Dear friends who follow this bog,
It has been a while, and I realized that I forgot to post on here that I’ve started a new blog and would love to invite you to view it. Check it out and subscribe over there to continue receiving updates and new blogs. I can’t wait to see you there to continue the conversation…
Journal Entry from 6/18/19 – Rome, Italy
Yesterday, we went to the Forum, Colosseum, and Palatine Hill. It was a long, hot day full of crowds, wandering, and wondering.
When we were looking down into the Forum from the Palatine Hill, Mitch pointed out a pair of green doors on a church much higher than the base of the ancient columns in front of it. Apparently, the church was built much later, after the Forum had been mostly buried under centuries of rubble and neglect. He said it was even referred to as the “cow field” for a while, years after being the center of Roman life. They only began excavating it all slowly, but surely, a few centuries ago.
Mitch said they’ve done a lot more to plant grass and continue the excavations since he first started coming to Rome 25 years ago. To be honest, I don’t remember much about the Forum from when I last came, other than it’s position between the Colosseum and the “Wedding Cake” monument.
When we walked on to the Colosseum, and were finally let in at our appointed time, we were already weary and dusty. Mitch and I had been up since 4:45 a.m. and Grace’s knee was struggling after all the stairs from the Palatine Hill. We walked through it all relatively quickly, but not before seeing an exhibit on the various iterations of the Colosseum.
While starting as a symbol of Rome’s grandeur in the 1st century A.D., full of gladiator combat and man vs. beast tests of will, it began to decline with alongside the might of Rome. Over time, fires, earthquakes, and raiding took their toll on it’s once grand physique. The last recorded events in the ancient Colosseum were in the 5th century.
After that, the Colosseum took on many iterations. It housed a church and later was sanctified as a shrine to martyred Christians. It was a giant graveyard. It was converted into markets and rented housing. It served briefly as a fortified castle. And now, it is being gently preserved as a symbol of Rome’s rich history as a great empire.
I saw an Italian mother talking to her toddler daughter about a fully decorated model of the Colosseum at the exhibit. It made me wonder what it’s like to come from a country, and a city really, that once dominated the known world. How does that impact your sense of history? How does that impact your sense of self? How does that make you feel about the current state of Italy and it’s place in the world? Do you wish you were born during Rome’s heyday?
What will be our Colosseums, or will we have any? And what kind of lives will our cherished places lead long after we are gone, and what lives had they led long before we were there?
It also made me wonder about the period of time and place into which I’ve been born. How will future Americans remember our world and the choices we’ve made as a dominant power? What will be our Colosseums, or will we have any? And what kind of lives will our cherished places lead long after we are gone, and what lives had they led long before we were there?
The Forum and Colosseum were a great reminder that time is the great equalizer. Each people, or place, will have their day in the sun, as well as their time to be forgotten. Our young country has yet to learn what the more mature ones have learned. History is about surviving and adapting to the changes and challenges around us. Just like the Colosseum has been mighty and humbled many times, likely we too shall be.
From Journal Entry on 6/16/19 – Rome, Italy
Today we went to see the pope’s regular Sunday address, rather fitting when you think about the fact that it’s Father’s Day. We double-checked his schedule to ensure he would be speaking, then we headed off on our 30 min. walk to the Vatican.
It was hot today, close to 90 degrees, and I could feed the extra sunscreen I applied making my arms and legs sticky. I anticipated great crowds with us standing in the middle of the colonnade’s arms before St. Peter’s, a sweaty, devout mass ready for mass. On the way, we all bought water and the girls bought fans for a euro that were lined with faux lace and decorated with landmarks from Rome. They literally said “souvenir” on them, as if there were any doubt, and Emily’s started to come apart before we even entered the Vatican.
We had to cross the Bridge of Angels before passing the fortress where the pope retreated during the sieges of Rome, the Castel Sant’Angelo
. The last angel on the bridge held a spear in a fearsome pose, as if guarding the fortress by himself. My mind started asking a million questions. How did the fortress stay in the church’s hands if the Vatican area close by fell? Would they just hunker down there and beg other Catholic countries to come save them? How much food did they keep there regularly, and for how long could they hold out? Mitch later showed us the passage the pope would use to escape to the fortress from the Vatican, high above the crowds below.
Then, we entered the colonnade. Surprisingly, there was no security like we were told to expect, which should’ve been our first clue something was amiss. There were also fewer people than I expected, with only about 1/5 of it full. Mitch told us that the pope speaks from a window to the right, so we chose to sit in the shade of the colonnade on the left.
