Yin-Yang

Day 20 - Monday, 14 October 2024 - Cahors to Paris

As I commence writing this post I am aware of, and need to be explicit that, the principal audience of many of my posts is, in fact, me. I love the reality that I have readers from all over the world, many of whom I don't know; I've always assumed that many are from Camino FB groups and networks, as well as the network of travelling friends I have built up over time. The map below shows the distribution of the reader network over the last month or so - obviously there's a weighting towards people from Australia generally and the south-west of WA more specifically, but there's a wide global spread on top of that.

I love writing, and if any of my words are interesting or useful to any of the readers then that's a bonus, but my main motivation in writing these words is to act as an aide-mémoire for me personally; an electronic travel diary as it were which I can refer back to in future times if I wish to recall or relive any of the times and experiences. It's one of the reasons I try to write a contemporaneous account of each day; aiming to commit to "paper" my observations, thoughts and feelings before the memory does its normal tricks and starts to distort the reality of the day.

Today's words are going to be more personal than normal as I reflect on the past three weeks or so. I'm drafting this from a train from Cahors to Paris. Because of the unplanned and unexpected decisions and changes I made to the overall trip I am alone on this leg of the journey. Janet and Helen caught their earlier scheduled train to Paris (it was fully booked by the time I got around to trying to get a ticket myself), and Trish has headed off in the other direction to complete her (also unplanned) journey. These words have been forming in my head for a couple of days now as we got closer to the end point, and my guess is that this draft may take a few days to complete.

For as long as I can recall I've avoided thinking and expressing myself in absolutes. I aim not to use "always/never"-type language, as I think that it is inherently narrow. I generally see the world in shades of grey, not in black/white or right/wrong. For every “yin” there’s a “yang” (that’s an oversimplified representation, but for the purpose of these words it’ll do); generally no one "good" nor no one "bad" exists in complete isolation. And so as I reflect on what I’ve seen and learned over the last three weeks I tend not to look at the lessons or the experiences through the limiting lens of “good/bad”. Even the language "positive" and "negative" has similar limitations. So for the purpose of the exercise I'll create my interconnected "yin" list and my "yang" list, and then as far as possible express them in some sort of very approximate priority or importance order, itself not always an easy task. Here goes ...

The Yins

1. Janet. Whilst we were obviously a group of four, the clear highlight of the last few weeks has been the time spent with Janet in this unusual environment. We normally spend a lot of time together (that's been the case for years now) but of course a group travelling/living out of a backpack/24-7 environment can bring its own stresses and strains. But there were none of any great consequence; we just wander along together - literally and metaphorically - never all that far from each other, comfortable. I regard myself as being very fortunate

2. The French countryside. I probably wildly overused the word "beautiful" and its various synonyms in my descriptors, but there really is an underlying beauty in the part of the world which we have just experienced which I previously wasn't aware of. This includes the many delightful villages through which we wandered. I said back on Day 5/Sept 29 that Nasbinals was "the most beautiful little French town that I have seen", and reader Steve T suggested that "wait until you get to Conques where you may revise your vote for most beautiful French village". It's a coin toss of course, along with Estaing, Figeac, Saint-Circ-Lapopie, and others (some of them may not have been "pretty" in a traditional sense, but they were often quite intriguing). Interestingly, Cahors fell towards the bottom of the list. One day I might list my favourites in some sort of order

3. The French people. Almost everyone we had interactions with was just delightful. Sure there were a few odd folk, but across the dozens we met they were very very few. I had previously formed an inaccurate stereotypical view of the French - I'm not sure what its basis was, but this experience proved it wrong

4. The pilgrims. We met some delightful people along the way, some of which I wrote about. One or two we might maintain some contact with, and if we do, great, and if we don't, well, the fleeting interactions were lovely

5. The food. I've always (now there is an absolute) loved fromage, but I have to say that the range of cheeses just blew me away. I was useless at ordering them at the fromagerie (how could I not be when presented with a range of a hundred cheeses all with descriptions which meant nothing to me even if I could read them), but I just loved the French custom of the cheese platter/selection being presented after the main course and before desert, or the selection of 4/5 cheeses at le petit déjeuner. And then the croissants ...

