Steve Dublanica's Blog, page 6

Scrapbook

I knew my father was dying but, since the hospice people said he’d probably last until the end of the week, I decided to go to the gym. Besides, I had a funny feeling I wouldn’t be able to get much exercise in soon. But as soon as I got on the treadmill, my cell phone rang. It was the hospice nurse. 

“Mr. Dublanica?” she said. “You’d better come here right now. He hasn’t got much longer.”  

Leaping of the treadmill before I’d even worked up a light sweat, I ran to my car and made the thirty minute drive to the nursing home in twenty. Treading across the long linoleum hallway as I made my way to my father’s room, my mind felt like a piece of film on long exposure, recording everything the struck my eyes – the flickering of a faulty florescent light, an old woman in a wheelchair plaintively calling for a help, a nurse smiling as she texted someone, and the late morning light as it streamed through the windows. Then I entered my father’s room and saw my mother lying with her head on his chest crying. The hospice nurse greeted me.

 “His oxygen levels are undetectable,” she said. “It’ll be soon.” 

“Okay,” I said. 

“Did someone call your brother?” 

“No one called Mark?” 

“I don’t think so.” 

“Jesus.” 

Pulling out my phone, I called my brother and told him the end was near.  It was a brief conversation. “Drive carefully,” I said. “I don’t want you to get into an accident.” Then I went over to my father’s bedside and placed my hand on his head. He didn’t seem to be in distress but more like a watch slowly winding down as his breathing grew shallower and shallower. Looking at my own watch, I sighed. 

“I don’t think your brother’s going to make it,” the hospice nurse whispered. 

“Probably not.” 

Moving next to my mother, I put my hand on her shoulder. “I’m so very sorry,” I said. They’d been married fifty-seven years and, as memories flipped through my mind like the pages of a scrapbook, I affixed on an image of my parents taken during their honeymoon in Montreal – looking impossibly young and beaming with optimism. Then, of all things, I remembered a can of ginger beer they’d brought back from that trip and left in our refrigerator like a piece of wedding cake for years. When I was small, it was an object of curiosity and I always wondered why they never drank it but, by the time I was in my late teens, the can had become an ugly thing – rust having torn it open and the liquid inside long since evaporated. Then one day the can gone. I guess my dad finally threw it out. 

Resuming my place at the head of the bed, I rested my hand on my father’s forehead and looked at his face. His chest has stopped moving and now the only sign of life was the tremulous quiver of the skin between his nose and upper lip. I thought about praying but, for some reason, it seemed futile and, as the weight of what was happening bore down on me, I knew the only thing I could do was watch. “This is going to leave a mark.” I thought to myself. 

You never know when an image is going to be frozen into your mind forever but, when it happens, deep down inside, you know it. I remember with absolute clarity realizing I’d never forget how the moonlight played over the naked skin of a long ago lover as she walked towards me with abandon. Same with green stereopticon brightness of the outfield at that last ballgame with my dad, my wife in her wedding dress, Natalie popping out of her mother with a splash, taking her first steps, and watching the life go out of my dogs’ eyes  The moment they happened, I knew I’d remember them to my dying day. Many of those and other eradicable images my mind snapped over the years are a joy, but quite a few of them are burdens and, the funny thing is, you have no way to know which image will become which. Very often. as life layers itself upon you, the happy ones sometimes become sicklied over with sorrow while the sad ones reveal a wisdom you never knew was there. There’s no telling – but I knew what I was seeing now would hurt for a long, long time. 

A few minutes later, I heard a commotion and, when I turned my head, I saw my brother rushing down the hall. When his stricken face came into focus, I felt that shutter click in my head. Another picture taken. Another image posted in that scrapbook forever. Then, as my brother knelt by my dad’s bedside, I stood with my hand on his shoulder and, within a minute, our father breathed his last breath Feeling faintly ridiculous in my gym clothes during such a solemn moment, I looked at my watch and noted the time. 

The hospice nurse had left to give us privacy, so I went in the nurse’s station to get her. “I’m pretty sure he’s passed,” I said. Looking at my father from her seat she said, “Oh yeah. He’s gone.” I guess after seeing so many people die, she knew death when she saw it. But she went through the motions, anyway, listening to my father’s chest before she called it. Then she told me, “He waited for your brother.” That’s when a part of my brain shut off. Suddenly eerily calm, a to do list began scrolling through my head and I excused myself from the room. There were details to attend to, people to call, texts to be sent, and a body to be picked up.  

When I returned to the room my brother, now joined by his wife, were comforting my mother. A trolley with coffee and cookies meant to soothe us had been wheeled into the room and, shrugging, I helped myself. Standing over my father’s dead body sipping coffee while incoming texts of condolence busily pinged my phone, my mind took another picture of the inanity of it all. Then, after about a hour, I got into my car and drove to the funeral home to sign paperwork – but decided to make a pitstop at my go to restaurant first. No sense passing put from low blood sugar. 

“How are you today?” my favorite waitress chirped as she set a glass of water in front of me.  

“My dad died two hours ago,” I said. The look on her face was yet another image I’ll never forget. 

Now that six months have gone by, I replay that morning in my head over and over again. If you asked me what I had for breakfast this morning, I might not be able to tell you but, if you asked me anything about that fateful day, I could describe it in granular detail. I remember the eye shadow a pretty blonde nurse wore, the sound of my mother crying, the antiseptic smells, the taste of those cookies, the dull sheen of that linoleum floor, and the feeling of the patty melt I ordered from that waitress sitting in my stomach like a greasy hockey puck. Someone told me that my photographic recall was guilt and perhaps they’re right. I’ve often wondered if it would’ve been easier to get the news via a phone call at 3:00 AM instead of watching my father die. But I was there with him as he waited for my brother, which tells me some small part of my father was still hanging on. I think Dad wanted me there too. 

Perhaps, in a few months, years, or decades, those images I unwillingly scrapbooked that day will patina with age and take on meanings I cannot fathom now. Maybe I’ll look upon them wistfully, realizing I was actually in the right place at the right time. But one thing is for certain, like all those other moments captured in mental celluloid, what I saw that day left a mark.

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Every Tear Wiped Away

“C’mon Dad!” Natalie cried, dragging me by the hand. “C’mon!”

“Lead the way,” I said

As the attendant lowered the safety bar on the roller coaster ride, I wasn’t overly concerned. When I was a younger man, I went on just about every kind of amusement park ride there is and came out unscathed and vomit free. Since I have a small child, however, it had been years since I’d been on a “big boy” ride, but I figured it would be like riding a bike again. I was wrong. 

When the old coaster hit the bottom of the big drop with a crash, a jolting pain lanced my neck and shot through my shoulder blade. Alarmed, I closed my eyes and tried to stabilize my head, which was next to impossible considering the G-forces involved. Feeling my skin break into a sickly sweat, I gritted my teeth and hung on to the bar for dear life as the world tossed and turned in the darkness. After what seemed like an eternity, the ride finally ended. 

“Ow!” I said, rubbing my neck and feeling woozy. 

“Are you alright?” my wife asked from behind me. 

“I think I got whiplash.” 

Stumbling off the ride, I twisted my neck around and was rewarded with an arthritic pop. I hadn’t really gotten hurt but was rattled. Now I knew why old duffers don’t go on these rides, content to watch their kids have fun. Was I becoming one of those people? Then again, I’ve been occasionally mistaken for Natalie’s grandfather. 

“Let’s skip roller coasters for the rest of the night,” I said to Annie. 

Despite being taken to Europe for her summer vacation, my daughter is still little and had been begging us to take her to an amusement park complete with water slides since the day school let out. As the pages fell from the calendar, Natalie asked us when we were going every day. “We have to take her somewhere,” I told my wife. “She’s been a good kid and deserves this.” 

“We’ll go to Hershey Park just before school starts,” Annie said. “If we go during the middle of the week, it won’t be crowded.” So, I took two days off from work this week, threw my family in the car, and drove to the “Sweetest Place on Earth.” Amazing that the Disney people haven’t sued them over that line yet. 