There was such a fascinating mix of people there: tourists interested in the spectacle that is the papacy, who wore shorts and tank tops and sandals; devout religious pilgrims from many countries coming to hear the words of their beloved leader, dressed in long pants and dresses and fine headdresses; beggars and the lame who came to find blessings amid the religious crowds, just hoping for some crumbs from the table, dressed in rage and bandages, holding crutches and cups for alms.
We all waited together in anticipation, each hoping for a different kind of blessing awaiting us as the noon bells tolled. We watched the windows high above as the sounds reverberated throughout the piazza. As the bells began to fade in the distance, we grew antsy. Something was wrong, for nothing was happening. We watched. We waited. Still nothing.
We all waited together in anticipation, each hoping for a different kind of blessing awaiting us as the noon bells tolled. We watched the windows high above as the sounds reverberated throughout the piazza. As the bells began to fade in the distance, we grew antsy. Something was wrong, for nothing was happening. We watched. We waited. Still nothing.
Mitch and I double-checked different websites again to ensure there was a scheduled address. Sure enough, June 16th was on the docket, but still nothing. The realization that hit us began to wash over the crowed, and groups began to leave with long faces. What happened? Was he sick? Why was there no announcement that he wasn’t coming?
I felt like a girl who had gotten all dressed up for the prom, only to have her date never show. I guess I was more excited to see the pope than I realized based on the level of disappointment I was feeling. I’m not Catholic, and I know enough history to have a very healthy skepticism about the office. However, part of me still wanted to believe that this man was somehow going to have a holy presence that true spiritual leaders often do.
But then I realized that he is, in fact, just a man. Just like every religious leader I’ve known. Just like every father I’ve known. Imperfect. Flawed. Human. We put too much stock in these fathers, holy or not, and force them up on lonely pedestals, shocked when they have trouble staying up there successfully. It’s unfair of us to demand it of them, or of them to demand from us.
The pope seems built from a system of separating him from his people. Just look at the high window from which he speaks or the fortress to protect him. What the church, and the world, needs is a father who walks beside them as an example, mentor, and support, not a man speaking to them from a gilded tower. But did we build that tower and gild it and place him up there? It gave me pause.
Later in the day, when the nine hour time difference made it appropriate, I called my dad. He seemed surprised to hear from me. “Are you in Rome? You sound like you’re next door.” We had our normal 2-3 minute chat before he handed the phone off to my mother who was itching for her turn. He told me to keep posting pictures so he could see them on Instagram right before he jumped off.
It made me thankful to hear his voice today. It might not have been the pope, but it was a more important father in my life for sure. I thought about Mitch and wondered if Father’s Day still hurts him only a few years after his dad passed. I didn’t have the heart to ask, and just tried to be extra sympathetic today. For me, at least, when there was no holy father’s voice today, my dad could fill that void.
Journal Entry from 6/13/19 – Rome, Italy
I woke up this morning after 5 1/2 hours of sleep in the last 36 as you would expect – begrudgingly. It was only 5:15 a.m., but a seagull, sounding both determined and desperate in equal measure, had perched outside on the terrace. Maybe it was from hunger, or trying to feed her young, or wanting to find her way back to the sea, but her calls were clear and haunting. 
Later, she was joined by a cacophony of other birds beginning their morning rounds – some more pleasant than others. So, I wearily joined them in their greeting of the day, a strange role reversal since Mitch was still asleep.
I have always been puzzled with Mitch’s preoccupation with Rome, having only visited once over 20 years ago, and being a Florence man myself. Rome seemed too big, too unorganized, too unsure of how to be both ancient and modern with grace. It seemed clunky and overly proud, gilded with a religious smugness that flew in the face of the pious religion I respected. It was also more harsh and barren terrain than I expected for an Eternal City. So I came back expecting to enjoy the food and wine – and especially the gelato – and trying to go in with an open mind in letting Mitch attempt unfolding his favorite city’s mysteries before me, all the while knowing I’m a Florence man and always will be. But, seeing him be giddy and inspired would ensure that it was all time well spent.
My first surprise happened on the drive in from the airport. There were copious amounts of oleander, both white and pink, all along the highway into the city. It was like a carpet laid down the center median ushering us in (and when it was time, out) of this grand place. 
Later, when walking through the city, it dawned on me that I was last here in November, not June, and so I saw a very different place. The Rome of summer is vibrant with color. Green ivy crawls up the sides of posh hotels and ancient columns. Bright red and pink flowers can be found throughout the city decorating window boxes of third floors, hanging off of black wrought iron terraces. Yellow flowers punctuate the walk along the ancient Forum roads.
