Airports should have an award for which could be most soulless.  Dublin would be up amongst the challengers.

Waiting for a flight this morning, I sat in one of the airport coffee shops.  A moment when one realizes that the years are passing and more sleep would have been conducive to feeling better.

The place was filled with vaguely Irish muzak, the sort of background noise that might have once been a tune.  It sounded strange.

A lady who must have been close to retirement age was cleaning the tables and clearing the trays.  The music changed to something I recognized, the Irish hymn “Ag Criost an Siol”.  As the lady wiped the table next to me she sang along with the music.

Looking straight ahead, I said to no-one in particular, “Anyone who knows the words of that hymn must go to church.”

She looked at me.  “Oh, I do.  Do you know where I was in the summer?  I was in Santiago de Compostella?”

“Did you do the camino?”  I asked.

“No”, she said, “My knees wouldn’t be up to walking the pilgrimage, but just being there – that was special”.

“I met a couple last year who did the camino in 35 days.  They thought they would do a bit of it, but got along so well, they finished it.”  I told her.

She smiled.  “That would be something”, she said, and went on her way singing the next verse of “Ag Criost an siol”.

Maybe there’s a bit of soul, even in the most soulless places.