Our tickets let us enter the park at five o’clock until closing and then reenter the next day. The park was mercifully uncrowded with no lines and we crammed in just about every non-coaster ride we could until the security people ushered us out. Then we walked over to Chocolate World which features an animatronic ride showing how chocolate is made. 

“Didn’t you come here when you were small?” my wife asked as we walked inside. 

“1978,” I said. I was the same age as Natalie then – and the place looked like it hasn’t changed a bit. 

“That’s right. I have that picture of you and your brother from that trip. You’re all wearing funny hats.” 

“I remember,” I said. “We had it on the picture board at my father’s wake.” Then, with a start, I remembered it was exactly six months to the day since my father died. Talk about timing. As we walked onto the continuously moving floor to board the ride, I was hit with an overwhelming feeling of sadness. I’d been here forty-six years ago, when my parents were decades younger than I am now. How old was my dad back then? Thirty-five? Now he was in an urn we’d finally placed into a mausoleum last week. 

Rubbing my eyes, I realized I’d had a hell of a time of it lately. I’d spent the previous weekend sweating the results of my bi-annual cancer screening and, though I got the all clear, I was too busy dealing with my food pantry’s school supply giveaway and dad’s internment ceremony to relax. It didn’t help matters that I got talked into giving a double blood donation to boot, which left me literally drained. So, when it came time to go to Hershey, I was looking forward to some much needed leisure time but, instead of delighting in my daughter’s wide eyed joy as we watched cocoa beans being turned into sweet treats, I was slumped in my seat, feeling defeated and old. Towards the end of the ride, a sign told us we were about to have our picture taken so, remembering that old picture of my brother and I with our parents, I pasted on a smile and said, “Say cheese everybody.” SNAP. Then, when the ride was over, I ponied up twenty-five bucks for a printout and a JPEG sent to my email account. 

“That’s nice picture,” my wife said. 

“Uh huh,” I said. Then we went to our hotel where, of course, our daughter wanted to swim in the pool. What is it with kids and hotel pools? Shaking my head at Natalie’s limitless energy, I just sat in a lounge chair and watched her frolic in the water until closing. Then, after some snacks, we watched the movie Groundhog Day on television and went to bed. Unfortunately, I tossed and turned in and bed and, when sleep finally did come, I dreamt I was Bill Murray – trapped in an endless temporal loop but with nothing to show for it. Unlike Bill, I didn’t learn how to speak French, play the piano, or achieve saintliness. Feeling like my life had been wasted, I awoke in a foul mood but, since I didn’t want to ruin my wife and daughter’s day, I kept my feelings to myself. But, as I watched parents chasing their kids around the amusement park, I could feel my soul coldly compacting in on itself, resentful that everyone around me was so fucking happy. 

My fuse got lit when came when my wife asked me to trek back to the car to fetch our swim clothes for the water park. Being absent minded, I forgot where I parked and ended up roaming the lot for half an hour in the afternoon heat.  “I’m turning into my dad,” I said, remembering his long slide into Parkinsonian dementia. “I’m gonna end up just like him.” Luckily my wife told me to ask Siri where we’d parked, and I finally found my car. Now stewing, I met my family by the main entrance and dumped the bag with our towels and swim trunks onto a park bench. 

“I’m going to get a cup of coffee,” I said, icily. “Wait here.”  

“But we’ve got to get to the water park,” Natalie said. 

“WAIT.” 

The line at Starbucks was long and the baristas slow, but I eventually walked out with an iced coffee and, as an apology for my brusqueness, a cake pop for Natalie. Sitting on the park bench, I savored the caffeinated coldness of my expensive cup of java and sighed. How many more hours until this day was over? Then, as we were fiddling with our things, my coffee cup fell off the bench and onto the ground. Three, two, one, ignition. “Goddamn it,” I yelped. “Goddammit!” Then I picked the empty cup off the ground and angrily whipped it into a trash can.

“It’s okay, Daddy,” my daughter said. That’s when tears filled my eyes. 

“You’re right,” I said, patting her head. “Now go on ahead.”

Upset I lost it in front of my kid, my wife asked me what was going on. “I think I’m losing my fucking mind,” I swore. “My fucking mind.” Then I stormed off, furious, sad, and unmoored in a sea of children’s joy. What my wife didn’t know, because I didn’t tell her, was what that stupid cup of coffee meant to me. My father loved coffee and, as he lay dying, he asked me for some but, because the nurses wouldn’t let him have it, I had to tell him no. For him coffee had always been soothing but, as dad struggled during those last days, even that small comfort had been denied him. Remembering the disappointment in my father’s eyes, I will regret that moment for the rest of my life. So, it doesn’t take Sigmund Freud to figure out why I freaked when my iced coffee hit the ground. 

I was ready to yank us all out of the park and drive home when my own words came back to haunt me. “She’s been a good kid and deserves this.” Stuffing my feelings down deep, I got my shit together and we went to the water rides. This was neither the time of the place. Then, as I waited on a long line with my excited little girl for a ride called The Whirlpool – and feeling self-conscious about being mostly unclothed – a wave of cold water crashed over me. But, instead of getting angry, the shock knocked me out of my selfish rage liked a clenched fist. When I opened my eyes, everything seemed clean and new and, in an instant, I knew that I was going through those fluid stages of grief – denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Holding my daughter’s tiny hand, I realized I really missed my dad but, luckily, the water cascading around us washed away my tears. Then, when I had a private moment, I pulled my wife aside and apologized for my behavior – but was still unable to articulate why. I guess I’m much better writing about my feelings than talking about them. Now, honey, you know why. Sorry. 

The rest of the trip was a delight and, after a long ride home, I shined my shoes, hung a suit, tie, and starched shirt on my valet, and then went to bed. A seminary friend of mine’s brother died and I had to go to a funeral. So, the next morning, I spent time with another family dealing with grief and, as I sat in the back pew of a beautiful church, I hung my head and got in touch with my own, praying for that day when every tear would be wiped away. 

I miss you, Dad. 

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Liam Neeson I Ain’t

As we journeyed on the Metro to The Louvre, I wondered if the subway car was overly crowded because of the security cordon for the approaching Olympics or if it was always this fucked up. 

“The station at Place de la Concorde is closed,” my wife said. “We have to get off at the stop afterwards and walk over.” 

“Just great,” I said. During our two week vacation we’d already walked one hundred miles, and my gimpy knee was suffering as a result. Maybe I shouldn’t have gone running that morning. Pulling into a station, I watched as a large multi-generational family surged into the subway car, jockeying for position in the crowd. Like two pieces of matter trying to occupy the same place at the same time, it could not be done. But it was fun to watch. 

Then a man, desperate to catch the train, pushed his way in just as the doors were closing, almost knocking a young woman from the family trying to board the car off her feet. Luckily, she didn’t fall but, as I watched her right herself, I saw a look of panic spread across her face. “My baby!” she cried in English. Sure enough, as the train began to move out of the station, I saw a baby stroller all alone on the platform. Oh shit. 

“MY BABY! MY BABY!” the woman screamed.

Closing my eyes, I knew every on the subway car was about to get a dose of PTSD after this mother and her extended family went supernova. Talk about every parent’s worst nightmare. I also feared for the man who almost knocked the mother down and caused this mess. The beatdown he was almost sure to receive was going to be epic. Then, as the train started to pick up speed, the baby’s father pounded on the window shouting, “Stop the train! Stop the train!” Then the screams began. 

If there’s anything that sends my daughter into a meltdown its children being separated from their parents. When Elsa and Anna’s parents died in a shipwreck in Frozen, she burst into panicked tears – and don’t even get me started about Bambi. Feeling powerless, I put my hand on her shoulder and noticed her muscles were tauter than steel cables. This was going to be bad. 

