This Tree Has Flown
I'm driving up Robertson after lunch today, on my way
back to the copy-bitching temp job I've momentarily
picked up in an effort to avoid welfare, when I see
it.
It isn't much--just the navy blue awning above yet
another LA eatery--but the sprawling white letters
declaring its name add up to Champs-Elysee, and I
nearly start to cry.
It's been two and a half weeks now since I returned
home, and at first I thought I was all right.
Seemingly I had avoided the dreaded travel withdrawal
that so many seasoned travelers had spoken of with the
same gravity as bedbugs and Delhi-Belly.
When, immediately upon my return, my eternally
wandering (or at least wanting to) friend Leah asked
me where I was headed next and suggested Thailand, I
laughed it off. Of course I'll get there someday, I
assured myself, but for now I am glad to be home.
And I am.
In a way.
But the twinges have started.
I find that I'm suddenly hyper-sensitive to stimuli
which can be associated in any way to skipping town.
When Star 98.7 plays The Metro by Berlin during their
80s flashback lunch--"I was on a Paris train, I
emerged in London rain,"--I actually miss (with a
capital M) all three cities. When I'm sorting the
mail at this ridiculous job, and there appears an
envelope from Prague, I curse the flourescent light up
here on the twentieth floor and long for the open air
of the Charles Bridge. An awning, a song, an
envelope--sometimes nothing at all, just a twinge and
the instinct to jump on a train.
So what does one do, then?
Last night, over tea and cookies with Ronit, she said
she thought that through the course of our friendship
she had given me roots, and I had given her wings.
Surely everyone needs both (lucky us), but the
question becomes how to healthfully and happily put
both our wings and roots to use in a balanced way. I
don't know about you, but I have never seen a tree
fly. Of course, I've never taken a stroll down
tornado alley...
I suppose that's the challenge I face now: to take
what I saw and felt and learned during my two winged
months abroad and use the seeds of that experience to
plant and sow and establish roots right here at home.
And as soon as this tree has grown, I'll climb it and
jump across the pond to Thailand.
Grecian Yearn
Part I, in Preface to the Retrospectacular
***
Somewhere between Corfu and Athens I am entirely
overcome. The crowded overnight bus that I've
sardined into with fifty-one other hard-traveling
souls is dark, and the man in the seat next to mine
has succumbed to a deeply sprawled sleep, so I make no
attempt to break the wave of emotion crashing through
me. They are quite possibly the best tears I have
ever shed--pure and pristine--the tears of a heart
that is breaking not due to neglect or
misunderstanding, but rather as a result of having
reached an incredible fullness--like the jackfruit so
sweet and ripe it bursts.
I've spent the last two months falling in love, again
and again, with the most unexpected people in the most
unlikely places.
Five beautiful, female Cardiologists--contemporaries
of mine--at a cafe in Moscow who called me over to
their table and poured me shot after shot of vodka,
inviting me momentarily and without question into
their world, encompassing me in their warmth and
laughter.
The Italian boy who descended upon me as I sat alone
at the Termini train station in Rome and implored me
to swap headsets while we each awaited our respective
late-night departures, then left me, after a brief but
exhilarated conversation, with an album by one of his
favorite Italian bands and some adamant tips on
staying safe.
The Dane in Copenhagen who, on his first day of work
at the Museum of the Danish Resistance in WWII, and
despite a malfunctioning cash register, insisted on
opening up my city map and pointing out his favorite
works of architecture, the cheapest canal tour, and
the best bakeries in town.
And these, of course, are examples of only the most
fleeting encounters; testaments, more than anything,
to the kindness of strangers. The many people who
invited me into their homes and daily lives; the
people that I met in hostels and on trains and with
whom I spent hours, days, even weeks--they are an
altogether different story, each of them deserving of
their own tome, and they have changed my heart and
mind forever.
***
So I traveled from Moscow to Athens and covered as
much territory in between as I could in seventy days.