6. My foot. Ahh, my foot. I've not said all that much about my foot in my daily posts, beyond that to which I referred here. What I hadn't bothered to say was that it punctures my sleep more nights than it doesn't, with either a sharp stabbing pain which just about sends me through the roof, or a weird "stewing" sensation (that's about the best description I can come up with) which leaves me lying awake wondering what on earth is going on. That's on top of the irregular but persistent niggles at various (and any) times of the day. The decision to curtail the walk was the correct one on balance, even though it had significant consequences, and one which at one level I regret making/needing to make. Would I make exactly the same decision again, knowing the impacts? Of course that's a hypothetical the answer to which I'll never know. [And to answer the question why is this in the yin list, it's because it exemplifies yin/yang. I've lived with a bung foot for many years now; it's just an is, a part of me. It usually doesn't define me so much; this time was a bit different.]

7. My fitness. I had carefully planned, packed and weighed the contents of my backpack before leaving home, and it had come in at a very very acceptable 8kgs. I didn't add impulsively to the packing list (really other than food and water), but somehow the reality was that the pack ended up in the 11/12 kgs range (a couple of sets of scales along the way confirmed that). Every time I picked it up I knew it was heavy, but for the last few days I hardly noticed it on my back (I recalled much the same thing at the end of the VDLP last year also). I think that I progressively and "hiddenly" became significantly fitter over the three weeks. It'll be interesting to see how long I maintain it

8. The accommodation. By and large the accommodation was beyond fault. Even the gites d'etape were quite acceptable, considering that I really don't like dormitory-like sleeping. They are already blurring in my memory, but Oltarcie (8 Oct) stands out. There'll be others of course - another list to be created

9. The language. I've enjoyed my very tentative forays into the French language. I've tended to rely on the other three (laziness), but I can get by to order coffee and food, and for anything else my very good friend Google Translate comes to the party. What I find intriguing is that because linguistically I'm completely out of my comfort zone, and of course there's no way I can think in anything approaching French (I can barely think in English!!), I find myself defaulting to my very rudimentary Spanish. I couldn't even start to count the number of times I've unintentionally said si instead of oui, or gracias instead of merci. But the French have mostly been very kind and tolerant, and graciously accepted my far-reaching mangling.

The Yangs

1. THE decision. I described the decision to curtail the walk as taking the "best worst" option. In the 2/3 days leading up to the decision I tried to work through the potential consequences in my mind. With the benefit of hindsight I'd have to say that they were considerably more impactful than I envisaged. Both the decision and its consequences have weighed heavily on me and I suspect will for some time to come

2. My health. I was crook for most of the trip ("crook" is Aussie vernacular for unwell). I had picked up a bug before I left home, and I never really shook it. It didn't hold me back all that much, but it did mean that I had the sniffles and a cough for pretty-well 5 weeks solid. It was a distraction at best and a source of annoyance and frustration from time to time. I rarely get sick, and certainly not for extended times, so something unusual was going on.

If I were to return to the good/bad language I'd have to say that that's a well-balanced list - tilting 9/2 in favour of the "good". That's largely how it feels too, despite the weight of Yang1 on my shoulders.

Perhaps a little surprisingly - on indeed perhaps not - I've found my mind wandering to the "how am I going to spend the rest of my life/what am I going to do differently when I get home?" questions. Big trips like this have that effect. I have some ideas. I guess time will tell on those questions ...

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Update 17 Oct

I've spent the last day and a half just wandering in Paris awaiting my unplanned trip home. Here's just a few shots, the ones everyone takes ...

And finally, for a bit of fun ...

I've yet to complete my "Penultimate Ultimate" post from a few days back. Soon.

And then I'll probably do a 30 or 60-day reflection, or something similar, so stand by for that ...