Luckily, an on the ball conductor noticed the developing drama and stopped the train just as the baby disappeared from view. Then, after the train backed up, the doors flew open and the entire family poured out of the car and surrounded the baby, crying tears of relief and launching prayers of thanksgiving heavenwards. Looking at the pushy guy who’d probably escaped being guillotined by an outraged parent, I noticed he was doing his best to alter his molecular structure and become invisible. 

“Crisis averted,” I said, patting Natalie’s shoulder.  “All is well.” 

“What would’ve happened if they couldn’t stop the train?” she said. “What would’ve happened to the baby?” 

“People are very nice,” I said. “They would have made sure the baby was safe until the police arrived and the cops would’ve found the parents.” That seemed to mollify my daughter but, as any parent knows, when confronted the enormity of losing your child, your mind goes to a very dark place. If it had been my baby in that stroller, I’d already be imagining infant organ traders scooping her up and flying her to some lawless shithole on the other side of the world. I have a relative who lost his two year old daughter at the Jersey Shore for half an hour back in the Seventies and, as he frantically searched for his child, he told God if she was found, he’d go back to church for the rest of his life. That man is now eighty and still goes to Mass almost every day. Talk about keeping your side of the bargain.

A short while later, when Natalie was out of earshot as we walked through the courtyard of The Louvre, I said to my wife, “What if Natalie got separated from us? How would we find her?  We’re in France, not Jersey.” 

“Good question.” 

“We should give her a piece of paper with our names, numbers, and what hotel we’re staying at. In French.” 

“By the time we noticed she was gone,” my wife deadpanned. “She’d be on a plane to Saudi Arabia.” When you’re married, your spouse knows just what buttons to push. 

“I’m not Liam Neeson in Taken” I almost shouted. “I can’t be electrocuting every guy in Paris trying to find her!” 

“She’s fine. You’re fine. Relax.” 

If, God forbid, my daughter disappeared in my town, I could get our entire police force out looking for her. But I wasn’t home. I was a stranger in strange land unable to speak the language. I had no old buddies working in the Sûreté, nor was I an ex-CIA agent trained in hand to hand combat, evasive driving, subterfuge, and enhanced interrogation. Quite simply, I had no particular set of skills. Then again, if Taken had been a realistic movie, old Liam would’ve been a blubbering mess. 

Aggravated and baking in the summer sun, I dragged Natalie towards a bench in the shade, sat down, and pulled her close. “I’m okay, dad,” she said. 

“What would you have done if that happened to you?” I said. 

“I would’ve stayed there and waited for you to come and get me.” 

“Good girl.” 

But next chance I got, I was going to sew my phone number into her underwear.

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Anchors Away

Yesterday morning I was sitting on the couch, sipping coffee to rouse myself into consciousness, when my wife said, “This is Natalie’s last week of summer camp.” 

“Already?” I said,  

“Fifth grade is right around the corner.” 

Closing my eyes, I tightly gripped my coffee mug. But I wasn’t aggravated we’d lost our seasonal day care; I was upset because Natalie was aging out of the summer recreation program she’d attended since before kindergarten. When I dropped her off with the counselors in 2019, she was a mere Jellyfish. Now, about to enter fifth grade, she’d graduated to Shark. Next year she’ll go to teen camp.  Lord knows what words she’s going to learn there. 

“That was too fast,” I muttered “Much to fast.” 

I have thoroughly enjoyed being a doting father to a wonderful little girl but now, with middle school fast approaching, I know Natalie’s “little kiddom” is coming to an end. It also doesn’t help that she’s starting to smell and losing the baby fat on her cheeks 

“Have you noticed her face looks different?” 

“She’s growing up,” Annie said.  

“I can’t figure out who she’d going to look more like. Me or you? I hope you.”  Then I went to work where the phone rang and rang, all with variations of the same problem.

My mom needs a nursing home. 

My dad can’t live alone anymore. 

My mom’s starting to get dementia. What do I do?” 

As tough as dealing with my parents has been at times, the experience also had a silver lining. Now, when I get calls like these, I’m much more well informed, patient and, most of all empathetic. And, because I shared my experiences with these callers, albeit curated, they were more comfortable talking with me than someone who’d never been through it.

“Everyone’s parents seem to be going off the rails today,” I said to my volunteer after I finished with my last caller.

“It’s hard,” she said. “I remember when I went through it.”  

One of the blessings of my job is that most of my volunteers are my age or older. Since they all had or were currently dealing with aging parents, they provided an excellent shoulder to lean on when I went through the worst of my trials. Slumping in my chair, I turned my head and looked at the picture of Natalie on my desk, taken when she was only four. Having a kid was the best thing that ever happened to me, but I came to fatherhood late. So, the odds are good that when Natalie has to stick me in a nursing home, most of her contemporary’s parents will still be hale and hearty. Unlike me, will she feel alone when that difficult time comes? I hope not. Then again, I could spare her the trouble by just dropping dead. 

Shaking the morose thoughts from my head, I got on with my job, but couldn’t shake the sense I was being carried away by the fast flowing currents of time. This month I’ll have worked at the food pantry nine years – the longest tenure at a job I’ve ever had – but it seems like I got hired only yesterday. And now, when I look at myself in the mirror, I’m surprised by the grey haired guy staring back at me. Tempus fugit, I guess. Oddly enough, seminary and my dad’s death both seem like they happened ages ago despite the decades in between. Time sometimes plays tricks on the mind, but Natalie’s growing up is no illusion, just a constant reminder that change is inevitable.

Well aware it was fleeting, I’ve always been careful to enjoy Natalie’s childhood, but now I find myself focusing on those little things that still make her a kid; the stuffed animals on her bed, wanting someone to go with her into the basement, watching cartoons, being tucked in at night, and excitedly talking about going to an amusement park. It’s almost like I’m using her as an anchor to keep from being swept away, to stay put and savor this time which will never come again. Of course, if I do that, I’ll screw Natalie up.  She’s going to become her own person whether I like it or not and I can’t hold her back just to make myself feel better. 

When evening came, my wife called to say she had to work late, and Natalie and I were on our own for dinner. “You want to go to McDonald’s?” I asked Natalie. 

“Really?” she said. She asks to go to McDonald’s all the time, but I always say no. 

“Why not? We haven’t been there in ages. Get your shoes on.”

After driving through a wicked thunderstorm, we arrived at The Golden Arches and Natalie’s eyes went wide. “They have a new play place!” she squealed. The restaurant had a play area which Natalie loved when she was small, but it was shuttered after COVID hit. “Good” my wife said. “That place always smells like dirty feet.” I guess they’d remodeled it since our last visit. 

“Can I go play?” Natalie said. “Can I?” 

“After you eat.” So, after dining on a meal that would’ve sent my cardiologist into a tizzy, I let Natalie into the playroom. “I’m going to get a cup of coffee,” I said. “I’ll be right back.” 

“But it says children have to be supervised by their parents,” she said, pointing to a sign. Maybe she’ll be a lawyer when she grows up.  

 “I’ll only be a minute.” 

Large decaf in hand, I found a perch in the playroom and read a book on my phone while Natalie played with a bunch of little tykes. Sniffing the air, I realized the offending odors my wife bitched about weren’t present. But then again, the equipment was new and had not yet had time to absorb the effluence of greasy fingered fragrant children. 

“Hey Dad,” I heard Natalie shout, “Look at me!” Lifting my head from my phone, I saw my daughter waving at me from high on the play apparatus. “Way to go, kid,” I said, surprised she was still gung-ho about the play place. Last time I took Natalie to the playground at the park, she said, “That’s for little kids,” but there she was, romping with chicken nugget fueled toddlers with unalloyed joy. 