Rome is alive in a way I didn’t remember from before, or maybe I am alive at 40 in a way I wasn’t at 19, and so I can now appreciate her. At 19, her winding streets felt untidy, like the inner workings of a messy mind – unplanned, unkempt, not ready for company. Now, they seem charming and adaptive as I watch the subtle dance between pedestrians and traffic, cobble stones and smooth pavement, old and new.
I now understand that Rome held secrets I wasn’t ready for at 19. Life can’t be planned like the gridded layout of a flat Oklahoma town. Having a rich history means sometimes tearing down or building around the old, appreciating the ruins from your life that serve as reminders of better times to inspire hope, or of darker times to keep you from repeating past mistakes.
As we looked over ruins where Julius Caesar was murdered, I wonder what my ruins are, left as they were in the past? As we looked at modern construction built on and around the ancient, I wondered where I’ve mended and rebuilt the broken places, instead of tearing them all down.
Rome merely winked as she continued whispering her secrets into my ear. She knew that to truly understand her was to see her through the eyes of age and experience, and that is why she is eternal.
When you’re a little kid, the world is full of magic. A rainbow in the sky. A Jack-in-the-box. Bubbles.
Then, something happens along the way, and most of that tends to go away. Science explains the rainbow. Jack gets kind of creepy. You can make bubbles from soap if you want, but you never do any more. You see behind the curtain in Oz, and the magic begins to fade.
Last week, I went with my five nephews and nieces to Universal Studios. In my mind, it was going to be about lots of walking, long lines, and swampy Florida heat. While all of that was there – and I realized I’m now of the age where I buy Neutrogena Age-Defying 70 spf specialty face sunscreen – there was something else waiting for me, as well. Magic. Sometimes, it takes hanging out with kids to bring back the magic in the world around us.
As a Harry Potter nerds, my family was most excited about visiting Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley. My oldest nephew wanted a wand so badly, he about had a meltdown over it. “But we have to get it before we get on the Hogwart’s Express or I won’t be able to fend off the Death Eaters! What if they run out of wands before we get there?” Kid, it’s an overpriced plastic stick. Universal is basically printing money with those things and will never run out. We’ll be okay.
Then he got the wand. The special wand (for $5 more) that “works” throughout the two villages. He stood in front of a fountain and made water run out of it by waving his wand. He stood in front of a shop window and made a quill write by waving his wand. And I stood next to his siblings with their mouths agape and couldn’t help but smile while I silently stopped judging my brother so much for buying himself a wand. I sort of wished I had, too. But at that point, it was still a waste of money.
We continued on, and I watched my oldest niece, a worldly and wise four, be terrified of animatronic characters who were too real for her. As I tried to explain that they weren’t real to help assuage her fear, I started to wonder if I should even be doing that. Maybe I should just let her experience it like a kid, so I decided to join in on her version instead. I had forgotten what it was like to be able to suspend belief and just lean in to the magic around you.
The first real example for me happened in Jurassic Park. Two of my nephews wanted to visit the Raptor Encounter, despite not really being sure what that entailed. We waited in line as the “park scientist” talked to us about Blue, the raptor we’d be meeting shortly. I could see the battle in their minds as they tried to remain calm and convince themselves that none of it was real. But when Blue came out and we began to get closer and closer to getting our picture with her, the magic took over. And it took over for me, too. That thing was super realistic! I let myself believe we were in Jurassic Park and reacted how I would’ve reacted with a real dinosaur. And you know what? It might have been my favorite thing we did the whole time.
From then on, I was really in. I excitedly joined in having my picture taken with the Scooby Doo gang and Branch from Trolls. I yelled alongside the kids when we were dodging King Kong’s swings, on an out-of-control roller coaster in Krustyland from The Simpsons, or shooting at aliens to help the Men in Black. I gulped down butterbeer and helped pick out a chocolate frog. I danced to the music playing throughout the park as we walked along in the summer heat. I ooohed and aaahed at my niece after she got princessed up at the Bibbidy Bobbidy Boutique at Disney Springs where Tinker Bell made her pixie dust nail polish. Then we twirled.
And I experienced the magic with all of them.
It made me a bit sad to be coming home from it, like the magic was about to die. Then, I was told about my youngest nephew throwing a coin in a fountain at Disney World this week and wishing for a camping trip in his own back yard. It reminded me, Dorothy-style, that the magic never dies if you continue to create it for yourself, even at home, and simply choose to believe in it.
