Day 29, September 29, Santiago de Compostela - late post

          On September 18, we said goodbye to Taylor in Ponferrada, but thanks to Facebook, we were able to stay in touch during our walk. She came to Santiago a few days earlier than us and decided to stay for a few days. Luckily, she was still there when we arrived. Our first night in Santiago was her last. We planned to have dinner together to just catch up and talk about our caminos. We met in front of the cathedral and walked around the streets of Santiago looking for a quiet place to eat and talk. That turned out to be an impossible affair because every few meters or so, she or my sister and I or sometimes all of us would get stopped by fellow pilgrims trying to catch up. This went on for a while until we just decided to plop ourselves at the next cafe or restaurant with an available table, otherwise, we'd never get to eat. So, we got a table and of course the same thing kept happening the entire evening. People would stop by and greet us, give us hugs and stay for a chat, some would stay and some would go on. I don't even know at what point our small table got extended and extended until there were more than a dozen pilgrims excitedly talking and laughing and swapping tales around us in various languages. So much for finding a quiet place to chat. I'm just glad we were able to order  and start dinner before everyone descended on us. One thing you learn fast on the camino: you may choose to start your walk in solitude, but that's not necessarily how you will end up at the end of the day. 

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          Taylor mentioned that there was an English pilgrim's mass every afternoon at the cathedral so we made sure to check the schedule and  make time for that. So, on our last day in Santiago, we found ourselves attending the only English mass we've ever been to during our entire camino. It was held in one of those tiny chapels inside the cathedral. The chapel couldn't have fit more than 20 people comfortably but I know that there were more people than that because they had to line the walls with chairs even all the way at the back of the altar, and every seat was taken. Laurie and Stacey were in the same mass and we were happy to see them make it to Santiago, physical injuries notwithstanding. The priest who presided was Irish and before he started, he asked all of us attending to introduce ourselves, which country we came from and talk a bit about why we did our camino. He wanted the celebration to be a personal thing for each of us. Another thing he did differently was that during the Prayers of the Faithful, he had all of us, or at least all those who were comfortable speaking about it, mention our petitions out loud so that we all could pray for it as a community.  That was something that everyone in the room appreciated, I think. During communion, instead of him feeding us the host, he set it up so each pilgrim can go up the the altar, take a host, dip it in wine and  feed ourselves. It was truly one of the most solemn and touching masses I have ever been to, bar none. He was able to create an intimacy in a roomful of strangers and made us feel again that sense of community that we experienced during our camino. There was not a dry eye in that chapel once the mass ended. It was a wonderful celebration and I think that was exactly the solemnity a lot of us were looking for to cap our camino. 

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We'll be taking the first flight out to Barcelona in the morning. We talk about our walk as we start sorting and packing our stuff for the last leg of our journey. Now and then we would look at our credentials and our compostelas and smile. Even now, 800 something kilometers from where we started from, there's a lot of it that seems unreal to us. Maybe it will always be that way. But for now we end this camino, prepare ourselves to go back to reality and with hopeful hearts, look forward to our next one.