
I love coffee. I kinda know coffee. I like to think I kinda know coffee. The barista quickly put that to rest this morning. She asked if I wanted a splash of milk to keep the shots alive. Are they in danger of dying before I swig them towards my gut and move them quickly into my veins? "Well, espresso only lasts about 10 seconds before it goes bad," she knowingly informed me. Yikes, give me that splash then! As I finished my walk, the one I intended to last 1.5 hrs but which took only 1 hr. thank you doppio, I realized this coffee episode might just represent something more. A warning perhaps. It hit me clearly that I better not jump ahead of myself as I prepare for this hike. I might just die out there after the first 10 seconds.
I'll tell you how I got here-a friend casually mentioned watching the movie The Way, with Martin Sheen. Great. I'm living a cliche, getting ready to walk 500+ miles from France, across the Pyrenees and Spain, to reach the Cathedral of St. James, and I'm not even a Catholic ("not that there's anything wrong with that"), all because my friend suggested we watch a movie and do this same trip sometime (did I mention in the movie someone dies while walking), and then she got married and that ended that...for her. My mistake was mentioning this movie to my husband. Last time I mentioned something off-hand to him, "You should see this beautiful house on the market that's so cheap," we were moving three months later into a house that is now lovingly referred to as "ye olde money pit." Cheap it was not. On top of all this, I'm BLOGGING. OH. NO. AND WRITING IN ALL CAPS. PERIODS. GALORE. But I digress. My husband is the real hiker. He has the equipment to prove it. Me? I'd rather get my heart rate up for 30 minutes and be done with it, all in the comforts of my own home and preferably while hyper-watching something on Netflix. Nevertheless, for the past few months I've been walking, most of the time with a 12 lb. backpack, getting in my camino mode and trying ever so hard to ready my body for this little over a month-long trip. "Those Who Know" say a person must walk walk walk to toughen the feet, strengthen the tendons and muscles, and acclimate the pack to the body. Well, some say this. Others say there's not really anything that can be done to prepare adequately. And toughen the feet? Nooo, one must slather them with special balms and oils. Shoot, I even read they should be soaked in a vinegar solution. Or was it a urine solution. I'll talk more about this whole camino preparation thing later, but really I want to go back to my coffee.
I love coffee. I kinda know coffee. I like to think I kinda know coffee. The barista quickly put that to rest this morning. She asked if I wanted a splash of milk to keep the shots alive. Are they in danger of dying before I swig them towards my gut and move them quickly into my veins? "Well, espresso only lasts about 10 seconds before it goes bad," she knowingly informed me. Yikes, give me that splash then! As I finished my walk, the one I intended to last 1.5 hrs but which took only 1 hr. thank you doppio, I realized this coffee episode might just represent something more. A warning perhaps. It hit me clearly that I better not jump ahead of myself as I prepare for this hike. I might just die out there after the first 10 seconds.