A Colossal Reflection

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.

Papa, Can You Hear Me?

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.

Getting Reacquainted With Rome

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.

Chapter Six: Getting Krunk at the Krankenhaus

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.

Chapter Five: The Worst Thing That Can Ever Happen To You… Seriously

 (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.

 

Chapter Four: A Course in Art Appreciation

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.

Chapter 3: Paralyzed

I had actually forgotten the “official” story of what happened my first night in London.  Here’s what I said at the time in my journal:

“Couldn’t sleep last night, so went on walk alone about 11:30 (dumb!) and accidentally left map in hotel room, but found out after getting lost.  Walked around a while before getting panicked, but ended up in bad places like Chinatown and Soho (red light district), saw many prostitutes (always wore skirts and hoes – how ironic) even though it was chilly and their pimps (men and women) followed.  Got hustled by one pimp lady enough to make me very uncomfortable.  Panicked a few times, ran, should have gotten a cab, but for some reason didn’t, got on wrong bus that took me farther away to West (Hyde Park), finally got home at 1:30 and won’t go alone again!!  Feel better this morning than I thought I would, hopefully won’t get sick as it was raining the whole two hours and I was wearing sandals.  Shouldn’t have brought sandals – waste of space.”

All that was true.  I had forgotten the shock this skinny, shivering, sheltered Oklahoma boy felt when the extremely aggressive pimp was determined that I would choose her girl.  I almost said yes out of sheer southern politeness.  How ironic considering my top secret mission that night.

I had also forgotten the growing concern slowly creeping through my body.  I was lost in a big city, far away from home in an age before cell phones, and slowly that creeping concern matured into fear, and that fear rapidly give birth to panic.  As it took hold, I found myself running, soaked, through the unfamiliar London streets.

But I was lost in a more important way that night, and the concern and fear and panic was about more than not knowing my way back to the hotel; it was about not knowing who I was and running away from who I feared I might be.

You see, I had this night excursion planned out well in advance.  Months in advance.  When I started out, I knew exactly where I was going even without the map I had forgotten.  The “jet lag” that drove me outside for a walk was an alibi I told my roommate to allay any suspicion of why I’d venture out alone, something I concocted when I hatched this plan in the bedroom of my parent’s house the previous summer.

What was I actually doing out that night?

I had decided that I needed to see if I was gay, and I was going to visit my first gay bar to see if I fit in there.

I couldn’t do this at home, because I might be found out and the stakes were too high.  I was from a well-known family, all of my friends went to a church that condemned that “lifestyle” of sin, I was a ministry major at a Christian university.  I might see someone who knew me and would subsequently out me.  No, my only safe chance at testing the waters would be when I was 4,623 miles away from anyone familiar, other than the handful of exhausted travelers tucked neatly in their beds.  Literally within weeks of finding out I was accepted for the Vienna Studies program, my brain started crafting a plan as my conscience nervously wrung his hands in disbelief.

In preparing for the trip the previous summer, I had bought many guidebooks to study up on all the major cities we’d visit.  In the back of many of them, there were small sections dedicated to hot spots in each place for LGBT travelers.  When I stumbled upon this section the first time, my body rushed with adrenaline.  Here was my chance.  I looked up the location of our hotel right outside of Piccadilly Circus (on Mapquest), and found that there was a gay club within walking distance.  If I could just sneak out, then it was easy from there.  I memorized the street names, distance in blocks, landmarks to check for along the way.  I must’ve looked at that section of the London map a hundred times before that night.

The alibi was the easiest part, but thinking through just the right way to perform jet lag insomnia took planning.  It would have to be casual, not forced.  Done at just the right moment when my roommate was clearly exhausted and wouldn’t care what I was doing.  I practiced it all in my head and then executed it better than a Shannon Miller beam routine.

As I snuck out into the cold night air, my internal fear started pleading as my body went into auto-pilot navigating the path to my destination.  Could I really go do this?  What if something went wrong?  I could be stabbed or robbed or roofied!  How could I be so careless?  I could be sent home on the first night of the trip!  And then kicked out of school!  But something inside drove each step forward.  Something inside wanted to know, or perhaps needed to, as fear tried to dig in his heels.

The battle raged inside my head the entire walk there.  As the streets got seedier and darker, away from the bright lights of Piccadilly, the gravity of the situation started sinking in.  This was an unfamiliar and scary place.  What was I thinking?  Fear started gaining a foothold.

As I rounded the corner of the last street, I looked up and saw the doorway of my destination.  It wasn’t gaudy or flashy like I expected, but rather understated.  A simple door with a simple sign.  Patrons would occasionally file in or out in groups or singles.  My legs began to fill with lead as my internal fear ratcheted the pleading up to shouting.  I found myself standing across the street from the entrance.

I was paralyzed.

Each time someone walked in, I’d catch a glimpse inside of what my life might look like in the warm light and company of the bar.  The truth inside me longed to take the few final steps across the street, but I was much more accustomed to listening to fear’s voice back then.  There was simply too much to lose, and I had “everything” going for me.  My family was counting on me to continue being the golden child they wanted, and I couldn’t let them down.  It was my grandmother’s dream to have a minister in the family, and I was her great hope.  It was my grandfather’s pride to have his first grandson at the institution he’d spent his entire life nurturing and building.  You can’t be anything else than what they want.  You just can’t, because that’s who you really are.  Not this.

And so, after pondering there an uncomfortably long time motionless as the steady rain ran down my face, fear won.  After months of planning and anticipation, I snuck out to stand, tethered by my fear, across the street from what I wished my life could be.  I wasn’t ready.

I remember the overriding emotions as I walked away, adrift in my own thoughts to the point that I ended up getting lost on my way back to the hotel.  I was disheartened, thinking I had just come to my proverbial crossroads, and I didn’t have the courage to make the right choice, so I made the easy one.  I was sad and resigned.  I felt doomed to a predestined life that others wrote the script for instead of me.  I was ashamed.  I was lonely.

And then, I spent the rest of the night berating myself for feeling all of those things because they were “wrong” and I had really just saved myself from a horrible decision that would lead to a wretched life.

This was not the last battle between fear and truth in my life, but it was the most poignant one.  When I think about that scared 19-year-old kid standing on that rainy street, it makes me incredibly sad. That night haunted me for the rest of the trip, and for years afterwards.  I was so lost, without a map, and would have to wander for a long time, often running panic-stricken through the streets of life, before I found my way back.