From my Facebook page, 10 May:
This city challenges me in more ways than I could’ve imagined.
It looks like Europe, but vibrates like Africa. It is alive in a way that almost makes me resent it a little, like all introverts resent extroverts when they haven’t slept enough.
It sells me on its causes.
It makes me weep for my own country, but also exposes my own hypocrisy.
It will not allow me to take pictures without people in them.
A man was quite forcefully arrested less than 1 meter away from me today.
Some moments earlier that same man waited for me to finish taking a picture of the marina before he walked on.
The churches are still here, but the overt Catholicism is gone.
The cathedrals charge an entry fee, and people ride the statues as if they themselves have tamed them.
Even the architecture doesn’t conform to expectations.
The street art is magnificent, but one needs to hunt for it. You’ll find it on doorways and in side streets, amongst Catalan slogans and pamphlets for flamenco shows.
Even my hair is wilder here.
When I first arrived at the Camino information office in Lourdes on Monday (Jeez. Monday. Where did the time go?), the lady behind the desk enquired about my next stops on the Way.
I proudly explained that I plan on spending the night in Lourdes, then move on Toulouse, then Barcelona, then back up to Pamplona, until I start at Roncesvalles at the end of the week.
She gave me a long look, and asked very simply, “Why so complicated?”
I had all my reasons (of course I did) but the question remained with me for most of the week.
“Why so complicated?”
I’m not really sure why I had to come to Barcelona. I meant it when I said I resented the unapologetic aliveness of Barcelona, especially after the deep experience that was Lourdes.
Even the long bus ride to Bayonne, and then the cross-over from France into Northern Spain, followed by the 6 hour train trip from Irún, conspired to lull me into a deep meditative state, ready to start my pilgrimage…only to be spat out, almost violently, onto the chaos of Las Rambla and its crowds.
Again, I’m not sure why I had to come to Barcelona, but I don’t doubt that it was part of my path. It is just not apparent yet.
And while I wait patiently for the reasons to reveal itself, there may be something to learn from my strong feeling response.
One of the many things I have learnt from my teacher Sue, is to track down the “Orphans of my Consciousness”, which often use my observations, tears and upsets as breadcrumbs to find those aspects of myself begging to be seen.
Mindful not to create something from nothing, the following thoughts may be worth considering as possible signposts to some of these ‘orphans’. At the very least, it may be ways to further facilitate my transition from tourist to pilgrim.
- I am still really tired, physically and emotionally. I am reminded of #commandment 5: “Guard my boundaries, cherish my spoons” – especially after an experience like Lourdes, which leaves me so wide open and vulnerable
- There is a reason why confession is considered a sacrament in some traditions and a sacred mystery in others. Talking is good for the soul. It is what makes thought manifest, and what allows insights and wisdom to live in the world. To paraphrase my teacher Sue yet again, “There needs to be a balance between the silent cure and the talking cure” #splendidtruth
- A lot of what makes Barcelona pulsate, is the unseen – the pent-up emotion that bubbles underneath the surface of things. A conviction, a march, a Catalan flag, a banner demanding the release of a political prisoner or that the tourists are sent packing. This is how it almost always is with me – there is always this well of strong feelings and tears and rage and emotion just under everything, and too often I get assaulted by it when it erupts and spills over without my permission.
So maybe this is why I had to come to Barcelona, to define everything I both resist and cherish about myself, so I can settle deeper into myself
My emotional landscape is as unpredictable and intense as that of Barcelona, and I resist that, even though my feelings are such a strong part of my life force. I am as sensual, proud, individual and fiercely independent as the Catalans, but I am also deep and quiet like Lourdes. I too resist living under the rule of those who do not honor what I bring or stand for. I’m tired of being questioned or jailed or exiled for being who I am. It is exhausting, and I will have no more of it.
Maybe I had to come to Barcelona to excavate the other half of myself, and not disown it or negate it or leave it behind. Maybe I had to come to Barcelona to gather some more of my pieces, so the whole of me can walk to Santiago.
In the end, it was not really complicated at all.
Daily Braveries 