As lightening flashed outside the rain sheeted windows, I suddenly got the sense time was standing still, and McDonald’s had become the center of all reality.  My little girl was happy and that was all that mattered. Then I realized that I’d been going about things all wrong. I didn’t need to drop anchor to stop the inexorable flow of time because there would always be moments like this to come. They’ll be different than when Natalie was a kid, but just as sweet. Then again, past, present and future are probably all an illusion because, when you think about it, all we truly have is now and what is there is all we’ll ever need. Snapping a picture of Natalie having fun, I texted it to my wife. Still a kid a little longer. 

Driving home as rain lashed the windows, I looked in my rear view mirror and saw Natalie had dozed off. Remembering doing the same thing in the back seat of my dad’s car as he drove me home from some far off place, I knew things had somehow come full circle. Now in the driver’s seat. I remembered what a sage said long ago, “Time is the moving image of eternity.” 

“Carry me inside,” my daughter groggily said, when we pulled into the driveway.

“No way,” I said. “You weigh sixty pounds.” 

Time may be an illusion – but my aching back is very, very real. 

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Dropping Le Deuce

Upon arriving at our accommodations in Berlin, like most kids walking into a hotel room for the first time, my daughter checked out the bathroom. When Natalie emerged, she said, “Daddy, come here.” 

“What’s up?” I said, following her into the bathroom. Pointing to a porcelain fixture next to the toilet which I knew her ten year old American eyes had never seen, she said, “What’s that? 

“That’s a bidet.” 

“What’s it for?” 

“It’s to wash your butt after you poop.” 

“But there’s toilet paper right over there.” 

“That’s for the in deep stuff,” I said. “You use the bidet afterwards. Then maybe pat yourself dry.”

“Weird.” 

“Just don’t mix them up.” 

Bidets are very civilized. After encountering them in Italy years ago, my wife and I idly thought about installing one in our house. The only trouble was our one bathroom is very small and we didn’t have room. We looked into getting one of those electric all in one Japanese jobs, but that would’ve necessitated hiring a guy to install a plug next to the toilet. Dreams of irrigated anuses fading, we resigned ourselves to living like barbarians. 

Since we’re on the subject of bathrooms, let’s talk about a common traveler’s complaint. When you factor in the stress of running to the airport, a transatlantic flight on a pressurized bus with their telephone booth sized commodes, jet lag, and richer food than you’re used to, that can do a number on your G.I. tract. That’s right folks, I’m talking about constipation. Luckily, I purged myself my second day in Berlin. Running does wonders for peristalsis. The others in my family, however, were not as lucky. I’ll spare you the details, but hotels really should offer free canisters of air-freshener along with those tiny soaps, shampoos, and shower caps. I mean, really. 

I also make it a point to do my business at home before I fly anywhere. This discipline developed later in my life as a result of my wife’s air travel OCD. A seasoned airline warrior, Annie becomes a different person the moment she steps into an airport. Unable to countenance anyone delaying her progress in any way, she also harbors a deep antipathy towards passengers who refuse to check their oversized carry ons and insist on hogging all the overhead bins. Sometimes she stews so hotly, I think she’s imagining those luggage fetishists getting sucked out of a port hole like Goldfinger at 30,000 feet. Messy. Early in our relationship, we were in an airport waiting to board our flight when I felt nature’s siren call. Seeing we had plenty of time, I excused myself and said, “I’ll be right back.” The bathroom was right by the gate and, as I sat down to get accomplish my mission, my phone announced an incoming text.  Good. Something to read. That helps sometimes you know. 

We’re boarding! Where are you?” 

I just sat down

Get out here now!

But I’m not finished. 

NOW! 

Had I misjudged the time? Was there some unspoken nuance of airline-fu that’d I’d failed to notice? One things for sure, Annie’s desperate digital entreaties put the kibosh on my toilet time. The turtle had indeed gone back into its shell. 

“What was the rush?” I said, uncomfortably buckling into my seat. “There was time.” 

“I wanted the overhead bin,” Annie said, triumphantly. By the time breakfast breached my defenses somewhere over Ohio, I made the Boeing’s tiny restroom olfactorily out of order for those seeking to join the Mile High Club. Talk about Snakes On a Plane.

Diet also plays a big part in a traveler’s digestive life. I’m sure they have vegetables in Germany but, other that sauerkraut, I despaired of seeing any. Then, when we were at a swanky buffet near the Black Forest, I finally found some, almost knocking the servers over to get to the tureen.  Honestly, I thought about taking the whole thing to my table and sticking my head in it. The body knows what it needs. But what really irked my ersatz brother-in-law about Germany was needing to pay money to use a public restroom. (They do take credit cards.) “How uncivilized,” he raged, but I shrugged it off since I’d seen that in Italy. I’ll never forget standing outside the Venice rail station restroom while waiting for my five month pregnant wife to complete her ablutions. Already October, but still very hot, I watched as an undeniably pregnant woman cried while begging people to give her a Euro. My interest piqued; I walked over to her.

“I need money to go to use the toilet,” she said in English before I opened my mouth. I guess I really do look like an American.

The poor woman was sweating like a pig and, having listened to my wife moan and groan about the how our incoming child was squashing her insides, helping this lady was a no brainer. “Here you go,” I said, fishing a Euro coin out of my pocket. Back then that was a buck thirty-three.  Another positive entry in St. Pete’s ledger. 

“Thank you!” the soon to be Madonna cried, “Thank you.” Despite being laden with child, she ran to that toilet faster than Usain Bolt. 

“Did you give that beggar money?” my wife asked, having seen the transaction and already weary from being accosted by gangs of youthful mendicants on the train ride over. 

“That was no beggar,” I said. Did I mention the woman was also ravishingly beautiful? My bad. 

Public toilets are a big deal – especially in Manhattan. In addition to their scarcity, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve pounded on a Starbucks’ restroom door because a junkie’s nodded off inside. When you gotta go you gotta go. Having practically lived in NYC for a time, however, I had assembled a list of free and very nice commodes for use by the general public – to the point of thinking about publishing a Michelin Guide for incontinent. tourists. The restrooms in the Time Warner Center get four stars. 

Paris, France, however, does shitting in public right. There’s almost never a fee and they even have automatic bathrooms in plain sight on the streets. You just wave your hand in front of the sensor; a door slides open and in you go. Then, when you’re done, the door closes and locks, the toilet retracts into its cubbyhole to be cleaned, and then it’s open again for business. The sign on the door tells patrons they have fifteen minutes to get their affairs in order before it opens and kicks you out. Enough time to drop a deuce or shoot up, but not enough time to take a three hour nap. Plus, if you’re a guy just looking to take a leak, you can use the attached urinoir to drain your main vein at no cost. Very civilized. The only problem was, when my wife needed to use one of these contraptions the door wouldn’t close – plus they freaked my daughter out. 

“It’s like R2-2 but a toilet,” I told her. Considering what they’re doing to the Star Wars franchise, I’m sure Disney will in installing something like that in all their parks. 

My daughter eventually used our bidet in Berlin and, as I heard her giggling inside the bathroom, I smiled. Travel does indeed broaden your horizons. Then, just before retiring for the night, my wife emerged from the bathroom screeching, “What is that in the bidet?” Getting up to investigate, I looked into the bowl and found an errant piece of Herr Hanky.

“Not mine,” I lied. “Must have been Natalie.” I know, how horrible am I? But I’m not above throwing my child under der Bus. 

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Ja und Nein

The Hauptbahnhof is a sleek, modern railway station in the Mitte section of Berlin where it costs €2 to take a leak and €4 for a bottle of water you could get from a machine at Costco for a quarter and even cheaper if you bought it by the case. Standing on the platform, I watched as legions of field tripping schoolchildren raucously descended the escalator to join the crowd already congealing around me. I don’t know how the school year works in Germany, but summertime seems to be when Deutsche Kinder all visit their nation’s capital. Turning down the gain on my hearing aids, I silently prayed they wouldn’t be in my car.

“Don’t worry,” my ersatz brother-in-law, said, as if reading my mind. “I booked us first class tickets.”

“You did?”  

“Those kids will be in second class.” 

“How much did that cost?” 

