Step by Step Read online

  The Camino, steering clear of roads and wending its way on ancient paths, was a great improvement, but it wasn’t always a simple matter to stay on course. It’s in the nature of paths to wander around, crossing one another more or less at will, and unless a trail’s well marked, a hapless peregrino can zig when he should have zagged.

  Various local bodies were charged with the responsibility of maintaining the trails, and some of them were more diligent than others. The first time we got lost, however, it wasn’t the fault of the locals. They’d done a good enough job of posting the trail, if only we’d known what to look for.

  The trail had led us to and through a village, but once we were out of it we couldn’t figure out where to go next. There were no signs to help us out, and a woman eventually noticed us wandering to and fro and asked us a question, which of course we couldn’t understand.

  I said or tried to say that we were pilgrims, and were looking for the Camino to Santiago. “Flechas!” the woman said.

  “Fletchers?”

  “Sí. Flechas!”

  That didn’t help. We wandered some more, half-looking for a sign saying FLETCHER’S. You won’t be surprised to learn that we couldn’t find it. Another helpful local said the same curious thing, but chose to elaborate. “Flechas! Flechas amarillas!”

  “Fletchers again,” I said, “but yellow ones this time. I wonder what the hell he was trying to tell me.”

  “I don’t know. What’s a fletcher, anyway?”

  “In Spanish? Beats me. In English it’s one of those old occupational surnames. I forget what a fletcher did. Fleisher means butcher in German, you know, as in flesh, but a fletcher’s something else. Oh, I remember. A fletcher is an arrowsmith.”

  “It’s a rock band?”

  “No, it’s a guy who makes arrows. I guess there used to be more call for that sort of thing, but—oh, fuck me with a stick.”

  “Yellow arrows.”

  “We’ve been seeing them all day,” I said. “Remember? We were trying to figure out if they were making some sort of political statement.”

  “And what they were saying was, ‘Follow me.’”

  Flechas amarillas.

  So that was a new word for us, and a useful one. The yellow arrows didn’t entirely eliminate the possibility of a wrong turn; there were often more turns than arrows, and some of them were so arranged as to lend themselves to more than one interpretation. And before long we learned another new Spanish word, senda, which means path.

  It was easier to remember the word than to avoid straying from it, or to find it once it had been lost. And more than once Lynne sang:

  Return to senda

  Address unknown

  No such number

  No such zone…

  We got lost repeatedly, but most of the time it wasn’t too bad; we’d find our way back to where we’d gone wrong and pick up where we’d left off.

  Until the day that prompted this entry, the Day from Hell.

  It started out like any other day, and the weather was certainly favorable, the sun shining away in a cloudless sky. We were out of the hills now and entering the flat plains of central Spain, which made for easier walking. And so we walked, and kept on walking, until we realized we’d lost our way, and didn’t know where the hell we were.

  It wasn’t entirely our fault. We’d crossed an invisible boundary from one province to another, and the Yellow Arrow Brigade in the new place turned out to be a bunch of slackers. The route wasn’t marked the way it was supposed to be, and we were by no means the first people to lose our way.

  As we found out when a woman popped out of her front door and regarded us with some alarm. “¿Peregrinos?”

  “Sí,” we said, proud of our command of the language.

  “¡Ay! Perdido!”

  Perdido was another word we knew. It means lost.

  And she’d evidently had occasion to use it before. She clued us in on where we were and how to get back to where we ought to be, and we’d gone a good distance out of our way, and the sun was higher in the sky now, and there was no shade along our route, and if we were not exactly disgruntled, well, you couldn’t say we were gruntled, either.

  It got worse. I don’t remember all the details, but one thing after another was going wrong. Our spirits were sagging, and it seemed like a good time for an emergency meeting of the Peregrino Group, so I recited the preamble and Lynne talked for a while and then I talked for a while and we said the prayer and walked on.

  And, of course, things continued to go wrong. We’d skimped on breakfast and couldn’t find anyplace to have lunch, so we went without. And we’d missed an opportunity to fill our water bottles, and another opportunity had not come our way, and we were running out of water. That’s never a good idea, particularly when you’re walking in the heat of a blazing sun.

  Earlier, on our way through Andorra, we’d discovered the importance of drinking enough water. If your water intake’s not sufficient, your mood turns nasty.

  We found this out empirically, when we realized we were snarling and snapping at each other for no discernible reason. I couldn’t figure out why, and then it struck me that I hadn’t peed in hours, and neither had Lynne. So I drank some water, and suggested Lynne do the same, and our mood lifted and the snapping and snarling stopped. From there on in we made sure we had water, and made a point of drinking enough of it to keep from killing each other.

  But now, on what was perhaps the hottest day thus far, we were running out of water. We’d be able to fill our water bottles at the next village, wherever it might be. As far as we could tell from our map, the next human settlement was a long ways off.

  On a day like this, a little surliness was the least of our worries. I didn’t really think we were going to die for lack of water, but people did just that from time to time, and not only in the real world. Think of all the film actors you’ve seen crawling across the Sahara or the Mohave or the Gobi, crying out “Water!” through cracked lips, their tongues swollen, their makeup caked.