What did I find? That everywhere you go, there are
scores of people who want to connect and share. Among
locals and travelers alike, the common human desires I
encountered were for understanding and communion. No
matter how different our Cultures or how distant our
Homelands, conversations sprung up, bridges were built
and alliances were forged in an instant.
At home we generally operate in deference to the
assumption that we need to be formally introduced or
connected to someone before speaking to them. On the
road, that old habit dies easy, and the inclination is
to casually strike up conversations with anyone and
everyone. Internationals search for a common language
everywhere you go.
"Parlez-vous Anglais?"
"Hablas Espanol?"
"Sprechen zie Deutsche?"
Romances are ignited through the trading of coinage in
Prague. Age and Nationality dissolve into a bottle
(or two) of Scotch in Berlin. Plans and routes are
altered so that friendships can be solidified across
borders.
Russians, Estonians, Finns, Danes, French people,
Germans, Swiss people, Czechs, Austrians, Hungarians,
Italians, Greeks, Americans, Canadians, Australians,
Spaniards, Costa Ricans, New Zealanders, Israelis,
Indians and everyone in between finds that they are
one people united by a common experience, and suddenly
all of the complications of daily life and human
interaction seem moot. Curiosity and affection become
simple, sincere and pure.
No matter how different we look, no matter how
different the foods we eat, no matter how different
the languages we dream in, no matter how different the
landscapes of our childhoods or the Gods we pray to or
disbelieve in, we all want the same basic things: to
give and receive love, to be appreciated and accepted
as we are, to be productive in some way that satisfies
and makes us proud. Incredible how when you leave the
context of home behind, with all of its blinders and
preoccupations, with all of the media's mental
manipulations and the fears and ignorances it provokes
and sustains, the world is suddenly revealed to be--of
all things--a breeding ground for friendship and love.
***
Rome If You Want To
Friends, Romans, Countrymen:
I daresay I received some interesting responses to my
last post. Don't worry your pretty little heads--I'm
not writing off my entire Italian experience because
of a spot of graffiti. And of course I understand
that those spray-can sentiments are directed more
specifically at the Italian and American governments,
rather than at individuals like myself. But I will
remind those who regard Italy as one of our oldest and
most consistent friends that they were an Axis Nation
who very willingly took up arms and fought alongside
the Germans from the beginning of WWII.
Bygones... :-p
I've spent the last few days in Rome, which has mainly
pissed on me, but the clouds parted long enough today
for me to check out what the Romans left behind, and I
have to give props.
Strolling through the Forum, exploring The Palatine
Hill, taking in the Coloseum and pondering the dome of
the Pantheon were awe-inspiring and eerie in the best
possible way.
Columns reaching into the sky in support of nothing...
Chills.
In any case, I'm taking an overnight train to Brindisi
tonight, where the plan is to catch the one and only
daily ferry to Corfu, Greece tomorrow morning.
Yankee Go Home
Italy is so fabled, so widely photographed, so
touristed and celebrated, that I was almost
indifferent about visiting. I felt, I suppose, as
though there was no mystery left in it, so I was
suprised to find that my heart went warm (quite
literally a physical sensation) when I was awakened by
passport control at 5 a.m. while crossing the the
Austrian/Italian border.
The country is mythic and storied in so many ways,
with such a vast and unique history and so very much
to offer, but sadly enough the one characteristic
about Italy that stands out for me thus far (Venice,
Padua, Verona and Florence) is the embarrassing
quantity of anti-American graffiti scrawled
everywhere.
"Yankee Go Home," "Fuck You Americano." These and a
plethora of other expressions touting anti-American
sentiment can be found all over the streets of Italy.
Most striking for me is the fact that this is the
first and only place I've encountered anything like
it. Even Paris, which I was warned about and which I
explored in great depth, was free of such sentiment,
at least publically.
In any case, I'll see what I can find out from the
natives. Is it Iraq (of course it is, to a degree),
is it the avalanche of tourism? Whatever it is, I
feel immense anger and hostility directed at me by
virtue of my nationality. A strange new
experience--perhaps I've been lucky.