“Don’t worry about it. It’s on me.” 

I felt a bit discomfited. Rene had covered the cost of an indulgent evening at the Ritz-Carlton’s cigar bar the night before and I didn’t want to feel like a leech. Then again, he makes a lot more money than me. 

“Well,” I said. “Then I’m picking up the beers on the train.”  

An old man came and tried to sell us a newspaper. Since I don’t speak German, I shook my head but, instead of walking away, he stuck his hand out. “Please?” Then I realized he was a beggar. You see the same kind of thing on the New York subway. “Sorry,” I said, and he walked away. Glancing at his watch, Rene said. “So much for German trains being on time.” 

“I think the Euro Cup thing fucked it up.” 

“Wait here, I’ll check the board.” 

Germans don’t seem to be enamored with air-conditioning like we Americans are and the station was hot. Something to do with the cost of electricity I read somewhere. Now, with Putin chocking off their once cheap natural gas supplies, I doubted things would change anytime soon. Feeling parched and slightly woozy, I wondered if I shouldn’t have stood on principle and bought that usuriously priced bottle of H20. Then someone tapped my shoulder. 

“Paper, sir?” a young woman asked. I was mildly piqued she addressed me in my language. Did I look that American? Must’ve been my Hawaiian shirt. 

“No thank you, miss,” I said, shaking my head. 

“PLEASE, SIR!” she almost shouted. “My baby is hungry.” Then, thrusting out her abdomen, she rubbed her swollen belly. 

Well aware St. Peter was keeping a record of my good deeds or lack thereof, my hand started going into my pocket, but then stopped. Having experienced the joys of my wife’s pregnancy by proxy, I knew something wasn’t right. Looking at the woman’s belly, I got the impression that it was too perfectly shaped, as if she was wearing one of those prosthetics high-school kids wear to know what they’re in for if they’re not careful. That, and the exaggerated thrust of her hips, made the sixth sense I’d developed during a long career dealing with people smell a Ratte. Probably a gypsy. I’d run into many of them in Italy. 

“Sorry, miss,” I lied. “I don’t have any money.” 

“You’re travelling by nice train. You have money.” 

I always keep loose change in my pocket when I go to Manhattan and make it a point to drop something in a beggar’s cup at least once during the trip – but I hate aggressive panhandlers. Deciding to means test this lady’s level of desperation, I said, “I’ll buy you something to eat right now.”

“No,” she said. “Money,” and then began started tugging on my shirtsleeve. Aggravated, I channeled the spirit of every oberführer I’d seen in World War II movies and snapped out a curt “NEIN!” Sputtering something in a language I didn’t understand, the woman spun on her heel and left. If only St. Peter could see me now. 

“Everything okay?” Rene said, sidling up to me. 

“Just a gypsy.” 

Half an hour later, ensconced in our first class seats to Stuttgart, I ordered two large beers from the steward and grinned when they arrived. This was the life. “I’m so glad those kid are not with us,” I said. 

“Can you imagine?” Rene replied. 

A couple of liters later and feeling no pain, our train zipped by the town of Fulda and, as I looked at the flat plains rolling past, I could almost see Soviet tanks blasting their way through columns of Bundeswehr troops. “See that?” I said to Rene, pointing out the window.  “That’s the Fulda Gap.” 

“The what?” 

“If World War III started in the Eighties, the Warsaw pact would have invaded here, and this would be the last place on earth you’d want to be.”

“How do you know this stuff?” 

I shrugged. “History teacher for a father I guess.” 

Feeling slightly tipsy, I closed my eyes and thought about my high school fears of the Cold War going hot. If the Russians got the upper hand punching into West Germany, NATO doctrine was to nuke the shit out of them. Probably with neutron bombs. One thing’s for sure, if things went sideways back then, the countryside I was chugging through would’ve become hell incarnate. 

“My baby’s hungry!” 

With a start, I opened my eyes, looking for the faux-pregnant lady from the train station, but all I could see was Rene gazing out the window as the train’s horn wailed. Maybe that’s what I heard and my unconsciously guilty mind turned it into a lamentation. I’d been living it up lately – fancy bars, good food, first class travel, and probably too many beers – and I now felt like I’d missed paying a toll. I was hungry and you gave me food. I was thirsty and you gave me drink. After spending so much on myself, a charitable Euro would’ve been a drop in the bucket. Had I turned into those restaurant customers I once despised? Living in a bubble while thinking life should be an uninterrupted journey from one purchased pleasure to the next? 

Then again, I say nein all the time. When your job is sorting out legitimate appeals for help from the bogus like mine, you develop a sense of who should get what or not. Do you hand over funds to a guy who’ll just drink or gamble it away or to the mom with three kids and no place to live?  Do you help that lady whose story is full of holes or the young man who came in with documentation attesting to his troubles?  Sometimes I’ve got nothing to go on but my gut and, while I know I’m right more often than I’m wrong, I remember every single time I screwed up like it happened yesterday. “Always err on the side of generosity,” I told my volunteers before I went on vacation, but did I really live up to that credo myself? Sitting in my quiet train car, I felt my own words getting thrown back in my face. “Deserves got nothing to do with it.” Maybe I should quit the food pantry and sell cars. Of course, that beggar was probably full of scheisse but so what? Sighing, I remembered the words of Somerset Maugham, “The road to salvation is narrow and as difficult to walk as the razor’s edge.” 

Staring at the German countryside, I realized I’d cut myself. 

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Training Wheels

Despite the considerable amount of walking I did on my vacation I didn’t lose any weight, but I didn’t gain any either, which is amazing considering all the wiener schnitzel, German beer, French cheese, and croissants I consumed. While I managed to run four times in Europe, after two weeks living large, I knew my cardio had taken a hit so, after allowing some time for the jet lag to wear off, I set out on a jog early Wednesday morning. 

I’d missed the heat wave that had gripped the States while I was abroad but, when I stepped outside, I felt like I was walking into a Turkish bath. Despite temps being in the lower seventies, a quick glance at the weather app on my phone told me the humidity was 91%. Ugh. Undeterred, I figured I’d do an easy three miler on the flat road near my house to get myself back in the game but, half a mile in, the high dew point caused sweat to accumulate unevaporated on my skin and soak through my shirt. “Maybe just two miles,” I thought to myself. Then, just as I was passing a school, my left foot hit an uneven sidewalk slab, causing it to overpronate and knock me off balance. 

Two weeks before flying out of Newark Liberty, I’d tripped on a curb while running through a busy intersection near my job, landing hard on my right wrist and ripping a nice gouge in one of my knees. I’d broken that wrist when I was twenty-four, necessitating surgery and rehab and, now that arthritis has set in thirty-two years later, I’m forced to depend on my wife to open a jam jar. If I hadn’t rolled to spread out the impact, I’m sure I would have snapped it like a twig again. As it was, my knee bled profusely and, fearing infection, I hobbled over to my job to patch myself up with the office first aid kit, but I still had a nasty leaky scab by the time I got on the plane. “Good thing you didn’t really hurt yourself,” my wife said. “That would have wrecked our trip.” Thanks for the sympathy, honey. 

The moment the pavement made my foot roll unnaturally, I knew if it continued its errant journey I’d suffer a serious injury.  So, taking advantage of the slowing of time a crisis creates, I twisted my body in the opposite direction and aimed for the grassy median between the sidewalk and the road to cushion the impact of my fall which, when you weigh almost two hundred pounds, was going to be considerable. Physics is a bitch. Landing hard on my side, I felt the air in my lungs blow out in with a loud huff and rolled over several times, my hands scrabbling on the ground to keep me from rolling into a road already thickening with commuter traffic. When I finally came to a standstill, I let out a string of pain induced obscenities which were so foul I hoped a city councilman hadn’t been driving by.  