  We thought of them, I’ll tell you. And, while we were thinking of them and other unpleasant prospects, we did what we were getting so good at doing in trying circumstances.

  We got lost again.

  I don’t know how it happened, but I can guess. The same swine who’d failed to provide flechas amarillas early on had failed once more. And we’d missed a turn, and here we were, hopelessly perdido.

  At least we didn’t have to worry about walking around in circles. As long as we kept the sun in front of us, we’d be walking west. And it wasn’t hard to know where the sun was, because there it was, grinning furiously down on us, glaring right into our eyes, baking our brains.

  The Spanish army saved us. We weren’t on anything resembling a road, just a path running across the center of a vast stretch of open ground, so we were not expecting to hear a car coming up behind us. We turned, and there were a couple of open jeeps filled with young men in uniform. We’d managed somehow to find our way onto a patch of land that the military used for maneuvers, and it was just our good fortune that their day’s agenda called for a lot of driving around and saluting, instead of, say, artillery and mortar practice.

  We told them that we were peregrinos, which didn’t appear to surprise them, and they told us we were perdido, which was no news to us. And they gave us, God bless them for it, a full bottle of water, and explained in detail exactly where we had to go in order to be where we were supposed to be. There were smiles and handshakes all around, and then they drove off to continue their essentially pointless maneuvers in the middle of nowhere, while we set out to resume ours.

  I can’t be sure exactly when the Peregrino Group held its unprecedented second meeting of the day. It may have been before the soldiers rescued us, or it may have been shortly after. We sat down for this meeting, instead of walking as we talked. We dropped our packs and sat on them, and one of us said the preamble, and we dove in. I couldn’t tell you what we said, but I�
�m pretty sure our sharing this time around was centered a lot less on personal history and a lot more on the present moment.

  When we’d finished, we got up and resumed walking.

  And the day went on and on and on, and the sun stayed in our eyes and went on frying our brains, and when we finally reached a village it was getting on for dinnertime, and there was no refugio in or near this particular village, and no chance we could reach the next one down the line before full dark. We looked around for an inn or hostal, and it didn’t look as though the village could boast of one, and then someone steered us to this very pretty little house, painted in vivid colors, where a handsome young man responded to our knock with a smile and a little welcome speech in English.

  Astonishing. There were vases of flowers all through the house, and pastel walls, and the aroma of sandalwood candles. He ushered us to an immaculate and well-appointed bedroom, pointed out an equally immaculate bath down the hall, and told us to make ourselves at home. He didn’t have to tell us twice.

  We took baths, and not a moment too soon, and back in the bedroom we remarked on the array of scented soaps our host had provided, and the deep-toned towels. “I can’t believe this place is here,” Lynne said. “Maybe we didn’t get water in time.”

  “You think we’re hallucinating?”

  “I think we died,” she said, “and they let us into heaven, even if we didn’t get our plenary indulgences yet. What on earth is that perfectly charming fellow doing running this perfectly charming inn out here in East Jesús, Spain?”

  “All those flowers and candles. And did you happen to notice the scented soap?”

  “How could I miss it? Little cakes of French-milled soap, all in different shapes and colors.”

  “You don’t suppose—”

  “No question. He’s wearing keys.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Nope. Pressed jeans, and he’s wearing keys.”

  “Well, he’s in the hotel business,” I said. “There’s all those doors he has to be able to open. And maybe wearing keys means something different here than it does on Christopher Street.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “But what on earth is he doing here?”

  “Where should he be? Huesca?”

  “Jesus,” I said, “how do we do it? I guess you can take us out of the West Village, but you can’t take the country out of Salem. I’ll tell you something. I don’t care how he got here, and I don’t care how we got here. I’m just glad he’s here and we’re here and this goddamned day is coming to an end, because I don’t think I could have taken another hour of it. What a miserable day! I was losing it, I was coming unglued—”

  “Well, I can’t understand why,” Lynne said. “Don’t forget, you did get to two meetings today.”

  REFUGIOS

  If we hadn’t gotten lost time and time again on the Day from Hell, we probably would have missed spending the night in Gay Heaven. We’d have gone right on through that particular village and walked on to the next refugio.

  The network of refugios all along the Camino certainly made it a lot easier to be a peregrino. The sort of no-room-at-the-inn debacle that led to our Zaragoza detour was no longer a concern. There was always room at the refugios, and all we had to do was follow the guidebook to be sure of a place to sleep.

  While the level of creature comfort never rose to floral arrangements and scented soap, some of the refugios were more than acceptable. I remember the one at Santo Domingo de Calzado; everyone who’d been there pointed it out as an example of what a refugio could be. It was, I suppose, comparable to any better-than-average youth hostel, but on the road to Santiago it was outstanding.

