A Gesture of Friendship
A Gesture of Friendship
by Barney Gorin | Gaithersburg, MD
The pack I had carried as an exploring novice in 2018 got lighter by the time I became a returning pilgrim in 2021. I scrutinized every item again and again. Was it needed then? Is it needed now? Might it be needed, really needed, someday? Whether a gram or a kilogram, if not needed, I would leave it behind. “Add nothing” was my rule.
I overrode that rule on July 30, 2023.
They had been walking together, a bit faster than my pace, but stopping often, too—an older fellow and a young girl who appeared to be at the threshold of her journey to womanhood. Finally, as they passed me once again, I asked the man, “¿Es ella su nieta?” Is she your granddaughter?
“Si.”
They were sharing her first Camino, and off and on for a few hours that day, they shared it with me.
Somewhere near O Pedrouzo, the three of us stopped for a brief rest and a chat. La Nieta (I can no longer recall either of their names) gave me a small blue plastic hand as a gesture of friendship. It is probably the only thing I added to my pack from Zumaia to Santiago. Today it has a permanent place on my backpack—and in my heart.
This tiny gift somehow made my pack and my spirit feel a bit lighter. A grandfather and granddaughter sharing her first Camino, and the gift that ever reminds me of them, is one small example of how the spirit of the Camino can lighten our load even when adding to it.
