hugo ronca muy fuerte, but it is music to my ears

at least that is my suspicion, that it must have been hugo, who snored.

depending on how you count, the snorer to sleeper ratio (or rather snorer to people trying to sleep ratio) yesterday was 1:3 or 1:4. hence, terradillos de los templarios enters the competition for top spot of snoring along the camino frances, together with roncasvalles and hornillos del camino.

here is a list of potential culprits in our room (nombres de guerra):

yannick de la bretagne, paul del campo de las mujeres en suiza, joaquin de euskadi, hugo de payens (o su fantasma) y belo de berlin.

i swear it wasn’t me. so, technically, you can strike me from the list right away.

the snoring was intense. sometimes it sounded like an air mattress being deflated, supplemented by an impressive assortment of sonorous, occasionally grumbling, and sometimes wall-shaking eruptions. very intense!

once again, an opportunity to practice equanimity. and use the noise-cancelling headphones. so i end up listening to this song by the swedish progressive rock band vulkan again. blinding ornaments. in my head i do a bit of a musical analysis.

a warning though - it is progressive rock, not everyone’s cup of tea!

it has this interesting rhythmic pattern of quarter notes per bar, that works like this for many parts of the song: 6 / 5 / 6 / 6 or 11 / 12, however you want to put it.

without a musical instrument handy, i can’t tell you too much about harmonies and melodies, but like any good progressive rock song, it is definitely a minor scale, a bit melancholic, possible a hungarian minor when the violin plays its solo towards the end.

and then there are the lyrics:

permanent monologue, staring at the fuse and rope
you try to stop the future but the anchors in the past they hold you still

you rage against the human sin, you hate the colors of your land
but everything's a monologue you raise the flag and just pretend

billions and billions and billions and billions of blinding ornaments
obedience, obedience, obedience, obedience from cradle to grave

what are you, a tool with hands?
how do you mend with all that you've done that is wrong

why are you afraid of them?
you only have a fragment of time, so be alive

the lyrics to me describe this inner conflict between conforming to societal norms, resignation in order to fit in, and the urge for a self-determined and free life.

often we find ourselves in a state of a ‘permanent monologue’, we are trapped by ‘anchors in the past’ and feel powerless to change the future.

although we feel resistance or even rage against ‘human sin’ and hate ‘the colors of our land’, we give up and our protest remains entirely internal, silent.

instead of taking meaningful action, we raise the (white) flag or (maybe even worse?) our land’s flag and choose to ‘just pretend’. it pains us, that our inner convictions and the lack of action on our part leave us hypocrits.

we let ourselves be blinded or distracted by countless ‘blinding ornaments’ - things & wants that we don’t need. we remain obedient ‘from cradle to grave’.

‘what are you, a tool with hands?’, basically asks the question, whether we are mindless instruments, serving a system. we can think for ourselves, no?

to me, there is an element of hope at the end of the lyrics, the question about guilt over past mistakes leaves open the possibility that mistakes in the past can be mended, that we should not be afraid to change our ways when we think we have gone in the wrong direction, that we shouldn’t continue in the same direction, just because somebody may expect or want us to do so.

ultimately, because our human existence is fleeting and we ‘only have a fragment of time’, we better try to ‘be alive’, to break out of the endless cycle of fear, guilt, and blind obedience.

when we, paul and i, start this walking day, it is still dark and we walk fast. it is cold this morning, barely plus degrees. eventually the sun comes up behind us, we walk our shadows long and to the side of the camino. despite the cold it is a nice walk.

we walk past san bruno, the italian refuge our friends stayed in, all the way to sahagún, already 13 kilometers into our day.

we meet our italian friends, paul presses ahead in order to secure his bed at the only albergue in bercianos del real camino, that doesn’t accept reservations and takes in pilgrims strictly by order of arrival.

with chiara, barbara and mateo i visit the santuario de la virgen peregrina, and we obtain the certificado por la mitad del camino frances. we have crossed the half-way line between sjpdp and santi.

we continue past the arco san benito and across the river on the puente canto. we walk fast. chiara and i end up walking together again, and our conversation continues. it is about what esperanzas we have for life.

acceptance

freedom

both big topics. we speak our useful mixture of italiano, castellano y inglese.

the remaining ten kilometers to bercianos pass quickly and we are at the albergue, joining the line of not yet 46 pilgrims. so everybody is happy. we will all have a bed tonight.

paul is there, myrto as well, ruby from canada, who i have seen a number of times, now we know each others’ names, sabrina from taiwan and other familiar faces from taiwan and korea.

the check-in into the albergue is a entertaining procedure carried out by volunteers, headed up by joao or giovanni from brasil. he speaks our language(s) - again a mix of many idiomas. he carries our backpacks up the stairs for us. so kind.

there will be a communal dinner and a meditation together tonight. i look forward to it very much. there is a guitar, it is jorge’s - he lets me play a bit. i’m happy.

i will leave it at that for today. more about freedom tomorrow or over the next days. now at the local bar for a cortado and maybe a snack. and my notes.