After a minute, I hoisted myself up and, with great trepidation, tried placing weight on my left foot. I’d broken the very same one in the early fall of 2017, forcing me to use a cane for several months and, because standing in front of the bathroom sink was too painful, give up on shaving and let my beard grow – which is never pretty. Of course, my three year old daughter fully expected me to escort her trick or treating on Halloween which I did, probably looking like a hobo child molester leaning on a cane. Of course, that glucose seeking quest just retraumatized my foot, earning me a reprimand from my both my orthopedist and my mother. “We’re going to Disneyworld in March!” she exclaimed. “You have to be better by then!” Since my parents were paying for the whole shin dig, I took her advice and put myself on light duty and, by the time we got to the Happiest Place on Earth, I could walk without assistance. 

Fearing I’d messed myself up again, I slowly walked, hypervigilant to the nerve signals coming from my foot. To my relief, however, everything seemed okay, and I started running again, glad to have dodged yet another bullet – but I was angry at myself. Ever since starting my running regimen last November, despite my natural klutziness, I’d never fallen. Now I’d tripped twice in a one month but, despite having been told by veteran pavement pounders that injuries are inevitable, I’d I become complacent, thinking I was invulnerable. As I paced alongside some railroad tracks, I thought about that trip to Disneyworld with my three year old daughter in tow. 

Though I’d given up my cane by the time we arrived in Florida, my parents could not walk unassisted and needed to use those motorized scooters Disney so thoughtfully provides. But, as I dodged those infernal contraptions in the sunbaked park the entire trip, I became convinced a solid percentage of the patrons using them were full of shit. Now, I’ve gotten a lot of grief in the past writing about people faking handicaps so they can access legally sequestered parking lots but, when you see a thirty year old woman zipping by with overheated, sticky kids wearing Mickey Mouse hats hanging off her scooter, you’ve got to wonder. My parents had a very hard time with the scooters too, either going too slow or panicking as they accelerated past warp speed. “Tortoise means slow,’ I said, pointing to the controls. “Rabbit means fast. It ain’t rocket science.” Then, when we were by the crocodile pit in the Animal Kingdom section of the park, my father rolled over my recently healed foot. 

“Dad,” I said, doubling over in agony. “You ran over my foot!” I don’t know if it was old age cognition loss, guilt, or sheer senior obliviousness, but he flat out denied it. In pain and wondering if my foot had been re-broken, I seriously contemplated tossing my father into the crocodile pit but, since, the authorities would probably take a dim view of feeding the reptiles with human sacrifices, I relented.  When I got back to the hotel bar that night, I downed two analgesic Mai-Tais and vomited out my frustrations to my wife. 

“He ran over my foot too,” she said. 

Now able to chuckle at the memory, I ran past the train station and watched the commuters boarding the train for New York with Starbucks cups in hand. Disney was over seven years ago and now I’d do anything for my dad to be around and run over my foot again. I guess it’s all about perspective. After my surgery in 2021, I was a real mess. Even though my cancer was nowhere near my lower limbs, I emerged from the operation with a numb right quadricep.  “You were under six hours,” my surgeon said. “Things happen. It’ll clear up soon.” Luckily, I still had my cane from the last time to help me get around but even now, years later, my leg isn’t 100%. When I stand for a long time, like I did at my father’s wake, it still gets sort of numb. “A little bit of nerve damage,” my primary doc told me later. “Probably resulting from the position, you were in during surgery.” Considering the oncological l bullet I dodged, I’ll deal. Like I said, it’s all about perspective.

After the train station was behind me, I thought about throwing in the towel. Before Europe I could do five miles without much difficulty but now, two miles in, I was already fatigued. Sweating as the sun peeking above trees began shining hotly on my skin, I gritted my teeth and committed to one more mile – that’d way I wouldn’t feel like a guilty out of shape slob afterwards but, by the time I got home, my spandex shorts must’ve soaked up a gallon of sweat. Icky.  Then, after a shower, shave and a banana to replace the glucose I expended, I went to work, feeling like I’d exorcised a demon. Then, when I was walking down some stairs on the way to meeting, the pain hit. Heading back to the privacy of my office, I removed my left shoe and sock to find a bruise had developed on my foot. I’d done something to it. 

Since I could still bear weight on it, I self-diagnosed a sprain and, using the office first aid kit yet again, slapped on a cold compress, taped my foot up, popped a few Advil and propped my foot up on my desk to keep it elevated the rest of the day – but I knew running was out for a while. Even though I’m a pokey novice, as the days passed, I got edgy from the lack of exercise, but I knew if I pushed it, I’d probably be out of the game for months, not days. “Slow and steady wins the race,” I told myself. Then again, I was used to waiting for my body to recuperate. After my cancer surgery I was a wreck for months and just walking into my gym had been an excruciating challenge. Then, when my father died, my body took another hit from the all the stress and grief, leaving me exhausted and unmotivated. Somehow, I managed to pull myself together each time. 

Deep down, however, I know all my previous travails were just a foretaste of what is to come. Illness, death and loss are part of life and, the longer I live, the more I know I’ll feel their sting. “Sometimes,” I told a friend, “I feel like all I’ve gone through is just traning wheels for suffering.”  Back when I was diagnosed with cancer I thought, hands down, that was worst day of my life. But now, hopeful that’s all behind me, I’m reminded of what the great sage Homer Simpson once said, “That was the worst day of your life so far.” More shit’s coming and now, in my late fifties, I can see the gathering storm on the horizon. So, what to do?  How should I deal with life’s inevitable tragedies? So far, the only answer I have is keep moving because, if you let inertia take hold of you, life will run over you and pass you by. 

Four days later, I set out on another run, this time on a blessedly cool and overcast morning and, as I sailed pain free past the five mile mark, I felt lucky I could still put one foot in front of the other. 

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Masterpiece

“I guess we should see the Mona Lisa,” I said to my wife.

“We still have time.” 

I looked at my watch and noted The Louvre was closing in an hour. “Not really. They’ll be a crowd trying to get a last look before they leave.”

With all respect to Nat King Cole, I think the Mona Lisa is overrated. Art cognoscenti say it’s a masterpiece and they’re probably right but, prior to being stolen in 1911, it wasn’t well known outside of the art world. DaVinci’s talent might’ve created the Mona Lisa’s enigmatic smile, but it was the true crime media circus following the theft that made his painting famous. Then again, I’d feel like a rube if I left Paris without seeing it. 

Heading down the former palace’s wide hallways, we passed by paintings which I thought were much better, but then again, I still mourn the passing of the Rigid Tool Calendar so I’m the last person to opine on what constitutes great art. Noting the makeshift signs plastered on the walls reading “Mona Lisa” with a pointing arrow, I figured they were put up by museum staff sick of giving hapless tourists directions in multiple languages. Following the crude guides, we eventually ended up in the right place and there she was. Of course, one hundred people snapping pictures were in the way. 

“Close as were gonna get,” I said to my daughter. 

“I can’t see it.” Reaching down, I picked her up, causing my right leg to screech in pain. “See it now?” I grunted.  

“Oh yeah,” Natalie, said, unimpressed. 

“Want to get closer?”  

“No, I’m good.” 

“So am I.” I’ve read some people faint or have a psychotic break upon seeing the Mona Lisa but, despite having seen pictures of it all my life, I was unmoved. Hobbling out of the gallery, I found a bench, sat down, and began to massage my leg. I went on a five mile run that morning, only to get lost and quick march an unwanted two extra miles back to my hotel. Then, after walking spending the day walking around the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, the Champs-Élysées, numerous arrondissements and walking up the countless steps of Montmartre to see Sacre Coeur, I might have overdone it. When I glanced at my phone app walking into The Louvre, my step count was hovering near 40,000. 

“You okay, Daddy?” Natalie asked. 

“I’ll be all right,” I lied, aggravated my body was showing its age. “Go along with your mother. I’m going to rest a bit.” 