Last night, I had two glasses of Kim Crawford Sauvignon Blanc.
I’ve always thought that alcohol doesn’t change your personality so much as heighten who you are on the inside. So what happens to me two glasses in? While cooking with Mitch and Beth, waiting on Jacob to join us, I start singing along with Madonna’s new single and performing an impromptu interpretive dance. It was short lived, but it happened. And then I harmonized with the Eagles. And then Fleetwood Mac. You can tell I’m starting to feel it when I get singy and dancy. It’s my tell.
So what does that say about me? That I’ve always wanted to be a backup singer? Or backup dancer? Or I have a performing diva on the inside dying to get out? Or that it’s my family’s fault for nicknaming me the “Disco Baby” as a 1-year-old and putting me up on a table to entertain them on family vacation while they played Donna Summer?
Partially, I think it means that I like to be the center of attention from time to time. It’s why I tell long-winded stories to try and hold an audience captivated. It’s why I get soapboxy with my students. It’s a little bit that I’m a performer, but it’s more than that.
I like to be heard. A lot. And I have an over-developed sense of how important everything I think and say are. Case in point: I’m writing a blog to share these thoughts instead of just thinking them…
I’ve always believed in the power of words. I’ve been a life-long reader. I love to write. I love to teach about reading and writing. And I’m good at wielding words – although sometimes so good that I Julia Sugarbaker someone into submission only to later regret it. Mostly, though, I just want to pass on any knowledge or wisdom that I have been given or earned, and words are the best tool at my disposal. Lots and lots of words. The more words, the better.
Or so I thought.
This year, I’m starting to question that. I blame my instructional coach at school. She made me do the one thing I absolutely hate doing, which is ironic based on what I just wrote a few paragraphs back: she made me video myself teaching and watch it. Bleh.
No one likes the sound of their own voice. It’s always a different pitch than it sounds like in your head. Or your mannerisms are always so weird, or your posture makes you look like a skeksi from The Dark Crystal, or you always use the same two hand motions when you talk. Bleh.
When it came time for me to watch my video, there was one thing that stood out above all the rest. More than the weird posture or weird voice. More than the actually pretty decent lesson being taught to my AP English class.
I talked WAY too much.
The Disco Baby came out all over again, and I was doing an intellectual song and dance routine. My poor students could barely get a word in before I would try and dazzle them with my incredible knowledge all over again. When they were talking, I just looked like I was waiting for the mic back again to perform another educational verse.
Bleh.
The educational jargon for this phenomenon is ratio. Talk time. Mic time. And I’m greedy when it comes down to it. So, I’ve been working on giving my students more air time and taking more of a back seat. Asking more probing questions. Creating more experiential learning. Mostly just trying to learn to shut up, and listen instead. I’m hesitant to ask them if they’ve noticed for fear that there’s no noticeable change. Yet.
On my hour-and-a-half drive home from Mitch’s this morning, I got to thinking about how maybe each year in my forties should have a focus. Immediately, it became clear that this should be the year of listening. You see, it’s not just in my professional life where my ratio is off. 96.7% of the time, I start my conversations with Mitch by telling him all about my day before asking about his. When I’m catching up with friends, I often talk more than I listen. And many times when I listen, I’m trying not to forget what it is I want to say next because it’s SO important or insightful.
Therefore, I’m going to work on my ratio and see what I can learn from my students, family, and friends. I’m sure if I can stop worrying so much about what I’m going to say next and be present, then I can be a better support, encouragement, and teacher to them. I’m sure they have a lot of knowledge and wisdom I can learn from, and some very interesting stories to tell, if only I would just shut up and listen.
Working with kids who have only been alive for roughly a third of my years has its advantages, perhaps the most important being that when most of your shirts are dirty and you decide to wear the school-issued uniform polo because it’s clean, they sometimes confuse you for a student. The week of my fortieth birthday, it happened twice. Happy birthday to me.
However, to keep me grounded firmly in my aging reality, I had to renew my driver’s license the same week, which meant a new picture. Anyone who knows me understands that my poor, light-sensitive, blue eyes ruined my shot at a modeling career because a flash immediately makes me look like a crazy stalker trying to suck your soul out with my startling wide-open eyes. (For photographic evidence, you can check out the “Crazy Eyes McGee” photo album on Facebook, or the collages from my dear friend Nicole.) In addition to the crazy eyes, I also have fair skin, for which I should wear sunscreen daily. I did not wear said sunscreen last weekend at my kickball doubleheader, and ended up with a sunburn resembling raccoon markings on my face, topped off with a nose bright enough to rival Rudolph’s. Those same dear students looked at me in horror, asking repeatedly either why I was mad all day or if was I sunburned. Suffice it to say, between the eyes and the red, I will only be going places that do not require a photo ID for the next decade.