  The village where it was situated, I should point out, was renowned as the site of a chicken miracle. We heard several versions of the story, but the gist of it was that someone had appealed to some local potentate, who was sitting down to dinner at the time. The pooh-bah pointed to the roasted chicken on the platter in front of him and announced that he’d grant the supplicant’s wish “when that chicken hops off the table and crows.” Whereupon the headless bird contrived to do just that, as depicted in a mural in the local church.

  I thought it was a pretty good story, and a terrific mural. Lynne agreed, but she went on to assume it was true. Lynne has never met a miracle she hasn’t been able to believe in—and, after our rescue by the Spanish Army and our eventual deliverance unto the Gay Guest House, I have to say I can understand her point of view.

  Her enthusiasm for this particular legend didn’t diminish when someone pointed out that chicken miracles abound throughout Europe, that every country seems to have one or more of them, all featuring a bird, roasted a golden brown, who saves some blameless person’s life by rising from the platter and cock-a-doodle-doing its heart out. Didn’t she think it was unlikely that all of these miracles had taken place all over the continent?

  “It just shows,” she said, “the awesome power of the chicken.”

  Another refugio, the very one where aguardiente was on offer, had a feature that was both eco-and peregrino-friendly—rooftop water tanks, heated by solar power, provided a good supply of hot water for showers. Most of the refugios had showers of one sort or another, but few of them had enough hot water to go around, and a combination of luck and good timing was necessary if you wanted more than a deluge of cold water.

  Once in a while a refugio had one or more private rooms, and as a couple we were apt to draw one on the rare occasion that one was available. More often I’d take an upper bunk and Lynne a lower in a room with a whole row or two of bunk beds.

  And when we did have privacy, it brought no guarantee of a comfortable night’s lodging. One village was supposed to have a refugio, but we had to go to the church and hunt down the priest in order to find it. He gave us a key and a set of directions; the key let us into a room some twenty feet square, with assorted debris in its corners and incomprehensible graffiti on its cinder-block walls. The place had once been a garage, and now it was a refugio, though the only indication of its new status was a large bare mattress in the middle of the concrete floor. We got a better night’s sleep than we expected, but figured one night was plenty; in the morning we returned the key and hit the road.

  With time, we found that two or three consecutive nights in refugios were about as much as we could take. Every third or fourth night we’d contrive to stop at a commercial establishment of some sort, where we’d be certain of a room to ourselves and access to a working shower. Sometimes, if the hotel and the room and the village were sufficiently attractive, we’d stay a couple of nights, but more often than not we were on our way in the morning.

  ACTIVITIES

  When we weren’t walking or eating or sleeping, how did we pass the time?

  I can’t say we watched much television. The refugios didn’t have sets, and neither did the budget hotels. Sometimes, though, we’d eat in a café with a TV set. Once we walked into a convenience store, the local equivalent of a 7-Eleven, and were startled to hear Peter Jennings; the French station Canal-Plus was carrying the ABC Evening News in English, and we stood there transfixed. And I’ve mentioned watching Eight Million Ways to Die in Basque country, where the locals seemed to be inventing a new way of their own every week or so.

  But the program that always seemed to be playing when we were around was The Flintstones. I was never a big fan of the show when I could understand what Fred and Wilma were saying, and I can’t say it gained a lot in translation. The only other program I can recall was the Spanish equivalent of America’s Funniest Home Videos. We’d never watched it back home, and I don’t know that we’d have been watching it over there, either, if we’d had any choice.

  But I could be wrong, because the Spanish version had something you’d never see in the States. Along with all the usual Stupid Pet Tricks and Rotten Little Kid Antics, they elected to show us this astonishing video of—I’m sorry, it’s more trouble than it’s worth to search for a polit
e way to say this—of a rabbit fucking a chicken.

  All conversation stopped around us. Everyone stared at the screen, and then everyone roared with laughter and offered up verbal encouragement that didn’t require translation. “I hope you were paying close attention,” I told Lynne, “because you’re not going to see anything like that ever again.”

  But I was wrong. At the end of the program the audience votes for their favorite, and of course the rabbit and chicken won, whereupon they gave us another look at it. And the next time we found ourselves in a room with a TV set was precisely a week later, so what program do you suppose was playing? And of course last week’s winner was entered again this time around, and of course the damn thing won. If the show’s still on the air, I would have to assume it’s still winning.

  I hate to admit it, but I wouldn’t mind seeing it again…

  What else did we do? Well, we did a little sightseeing, when there was a sight to see. And we spent time reading. Along with my regular attempts at getting the gist of the stories in El País, we plugged away at the few books we’d brought with us. The couple of novels didn’t last; we’d read and discarded them before we were out of France. But I’d packed a Bible, and neither of us was in danger of knocking that one off in a night or two. Nor were we likely to get all caught up in it, but it somehow seemed like the right sort of thing to dip into in the course of a journey like ours.

  I’d also packed Chaim Potok’s History of the Jews, figuring it might counterbalance the undeniably Christian nature of our adventure. If I was going to tag along after St. Francis and St. Clare, and treat myself to a dip of holy water in every church along the way, the least I could do while I was at it was refresh my memory of the history of my own people.