Natalie toddled off and I let my mask of parental invincibility drop and groaned in pain, ruefully grateful I finally got to see Paris at fifty-six. If waited any longer, Natalie would be pushing me around in a wheelchair. Feeling depressed, I closed my eyes and tried willing my body’s endorphins to up their game. As I waited for the throbbing to subside, I watched the visitors shuffling into Mona’s gallery, their faces beaming with anticipation. Would they be underwhelmed too? 

Life, when you think of it, can be underwhelming as well. Most of the time, engaged in the daily grind of school, work, or raising a family, days tend to pass by unremarkable and forgotten. Small wonder we wonder where all the time went. Now grey haired and older than most people around me, I often feel like I’m stuck on a sandbar while the river of time flows past me. I get a kick out of these “live your best life now” people for whom everyday has to a wonderful experience. They’re in for a rude shock because it cannot be done. Besides, there’s something to be said for the rituals of ordinary time. After two weeks living out of a suitcase while touring Germany and France, I was already pining for the familiar comforts of home. 

No, life is sameness and routine occasionally punctured by moments of joy, wonder, fear and sorrow which, when you think about it, is how we internally mark time. For me, my life is divided by such moments into discrete eras; seminary and after, between 9/11 and writing my books, from when I met my wife and had a child to getting cancer and when my father died. Contained within those topsy-turvy times, there have been days which have been pure masterpieces but now, feeling old and worn out, they all seemed far away. Looking at the art gracing the walls, I also wondered what reminder of me would survive after I departed the earth. Unlike the centuries old masterworks being appreciated by the people surging around me, I was fairly certain no one would be reading my books a hundred years from now. Shakespeare it ain’t. Shaking my head, I wondered if I was experiencing some version of Stendhal Syndrome but chalked it up to exhaustion, hunger, and the Olympic security fever tightly gripping the City of Lights. Then my cell phone buzzed. 

Pulling it out of my pocket, I saw I’d received a text from a former client who had a question about her subsidized housing. After typing back that I’d look into it, I resisted pulling my mind back into vacation mode and emailed a couple of agencies to work the problem in my absence. This particular person had been a project of mine for years and, although she wasn’t officially my responsibility anymore, I’d made it a point to keep an eye on her life while riding herd on her caregivers when they dropped the ball. When I met this woman, she was disabled, without prospects or support and living in a bad situation. Though it was outside my official job description, I got her classified, hooked up with funding, medical care, job training, and moved her into her own apartment last year. Of course, this all took years and was often a pain in the ass but, when I was discussing the case with a social worker a few weeks ago she told me, “Now she’s thriving. Thank God she met someone like you.”  

“Just trying to shave off a few days of my time in Purgatory,” I replied. 

I’m not above patting myself on the back, but I tend to deflect praise for my work because it’s exactly that, my work. But then, aching in pain while surrounded by beauty captured in colorful brushstrokes, I was reminded of something I told my daughter when we visited Notre Dame. The cathedral was closed but, as we looked at the photos of the people involved in the edifice’s restoration on the worksite’s barrier walls – the crane operators, stonemasons, architects, historians, glaziers, carpenters, and innumerable others – I told Natalie, “These people are very lucky. Years from now, they’ll be able to point to this church and tell their grandchildren, ‘I did that.’” They’d saved a masterpiece from destruction and, in doing so, created one of their own. 

It was then I realized that, if I died tomorrow, my former client would probably be my masterpiece. It would never be displayed in a museum and, like all flesh, one day be consigned to the flames of time – but those few in the know would be able to point to her and say, “Steve did that.” Would it reduce my time shoveling shit in the afterlife? Probably not, but it couldn’t hurt. Then looking back at Mona, I remembered that DaVinci painted many masterpieces in his life. Did I have a couple more in me? Time would tell. Then my wife returned with Natalie, and we began the trek back to our hotel. 

By the time we got back to our arrondissement we were hungry but most of the restaurants we walked by were closed. Luckily the owner of a shuttering café took pity on us, sat us outside and brought me a very welcome and medicinal beer. The waiter, an old hand, didn’t speak any English but seemed happy to serve us and we muddled though the menu and ordered dinner. By the time the food arrived, the heat of the day had been displaced by a cooling breeze and, as I sipped my second beer, I looked at my daughter as she happily ate her dinner of grilled fish. Normally a picky eater, Paris has done wonders for her palate. Then, the pain in my leg subdued, I felt my exhaustion being replaced by something close to contentment. Fishing out my phone, I showed my wife a picture I snapped of Natalie by the Eiffel Tower. 

“That’s a really good picture,” Annie, who’s an excellent photographer, said. 

Looking at Natalie’s captured smile, I chuckled to myself. Another masterpiece. Another day of beauty puncturing ordinary time. Relaxing, I realized there would be more to come. “I’m going to frame it and put it on my desk,” I said.   

DaVinci, eat your heart out. 

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The Elements Time Cannot Wear

My eyes snapped open at 3:00 AM and, despite my best effort, I couldn’t fall back asleep. After an hour, I gave up. 

Gingerly getting out of bed so as not to wake my wife and daughter, I silently changed into my workout gear, made my way down the stairs, said hello to the desk clerk, and then launched into my run. As I made my way down unfamiliar streets, I marveled at how light it was despite the early hour. No other runners were out, and as I ran past empty shops and restaurants, I felt like the city belonged to me alone. 

The air was cool, and the avenues flat compared to the hilly topography of my home, so it was easy going. After a mile my legs warmed up and I picked up the pace. Running alongside the river I watched as office lights snapped on in the government buildings lining its banks as if saluting my effort. As I breathed easily in and out, I said hello to a pair of policeman standing guard. They nodded back, dismissing me as just another sweaty middle aged guy trying to slow down his body’s clock. Then I turned a corner and stopped, shocked at the massive building towering over me. 

The Reichstag. 

Being a student of history, I knew that when Russian troops assaulted this place during the Battle of Berlin, their tanks were hammered by heavy guns firing from a fortification called the Zoo Tower located in a nearby park. Even now, despite its restoration after the city became the capital of a reunited Germany, the building was still pockmarked in places from bullets and shrapnel. I also knew some of the graffiti Red Army soldiers left on the walls inside had been purposefully left in place. 

Leaving the Reichstag behind, I jogged past the Brandenburg Gate, went down the Unter Den Linden, made a right on Wilhelmstrasse, paced down a few more streets, and then stopped by a sign in front of some unremarkable apartment buildings. Seventy-nine years ago, the ground I was standing on was the site the Führerbunker were Hitler killed himself. Looking down the street, I saw the stone plinths making up the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe and thought about all the men, women and children the Nazi’s exterminated with ruthless efficiency. On the plane over, I read a biography of the British actor Dirk Bogarde who, while serving as an army officer, helped liberate a concentration camp. Seeing all those decaying bodies stacked like cordwood rotting in the sun, he was never the same again. After the war, if he got on an elevator with a German who was his contemporary, he got off. 

In Berlin, you cannot escape the long shadow of history. As sweat dripped off my body, I could almost hear the clatter of gunfire and the screaming of Katyusha rockets as Stalin’s soldiers reduced Berlin to ashes. Watching lights in the apartments switching on and early risers beginning their day, I wondered how they could live with all those demonic ghosts beneath their feet. Running back along the River Spree to my hotel, I looked at the moored party boats and cafés lining the banks and remembered something a German woman who’d been young girl in Berlin during the war once told me, recounting in harrowing detail how the Russian conquerors raped every German woman they could find. “No one was too young or too old” she said, many being violated uncountable times. “The victims threw themselves into the river,” she said. “I’ll never forget all those dead women floating in the water.” Now the Spree was a tranquil tributary where people picnic, sunbathe, jog or take boat rides – but all I could see were the bloated corpses of those women bobbing up and down in the dark water. This was once the River Styx and, as I ran through Hell’s echo, I realized the words Dante inscribed on Perdition’s gate might have well been Berlin’s epitaph. 

I am the way into the city of woe.

I am the way to a forsaken people.

I am the way into eternal sorrow.

