I met Jens a week after walking across the Pyrenees from France. It was September, and we were in the heart of Basque country, following the ancient pilgrimage trail to the city of Santiago de Compostela which lay over four hundred miles to the west. I’d noticed Jens earlier in the day, an old man tottering along the path, sweating despite the relative cool, his tall figure supported by a pair of trekking poles upon which he leaned precariously. As I’d hurried past him I’d nodded and given him the traditional pilgrim’s greeting: “Buen Camino!”
He’d been too occupied by the strenuous act of walking to return the greeting, but he had returned my nod. His age made him an exception on the Camino. Most of the other hikers were middle-aged or younger. Though he bore himself with youthful pride, his gait gave him away. It was the shuffle-sway-shuffle of an octogenarian. Jens was far older than his fellow pilgrims, but despite his age, he was still a large man with broad shoulders and a strong back. He carried a small blue pack, but he wore no hat, and his face and scalp were dangerously red.
I spotted him again later that afternoon in a village named Sansol, in the stone-walled courtyard of the rural albergue at which I’d stopped for the night. He was alone at a table, adjusting his chair beneath the large umbrella to follow the moving shade. A dozen more pilgrims sat clustered around other tables in tight groups, drinking wine and chatting in broken English, the de-facto common tongue of the Camino. This part of northeastern Spain was justly famous for its wines, especially the rioja. Jens was the only pilgrim drinking beer, and the only one sitting alone. I ordered a beer too.
He was fumbling through his trail guidebook when I approached and asked if I might join him. He nodded and motioned at an empty chair. “Of course,” he said. His English was precise, but heavily accented. I introduced myself and told him that I was hiking with my wife, who was showering inside the albergue. He told me his name was Jens (pronounced “Yens”), and that he was from The Netherlands.
Jens had just arrived at the albergue. My wife and I weren’t the fastest walkers, but we’d managed to hike the twenty kilometers from the previous village in about six hours. It had taken Jens nine hours, and he looked exhausted. He sipped his beer and eyed his map, planning the next day’s hike. We chatted for a while about our trail experiences and talked about our plans. Jens was hoping to walk to Viana, about thirteen kilometers to the west. I pointed to his sunburned scalp and face. Like many Dutchmen, Jens’ skin was fair, and his thinning hair was pure white. I told him he should be wearing a hat. He shrugged and shook his head and informed me that he never wore a hat. I warned him about the meseta, the sun-drenched plains that made up the central third of the Camino. Once again he shrugged, as if sunburn didn’t concern him.
It was obvious that Jens was a proud man. His face was square with a strong, dimpled chin. Deep wrinkles cracked every corner of his features, but they somehow made him look even stronger. He was also a big man, with broad shoulders that had probably once been fearsome, and were still very impressive. Everything about him gave the impression of aging strength. Everything but his eyes. They were the bright neon blue of a Dutch teenager, with no trace of the yellowing or cloudiness of age. Somehow, they were the most formidable part of him.
As we talked I learned that Jens had been an executive for Phillips Electronics, one of the world’s largest technology companies. In this role he had travelled the globe. It was easy to imagine him in a business suit. It was easy to imagine him as a power-broker. There was a great deal of arrogance in those blue eyes. It was an arrogance that had been earned.
Eventually I got around to the most common question one pilgrim asks the other. “Why did you decide to hike the Camino?” I was especially interested in Jens’ answer. Most of the other pilgrims I’d met along the path were not just younger, but were also of a much different emotional persuasion than Jens. Some pilgrims seemed to be searching for something to fill an emotional void. Others were doing it for the adventure or for bragging rights. Some were deeply religious and were making the journey for spiritual reasons. Jens, on the other hand, seemed like a man who was, and had always been, confident and complete. There was no trace of weakness or sentimentality in him. He was a huge, unmovable rock. In no way was he a typical pilgrim. In the sea of emotional openness that is the Camino de Santiago, Jens was a curious aberration.
He looked at me for a moment. The moment got longer. He just stared at me with no expression. Finally he said, “I’m walking in memory of my wife.”
This great granite-stone of a Dutchman sat in front of me and took another sip of his beer. He didn’t offer any more explanation. I wondered if I’d offended him with my question. He didn’t seem to want me to leave, but he didn’t seem to want to talk, either. So we just sat there for a while and listened to the laughter of the other pilgrims, most of them punch-drunk from the exhaustion of the day’s hike.
Then I asked him how long he had been married. The question slipped out. I hadn’t meant to press the subject. And I knew instantly that it had been a mistake. Once again, he just looked at me. But then that great granite face cracked. It was like a tiny fissure in the walls of a fortress. From inside that momentary fracture shone a strange and terrible light. “Forty seven years,” he whispered.
I just sat there and watched him. I couldn’t think of anything to say. This guy wasn’t the crying type, but there was liquid in his fiercely youthful eyes that he did not wipe away. It was one of the most awkward moments of my entire life. I realized that a man like Jens could have had only one type of love story: a mighty one, full of joy and adventure.
I suddenly found myself choking back my own tears. I knew nothing of this man, but it was clear that the final chapter of a half-century-long love story was being written, right here on the Camino. I couldn’t think of anything else to do, so I reached into my pocket and pulled out a stone that I’d collected earlier in the day from the side of the trail.
“I’m from America,” I told him, “And I live on the flanks of the Great Craggy Mountains in North Carolina.” I told him about the highest peak of the range, known as Craggy Dome. From the summit of Craggy I told him that an observer could see miles in every direction. I told him that it was one of the most beautiful places I’d ever been.
I asked for his permission, upon my return to America, to place this stone from the Camino on the summit of Craggy Dome in honor of his wife. He thought about it for a moment and once again I felt like I might have offended him. But then he reached out with a massive hand and squeezed my shoulder. He used his pen to write on the stone, and handed it to me. He’d written her name and a date. It must have been the date of the day she died. It had been three months earlier.
I put the stone in my pocket and he raised his glass to me. We gave a silent toast. Me, I was toasting what I imagined had been a great European love affair. What Jens toasted I’ll never know. His composure was once again as solid as a mountain.
A few minutes later my wife joined us. She was smiling and relaxed and happy to be clean after a long day of hiking. She joined us and was soon chatting away with Jens, charming him as she does everybody with her pure, honest inner light. We spent the evening with Jens, eating the Pilgrim’s Meal and talking in awkward English about the trivial things pilgrims discuss on the trail: blisters, sore knees, sunburn. He gave my wife a huge, lingering hug when we parted before bedtime. The loneliness of that embrace almost broke my heart.
I saw Jens as we passed him along the trail the next day. He still didn’t have a hat, and he was still leaning heavily on his walking stick. I knew it would take a miracle for him to complete the remaining 450 miles to Santiago. He greeted us with a smile, but soon we pulled ahead, leaving him shuffling along his way. I never saw him again, but I strongly suspect that he did indeed make it to the finish at Santiago. A man like Jens would never, ever give up, and miracles happen every day on the Camino.
Postscript:
The Camino is a teacher, whether you walk to learn or not. I learned from Jens to relish every page of my own life’s love story. Though it is still in its middle chapters, it will come to an end someday, as all great love stories do. Then it will become a joyous memory, and then, if we’re lucky, it will live forever as a stone on a mountaintop in a faraway land.
Once the Blue Ridge Parkway to Craggy Dome reopens in the spring, my wife and I will take the Dutchman’s stone and place it at the highest point of the summit. I hope that at that moment, wherever he is, some form of synchronicity will cause Jen to smile. Ultreïa, my friend!
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