Such is the dichotomy of forty, at least what I can gather from this new phenomenon. And the good part is that I’m settling into a place in life where I can take both in stride. Maybe this is due to the major life construction that happened in the last decade, where I finally found my city, my career, my person, and just my general footing in a way that has given me a more solid foundation. Or maybe I’ve learned to care less about things that don’t matter or that I don’t have control over in the first place.
Take, for instance, my body. I know that some of you will want to punch me in the throat for this, but hear me out. I have always been thin. Like never went through an awkward adolescent larger stage, didn’t have to try to have abs, still have 7th grade girl arms to this day, thin. My friend Stu always used to tell me that my metabolism would get the better of me around 26. Then he changed it to 28. Then he said 30. Then he said he hated me.
Well, he was about a decade off. My body has definitely begun to shift and change. The business of teaching a new grade almost every year for the past few years, which means creating and learning new lesson plans for every single lesson, meant less time for yoga or running. This, in turn, meant my pants started feeling funny around the waistband, and for the first time I thought about getting rid of clothing because it didn’t fit my stomach. My abs started merging from six into one. My hairline started creeping back ever so slowly. Instead of six chest hairs (each of which had their own individual name), I had twenty-six (or too many to name). I had to start trimming my nose hairs, but I could finally grow a somewhat respectable beard without being ridiculed. I got weird rosacea on my face. The skin on my thighs changed texture to resemble tanned leather. I stopped being able to sleep through an entire night most of the time. Before I knew it, I was like a stranger in my own body.
At first, this was disconcerting. I got frustrated with my body for not responding the way it used to. It’s not fair to be one way for almost four decades and then up and change, right? This is where I would’ve broken up and said it’s not me, it’s you. Or I would have fired it for not meeting expectations. But you can’t dump or fire your body, you’re stuck with it. So now what?
In a wild, and probably too-rare, attempt at personal growth, I decided to make friends with my “new” body. First, we needed to get acquainted, like dating. I started learning how getting off my phone by 9 p.m. meant a better night’s sleep. I found a good moisturizing lotion to use daily that helped my skin. I started using aftershave. I noticed that my body was regularly communicating with me about what it needed if I would just listen. And I found a balance between letting go of demanding my body be its 20-year-old self and still working on the parts that I had control over.
My body is just one example of learning to be more at ease in the world around me as I round the corner into my forties. I’m trying to apply these same lessons to other areas like daily moisturizer, with varying degrees of success. But I think this is going to be a more forgiving decade, so I’m excited for years where I know who I am, I know my place, and I know my purpose.
Now, if I could just find a way to make peace with that driver’s license photo…
In the last blog, I talked about experiencing the most embarrassing that can happen to you when I was in Germany. Not long afterwards, I experienced the worst thing that can ever happen to your mom when you are studying abroad: I got sick. Really sick. Like had to be carried and or wheeled around sick. Ten days in the hospital in a foreign country sick.
I’m not sure when it started. I’m guessing it was that really bad pizza I ate in London, or maybe the questionable McDonald’s in Paris. Regardless, my stomach declared war on the food, and then it declared war on me for the next few weeks as punishment. Being my mother’s child, I came fully prepared with an arsenal of medicines for any possible ailment, ranging from bee stings to bubonic plague. I started with a barrage of over-the-counter drugs I was confident would end the skirmish before it really took off. I underestimated my foe.
Interestingly enough, I might not have been the only one suffering gastrointestinal battles, as around the same time my journal starts mentioning my stomach hurting regularly, it also mentions the “Great Fart of 18:39” from 9/12 on a bus through Germany. Apparently, it was the “WORST THING I’VE EVER SMELLED” and wiped out 8-10 rows of us – even the one who committed the foul deed was choked up by the noxious fumes. I won’t mention the specific party by name, but his initials sound like a fast food chain that serves roast beef…
The next day’s journal entry mentions the war with my stomach ratcheting up a few notches, with diarrhea six or seven times that day. It got to the point that my drugs clearly weren’t doing the trick, so I phoned in reinforcements in the form of a family doctor back home. He gave me some advice, and I marched on confident of a swift victory. Again, wrong.