Sacred justice moved my architect.

I was raised here by divine omnipotence,

Primordial love and ultimate intellect.

Only those elements time cannot wear

Were made before me, and beyond time I stand.

Abandon all hope ye who enter here.

Feeling thoroughly jet lagged and depressed, I went back to my hotel and took a long shower, trying to wash away the awful images filling my mind. Then, later that day, as my brother-in-law and I were enjoying coffee at a café, a sudden summer downpour caught a gaggle of school kids on a field trip as they were crossing the street. As they laughed and shrieked with youthful delight, I smiled, remembering visiting Washington D.C. when I was their age; innocent and with my whole life ahead of me, when my parents were young. With a start, I realized I was being given a glimpse of those “elements time cannot wear” which lie hidden beneath the fragile structures of the ordinary.  

Berlin has a history that cannot be ignored but, rising from the ashes of madness and war, it has become a new and vibrant city filled with life. Thinking about those apartments built above the ruins of Hitler’s bunker, I realized that they were just filled with regular people living their lives – cooking, cleaning, making love, raising children, talking around the kitchen table, worrying, laughing and, like all of us, hoping for the best. Journeying though Berlin and seeing lovers strolling arm in arm in the Tiergarten, mothers pushing baby carriages, and old people watching kids play, I was reminded yet again that life is the utmost expression of “Primordial love and ultimate intellect.” 

Sometimes, when we are filled with sorrow and despair, seeing life “just going on” can be painful – as if it’s ignoring our pain and grief – but its very inevitability is a sign that “Sacred justice” cannot be denied. Once a forsaken city of woe, Berlin was lost but now has been found. And, as I saw men and women of every color and religion walking its streets, many the very people the Third Reich sought to eradicate, I knew if resurrection could happen here, it could happen anywhere. Never abandon hope because Life, which pours forth from Love Itself, always wins. 

In a sense,“Wir sind alle Berliner.” 

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The Promised Land

“I’m bored,” Natalie said. It had rained all day and, after playing video games, watching TV, and surfing kiddie You Tube, digital ennui had finally set in. 

“Being bored is part of life,” I said. 

“What does that, like, even mean?”

“Go outside and play with some sticks. Find ways to entertain yourself.” 

“I’m not playing with sticks.” 

During the lazy, hazy days of summer, some parents think they’re a failure if they don’t pack their child’s day with enriching activities, trips, sports, or other such distractions. I, however, never saw “cruise director” listed in my fatherly job description. “Benign neglect,” a friend of mine once said, “Is an essential part of raising a child.” That statement might upset some people, but it’s very true. When I was a kid during the summer, my parents took me on vacations, to museums, amusement parks, and baseball games but, most of the time, they just threw me out of the house and didn’t expect to see me until I was hungry, or the streetlights came on. Was I bored much of the time? Absolutely, but I learned how to create my own fun. These days, however, if I left my child to roam unattended through the neighborhood, I’d have child protective services on my ass. 

“Can you do something with Nat?” my wife asked me a while later. “I’m trying to clean the basement and she’s driving me nuts.” 

“Okay, honey,” I said. Of course, I wasn’t thinking about my child’s welfare. I just didn’t want to get roped into excavating all the crap that had accumulated in my basement. 

“Let’s go to the park,” I told Natalie. 

“It rained,” she said, “No one will be there.” 

“Let’s just see.” 

Of course, the park was washed out and bereft of kiddies, but the pickleball players cramming the slick courts didn’t seem to give a damn. I hoped they weren’t thinking about suing the town if the slipped and fell. Sighing, I said, “Sorry Nat. The playground’s a bust.” 

“What are we going to do now?” she whined. Then I was hit by inspiration. 

“Natalie, can you see the mountain from here?” 

“What mountain?” 

“It’s right over there,” I said, pointing. 

“I don’t see it.” 

“I’ll show you.” 

I live in near the foothills of the Appalachian Mountain Range. Strictly speaking, there are no mountains in my town, just some really high hills. Due to the undulating typography of the area, however, you’re often not aware they’re even there, but I knew where one was hidden. Driving a scant quarter mile from the playground, I turned into a side street, shifted into a lower gear, and guided my car up a steep climb. 

“Whoa,” Natalie, said, reacting as the car tilted upwards 

“This is nothing,” I said. “Wait until we get to the top.” As my back pressed into my seat, I listened as the car’s engine strained with effort while my brow furrowed in concentration. The road we were on was notoriously difficult. Narrowing to one lane, with a steep drop off hemmed in by guardrails, if a car came from the opposite direction, you could have a problem. When fire and garbage trucks climb this hill, they have to go into reverse to go back down. One time, a DPW truck tumbled over the edge. 

“Wow,” Natalie, said. “Look at those houses!” Quite a few wealthy people have built showpieces on this hill with commanding views of the valley below and a famous politician lived up here for a time but, if you didn’t know where to look, you’d never know they were there. Eventually we got to the top of the hill and were rewarded with a spectacular view. 

“Look at the lake down there,” my daughter said. “It’s like were in an airplane!” 

“On a good day,” I said. “You can see New York from here.” 

The sun was starting to set and, as its rays sliced through the dark swollen clouds, a mighty rainbow arched over the tree covered slopes.  Sighing, I pulled my car into the narrow roundabout at the top of hill and parked. “Is that something?” I said, pointing. 

High above the modern world’s tumult, the hilltop was eerily quiet and, as I looked on the vista below, I was reminded of how, on another mountaintop, God gave Moses a glimpse of a promised land he’d never live to see. Looking at Natalie, I thought about how’d she’d grown in past couple of months, evincing the beginnings of the woman she’ll eventually become. Then a thought struck me. Would I live to see it? See her graduate college, fall in love, get married and have children? After cancer, I harbor fewer illusions about my mortality than I used to but there, on the summit, I realized children are also a promised land of sorts. Usually outliving us moms and dads, kids are an echo of their parents revertebrating into a future we’ll never see. Then I thought about my dad on his deathbed and how I got the sense that he was disappointed. He lived to see his children grow up and delighted in his grandchildren, but I’m sure he was hoping for more time to see how things turned out. How many oldsters hang on to life until they see a grandchild born, graduate high school or get married? The need to see those things for ourselves is powerful and the thought of not being around to witness them can be distressing. But as I get older, I’ve come to understand I’ve got to get used to the fact I’m slowing down while younger people are speeding up and leaving me behind. I could accept that fact with either good grace or bitterness but, if you’re like me, I’m suspect it’s a combination of the two – but all of us want to see that promised land. 

Moses didn’t, but I wonder if he took solace in something the philosopher Alan Watts would elucidate millennia later – that there’s no such thing as the past or future, only an eternal now.  When you think about it, a memory is something we relive now, just like dreaming about flying cars and warp speed can only occur in the present.  We can only gaze upon the past and future in the here and now. Some of us will get to see our kids grow up and some of us won’t. Sometimes they don’t even get to grow up.  None of us really knows what’s going to happen and that causes me anxiety from time to time but, as I looked at my daughter staring open mouthed at the rainbow, I suddenly remembered another snippet from Scripture, “Behold, the Kingdom of God is already in your midst.” It is here now. 

Ruminating over past wrongs or filled with worry about the days ahead, we often overlook the now, walking right past beauty’s endless gifts: a child’s wondrous face, a rainbow vaulting heavenward, or the love people offer us. But that’s okay, for those moments will always come again, and again, and again. For, in the eternal now, The Promised Land is yesterday, today, and forever. We only to need eyes to see and, as I looked at my child, I savored that moment which, in a way I cannot describe, contained everything I knew I’d ever need.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” my daughter. said, shifting nervously in her seat. I smiled because my dad used to look at me the same way and now, I knew why. He may be gone but, when I think of him, he is here with me now – again, and again, and again. Right now.

“One day, Natalie” I said. “You will understand.” 

‘Can we get ice cream?” 

“Sure, kid.” 

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