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Confessions Of A Pilgrim
Sue returns to the
celebrated ancient
Spanish pilgrimage path
to walk 500 kilometers
alone on the
Confessions of a Pilgrim
The Story Outline
Confessions of a PilgrimIn the introduction to the book, the reader finds out about what has happened in Sue Kenney's world since the release of her first book. She brings the reader up to speed as she recounts and reflects on the experiences of her first pilgrimage. We learn that Sue's daughters have left home, she then leaves Toronto herself, the place where she has lived all her life. She moves to a country cottage on a lake in Northern Ontario. Here is where she begins to integrate the profound experiences of the Camino into her life back home. We learn more about what happened to the long distance love affair with the German pilgrim Andreas, whom she met on the path and about her new life as a writer. Around the same time as she finishes the final draft of the manuscript, Sue feels a special calling to return to the Camino.
Pilgrims of the past walked to Santiago and then turned around to walk back home again. Modern day pilgrims, including Sue generally only walked in one direction and then took a train, car or plane back home. This time she decided that she would follow the Galician coast from Portugal into Spain and walk almost 500 kilometers covering both directions of that Camino path.
Just weeks prior to leaving for this pilgrimage, she received an email from a native woman. This woman had a dream that involved Sue and she insisted they meet before leaving for the Camino. They met and she told Sue that in her dream, she was to give Sue an Eagle Feather; one of the greatest honors of the First Nations people. She instructed Sue to give the Eagle Feather to someone on her journey. Sue was given a list of very strict rules and procedures as to how she would select the person to receive the spiritual talisman.
Although honored by this gift and intrigued by the mystery of this Native spiritual quest, Sue was concerned that her simple walking journey had suddenly become more complicated by this unexpected responsibility. She was hoping to walk to connect with nature and clear her mind after writing her book. It seemed however, that the Camino other plans for Sue.
Fraught with problems, Sue's journey initially unfolds with a series of catastrophic events that would send any normal person running back home. On her first stopover, she is mugged at the airport in Frankfurt, losing the only wallet she has filled with all of her cash for the trip. She arrives at her destination in Vigo, Spain to find out that the airline has lost her backpack. All she really has left is the Eagle Feather tucked in a pouch around her waist. We see her confidence weakening in the throes of becoming a humble solo Camino pilgrim, on the road to Santiago once again.
On her journey, Sue adds to her struggles when she loses her glasses and has to walk back an extra two kilometers only to be unsuccessful in finding them. To add to that, she has to care for some nasty blisters and an old knee injury from her previous journey. She meets a group of young student pilgrims walking together and relates the story of the Sorrow Stones, a centerpiece in her first book. One of the students, a teenager, connects with her emotionally when he imparts the recent death of his mother during the Madrid train bombings, just a few weeks previous. This gives Sue a sense of hope that she is on the right path.
Women appear in many forms on the path and Sue pays careful attention to their wisdom. One day as she is leaving a village, she sees a Good Friday procession that takes place and becomes intrigued by the importance of the Virgin Mary. Throughout the next few days she is presented a female-skewed perspective on religion and the role of women in this European lifestyle. At one refugio, the Spanish women massaged their husband's feet and then rubbed ointment on their sore legs. Then the women put their husbands to bed, tucking them in like their own children. These women were content to serve their man's needs before their own. This raised many questions in Sue's mind.
Before Christopher Columbus discovered the world was round, it was believed the most westerly point of the Spanish coast was the end of the world. Sue followed the pilgrim tradition of walking beyond Santiago to this point, known as Cape Finesterre. Once there, Sue turned around to walk back to Santiago. After six days of walking. She arrives there with horribly painful, oozing blisters and her knee injury. After meeting up with an American pilgrim who treats her to the luxuries of dining at the five-star Parador Hotel, she leaves the hotel and very quickly returns to pilgrim status finding a hostel for cheap accommodation in the city.
Continuing on her journey she connects with Natalie, a French pilgrim. They share their stories and give each other the support they need to get through a three 35-kilometer days of rigorous hiking in the mountains of Galicia. It is said that everyone has a love affair on the Camino. She tells Sue all about falling in love with a Spaniard from Madrid.
There is still no home for the Eagle Feather but walking with the French pilgrim has taken her mind off trying too hard to find the right person. Sue wonders how she can possibly walk for another 9 days with the condition of her blistered feet and she contemplates quitting.