Three days later, my journal said it was the “WORST DAY OF MY LIFE” (Can you say drama queen? Why was I always yelling in my journal?). Not only was I having severe diarrhea regularly, but now I was having severe cramping. I called Dr. Mitchell back home, and he said I needed to go see a doctor in Vienna. Our sponsor had the contact information of an American doctor, and so he took me to see him.
Before I talk about my diagnosis, I want to mention some questions I’ve thought about in retrospect that I should’ve asked then, such as: 1) Why are you practicing abroad and not in America? 2) Are you still allowed to practice in America? 3) Did you do anything illegal/unethical that caused you to take a trip abroad and just never come back? 4) Are you actually a doctor of medicine, or do you just have a doctorate in philosophy and a Mayo Clinic book? You see the foreshadowing here. He was clearly a double agent working for the opposition.
My diagnosis was that I had a bacterial infection, a fever, and I was dehydrated. He gave me a shot in the butt, some antibiotics, and sent me on my way. I was so exhausted, I didn’t think I’d make it home. That night, I was so feverish that I just laid awake shivering under the covers. I still was getting up “every five minutes” to go to the bathroom, and the last two times I had blood in my stool. I looked at the mirror in my reflection and got scared because the battle had taken its toll. I looked pale and gaunt, but my cheeks were flushed with fever. I missed my mom because she would’ve been there with a cold rag to help assuage my condition. I finally fell asleep.
As it turns out, Dr. Quack had given me drugs that killed all the good bacteria in my intestines and left the bad bacteria to take over and crush my will to live. A few nights later, I was physically unable to move to go to the bathroom any more, exhausted from not sleeping much, dehydrated, and still feverish. And so, on 9/20, I waved the white flag and asked to go to the krankenhaus (hospital) because I was very krank (sick). I remember they had to physically carry me down to the cab because I was too weak to walk, and was worried that they would speak enough English for us to communicate at the hospital. The rest was a blur for the next few days.
My only memories of my first 48 hours in the krankenhaus were a mix of the snoring of my two roommates (whom I named Dr. Buzzsaw and Herr Hairball), having to be wheeled to the bathroom on the regular, and awaking once in my own mess.
Sometimes, I would wake up disoriented because it all seemed like a dream between the unfamiliar place and everyone speaking German. I actually started dreaming in German because I was so submerged in it. The doctors spoke English when they came to check on me, and most of the nurses would try with their broken English, but the only regular mother tongue I experienced was when I got well enough to go down the hall to the room with the television. If I turned the sound up over the dubbing, I could get Cartoon Network loud enough to hear the English dialogue. I’ve never been so happy to hear Foghorn Leghorn’s southern drawl or Shaggy’s cowardly retorts to Scooby.
I also vividly remember that it was a teaching hospital like on Grey’s Anatomy. Why do I remember this random detail? Well, I’m a touch needle phobic from a traumatic childhood injury, and so I remember a very nervous intern approaching me with a needle about day four. He needed to put in my IV for the day, and he was shaking as he reached for my arm. I have very skinny arms and very giant veins, so a blind nurse could get an IV in my arm, but he missed four times. I almost threw up, and finally told him that he was going to have to get someone else before he made me sick. I felt bad, but he needed to go find another pin cushion without childhood trauma to learn on.
In addition to my first experience with a teaching hospital, it was my first interaction with socialized medicine, which was fascinating to me. While one of my roommates was a burn victim – watching, and smelling, dressing changes was not so wonderful – the other was a younger man who would leave every morning, and then return in the evening, get medicine, and then go to sleep in the bed at night. I wished I could’ve spoken enough German to ask him what was going on, where he went every day, and why he needed to stay in the hospital overnight when he seemed fine to come and go as he pleased. I realized that they are much more cautious with sending you on your way under this system when, after I was feeling better a few days in, I was informed that I would be staying ten days total before I would be released. Um, say what? By the end of the experience, I was leaving in the morning, going all the way back across town, attending class, grocery shopping, eating pizza at my favorite spot, and then coming back to sleep there at night like my roommate. In America, I probably would have been there two nights and then sent home.
The thing I remember the most about my hospital stay, however, was the care and concern shown to me by so many people. Lindy Adams, one of our sponsors, was a saint and came to see me every day. Her daughter, Liz, made a card for me and had everyone sign it. Most of my travel mates came to visit me, some very regularly. They brought me little gifts, like a cactus or a bucket of Tichy Eis (ice cream) to share, or they dressed up to make me laugh. My mom and dad called every day, and it was all everyone could do to keep my mom from hopping on a plane to be with me. My grandparents called regularly, and many friends from school called to check on me back when international calls were not so cheap and there was no Skype. My mom sent a giant care package that I was sure to note in my journal cost “$117!!!” to ship. I was in no short supply of love, and that assuredly helped me heal more quickly.