However, by putting one foot in front of the other, Sue makes her way to Muxia; a village on the Costa del Morte (Coast of Death). Excited to be near the sea she innocently runs to the beach to stand barefoot in the ocean. Quickly her feet slide deep into the sandy bottom of the ocean floor. Feeling a sudden pain on the side of her foot near a blister, she pulls her foot out of the sand. A closer look reveals the sand from the sea has found its way into a tiny whole that she punctured earlier in the day to relief the pressure of fluid built up inside the blister. The blister had filled with tiny particles of sand. It felt hard to touch and was very painful. Now she was faced with the difficult choice; to take a bus to Santiago or attempt to walk on the tiny stones lodged under the layers of her skin. That night at the refugio Sue soaked her feet in salt water hoping that the blister would heal by the next morning. If there was no improvement, she decided that she would take the bus to Santiago tomorrow, and give up on completing the walk by foot.
The next morning unsure what she is to do, Sue decides to go for a café con leche with Carlos, the Spanish pilgrim she met at dinner. He tells her a story that changes the course of her journey forever. He explains that if a pilgrim walks from Santiago to Finesterre, and then from Muxia to Santiago they are completing the Camino triangle. "When walking in the triangle," he says, "You are walking in the Eye of God." Compelled not to be a quitter in front of God Himself, she decides to continue walking regardless of her condition.Her journey takes her to a small village where she meets a local woman, Anna, who invites her to her home for warm milk and cookies. They can't speak each other's language but they manage to communicate with a series of hand motions, pointing and a lot of laughter. Although, physically exhausted and longing to give up, Anna assures her it's only a two-kilometer climb up into the mountains to the next village, which has a refugio. Sue leaves her new friend and begins the difficult climb up the mountain.
Hours later Sue finds that she has somehow arrived at the village she just left. Since she is now walking the reverse route there are no arrows to follow. She realizes that when she reached the top of the mountain, out of habit she followed the yellow arrows back down the mountain back toward Finesterre, instead of in the opposite direction. Now angry with the Camino, she stomps up the mountain. About halfway up, darkness sets in and she makes the decision to stop a car that drives by, accepting a ride to the next village, with a strange man.
Eventually, she returns to Santiago again. Like a pilgrim of the past, she hugs the Apostle and then goes down to the tomb where a special Mass is taking place right beside the Saint's casket. The priest invites her to join them inside the gated tomb. He allows her to place her hand on the casket with the remains of St. James the Apostle. With one hand on the Apostle, she gently places the other on the Eagle Feather stored in a pouch around her waist. Historically, pilgrims walked the Camino because they believed that being close to the remains of the Apostle meant that one would be closer to God. Her native friend assured her that by holding the Eagle Feather she would be in direct connection with the Creator. By connecting her hand on the remains of the Apostle and the Eagle Feather, Sue comes to a deeper realization of the importance of her quest. She is a part of another Camino triangle and once again, Sue finds herself in the Eye of God.
Leaving the holy city, Sue embarks on the final return leg of her journey from Santiago, back to Valenca, Portugal. After another day of walking in the rain, she arrives at a refugio to spend the evening alone. In the middle of the night the doorbell rings. She's frightened, and calls out to ask who is there. The man looks like an evil villain with his poncho flapping in the wind and rain. She finds out it's a pilgrim from Portugal who cannot speak a word of English. Sue struggles about whether she can just trust in her judgement to let a strange man into the refugio.
Throughout the journey, she is presented with a series of potential recipients for the coveted Eagle Feather. She meets a pair of British pilgrims who teach her a Tai-Chi method of walking to relieve the feeling of weight on her back. She encounters a Benedictine Monk and meets a wise Australian woman who has been traveling the world for over two years. One day she stops to speak to an American pilgrim and finds out he is on a race to walk the Camino, based on a bet he made with the man who stole his wife away from him.
In most cases Sue stops short of actually telling the people she meets that she is considering them as possible choices for the Eagle Feather. Through their reactions and responses she notices that most people find reasons or excuses for why they shouldn't receive the Eagle Feather. By doing so, they self-select their own destiny.
Finally arriving in Portugal, Sue is discouraged and disappointed. She has walked for 18 days and is still unsuccessful in selecting someone to receive the Eagle Feather. She is resigned to the fact she might have to take it home with her. She goes on a plane from Vigo to Madrid and then on to Frankfurt, where she will meet Andreas, her pilgrim love she met on the first Camino experience. They travel to the Rhineland and quickly begin to fall in love. Sue resists the temptation of a romantic relationship with him and even so, the weekend ends on a happy note.
In a dusty blissful moment, Sue realizes what she must do with the Eagle Feather.
Confessions of a Pilgrim
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