In the end, I reflected in my journal that this experience had taught me patience. In retrospect, I think I learned that I need to take care of and listen to my body instead of pushing it so hard. And, most importantly, the Austrians and their socialized medicine seemed to know something that us Americans don’t always understand: healing takes time, even when you look fine on the outside, so take your time at the krankenhaus.
(originally written 6/10/2007)
I know that a lot of times people use exaggerated language. I had the best time ever. I ate the worst meal of my life. It was the longest sermon in the history of mankind. I’m guilty of language inflation as well, but I am not exaggerating at all when I say I’ve experienced the worst thing that can happen to you. Trust me.
The first leg of our study abroad program included stops in England, France, and Germany on our way to Austria. These first two weeks were a time for introductions to world travel and, more importantly, to the each other as a group. First impressions were of paramount importance when these thirty or so people would be your only social circle for the next few months. One fatal mistake early on, and you were forever branded the group klutz or the unfortunate kid who didn’t wear deodorant, banished with the other outcasts who were never picked for gym class teams. The first impression pressure was crushing for the self-conscious like me.
Despite this, I was determined to enjoy the German portion of the first two weeks, which included seeing the real version of the Cinderella castle I had constructed out of Legos as a kid, experiencing the wine vineyards of the Rhine despite never having tasted wine in my life, and Dachau.
I’ve always had a strange fascination with the Holocaust, which I admit makes me a bit of a freak. When I was little, I would watch World War II documentaries recounting the American soldiers storming into camps full of victims barely recognizable as human. I read the diary of Anne Frank. I did reports on concentration camps for school, reading about how Nazi scientists used the Jews, gypsies, and homosexuals as lab rats for their experiments. They would leave them outside for extended periods in the winter to test the human body’s reaction to extreme exposure. They would construct machines to simulate atmospheric pressure, testing how much the body could withstand. It was almost too gruesome for belief, and yet I was a junkie.
I could see it all so vividly that it almost became my own experience. I would imagine I was a victim in the know about all the heinous activity of my Nazi captors. I chronicled all the horrors in a secret code of markings on the bottom of the bunk above me so that I could expose them to the world when I was liberated. I would become the spokesman of the oppressed, the face of hope, the name associated with determined stele in the face of adversity. Martin Luther King, Jr. Mother Theresa. Nelson Mandela. Luke Anderson.
Needless to say, the opportunity to finally see a place I had spent hours visiting in my mind was thrilling. I knew it would be a solemn experience. Impactful. Possibly life-changing.
As our tour bus full of idle chatter screeched to a halt with the sound of airbrakes, we disembarked in silence. Wide-eyed, we approached with the proper amount of reverence. We toured the entire camp. The site of the barracks. The crematorium. The infamous “Arbeit macht frei” sign. It was overwhelming.
And then, it happened. The worst thing that can possibly happen at a place like Dachau.
I got a boner.
Any guy can tell you that one of our biggest fears is getting a boner at inappropriate places. Church. School. Family Dinners. In your late teens and early twenties, you have no control over your penis. The wrong person walks by and it salutes. You accidentally remember the website you looked at three weeks ago and your penis remembers it, too. But it’s not always a sexual cause for this phenomenon. Your boxers brush it the wrong way walking and it pops up to say hello. The wind blows your pants a certain way, and here we go. I’m telling you, half of the time, it’s just a physical reaction. It’s like your penis is afraid you’ll forget about him without regular reminders.
My penis decided an appropriate time for a reminder was at the most inappropriate of places. So here I am in a concentration camp with a boner. It’s ironic that my personal version of hell happened at hell on earth.
Any guy can also tell you that we have a few options when it comes to de-escalating the situation should it arise. You first try for the pocket adjustment. A usually effective first line of defense, at Dachau it came up short. Next you can try a quick turn and grab, but you must have some kind of cover for this to work, and there was no way I was getting busted grabbing my crotch at Dachau out in the open. There were no bathrooms in sight, which is normally option three. So, I was stuck trying to adjust this abomination in my pants with option one. I felt like a pervert to the enth degree, and then it got worse.
My roommate saw me walking funny and came to ask me what was wrong. I’m sure he assumed I was moved by the experience being such a sensitive soul and was preparing his best comfort-the-wuss speech. I don’t know what came over me. I should have lied and said I was fine. I should have feigned a deep connection with the emotional pain of the place. I guess I froze under the horror that was my life at that moment, and said, “You know how sometimes, without there being a reason, you just accidentally get hard?”
The best-case scenario would have been sympathy from a fellow guy who had experienced church wood himself, followed by him nodding while walking away. My destiny has never been best-case scenarios.
My roommate’s eyes got huge, his face twisted in a look of utter disgust. It felt like he had a megaphone as he answered. “You have Dachau wood?!?” I tried shushing him without drawing any more attention to myself, but the damage was done.
Now, the best-case scenario at this point would have included him being stunned to the point of silence… for the rest of his life. Again, my destiny has never been best-case scenarios.
This kind of information was too bizarre and glorious a story for secrecy. By the time I got back to the bus, my pants tent successfully taken down, the story had spread like wildfire through the group. Some of their faces were twisted in the same disgust as my roommate’s, like I was a Neo-Nazi getting excited by Holocaust atrocities. Some looked at me with pity, but not sympathetic pity, the kind of pity you have for televangelists or crooked politicians. Others just look at me like I was Hitler’s offspring. I took the walk of shame down the aisle, sat by myself, and immediately started planning to jump off a bridge at our next stop.
Of course, I was affectionately referred to as “Dachau Wood” throughout the rest of our three and a half months together. It was just too big a first impression to shake.
It was the first time it had ever happened, so it was unsettling. What in the world was going on?
At the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, Monet grabbed me by the lapels and dragged me into one of his paintings. I stood, transfixed, unable to move on with the rest of the tour group as they traveled on through the rest of the Impressionists.
The protagonist of A Corner of the Apartment was staring at me, and I couldn’t break his gaze. He was a little boy, in what appeared to be a school uniform, standing in the middle of a room, hauntingly isolated despite the matronly figure in the distant background, head cocked slightly to one side. I felt like I knew him, and he was wanting to say something to me. I stood there for maybe 10 minutes, trying to listen, yet unable to hear him. What did he want to tell me? Was it important? How could I coax the words out? But I couldn’t hear him, no matter how hard I tried.
Eventually, I moved on to the next room, but my mind kept drifting back to the painting. I was fascinated by the experience. How could something painted 123 years before speak to me like this? I had never had such a strong reaction to a painting before. Was this normal? Did other people have this happen to them?
And then, it happened again a few rooms later when The Dream by Detaille sucked me in. As the French soldiers slumbered behind battlements, their dreams of glorious victory played out in the clouds above and I became one of them. I long stood daydreaming alongside the sleeping soldiers, hearing bugle calls and horse hooves and drumbeats and Les Miserables anthems driving me onward. Finally, I shook my head and broke the spell Detaille had cast, returning me to a room in a museum from my mental field trip to a French countryside battlefield.
Weird.
I didn’t know what to make of the experience at the time, for art had never moved me or stirred me in such ways. Maybe it’s because I had primarily experienced it through the pages of textbooks or the art anthologies I’d regularly thumb through at Barnes & Noble. I’ve come to discover that a photographic copy robs art of much of its true power. You can’t see the brilliance and depth of the colors or the magnitude of a painting that takes up a giant swath of wall space. The printed page neuters the art experience in a way, making it safe and sedate and, all too often, lifeless.
Later in the trip, the same experience with art happened again and again as I encountered the masters in person. I crept through the darkness with Rembrandt’s The Night Watch or covered my ears to stop the piercing sound coming from the mouth in Munch’s The Scream. Even within the last year, I have been lulled into a tranquil bliss by Monet’s The Path Through the Irises and horrified by the ravages of war as depicted by Sargent’s Gassed.
Perhaps the most significant time an artist spoke to me was when I had a chat with Norman Rockwell at the Frist in Nashville almost five years ago; we talked about writer’s block when I was looking at his Blank Canvas for the Saturday Evening Post cover from 1938. I’ve been there so many times, scratching my head in the same way with my similarly skinny arm poking out from a rolled-up sleeve, trying to get something to come out when nothing will, frustrated and helpless. I sat and commiserated with Rockwell for quite some time before going home and writing a blog post about it, ironically inspired. That summer, accidentally running across a handsome stranger re-enacting that very painting for his profile picture changed my life.
But none of that would’ve happened if it wouldn’t have been for Monet, over a century ago, painting something universal enough for me to connect with as I stood there twenty years ago in Paris. I still can’t explain why that little boy haunted me so.
In retrospect, after my experience in London, maybe he was me.
My Name Means Light 