February 14, 2014
How not to lie or "between two parises" Part I
I don't feel a strong urge to attach any chronological importance to the events that happened between the Two Parises. These "non- Paris" events will unfold in specifics if it becomes relevant. What is relevant however the effect the non-Paris events had. Like I mentioned at the end of "Paris the First Time", I eventually returned to Paris--or at least someone that looked like me did. This collection of mismatched memories and geographically incorrect recollections is why, when I returned, I resembled myself but little.
My intention, when I left Paris, was to go to Padua, Italy, to meet my closest friend-for-life Lydia, who was studying abroad.
But my memory today--as I try to access this story from 25 years ago (yikes)-- is telling me that I did not just GO to Padua directly.
(Important side note, I have recently discovered that a bad memory, while frustrating, is a whole separate asset in itself. It certainly doesn't function as linearly as, say, an eidetic memory, but it has it's own brand of accurate and beautiful information.)
While straining to recall this information, I consulted a map of Europe. It was only a little helpful. My spotty memory was telling me that I did not go directly to Italy but instead went to Munich. A quick glance at the map will confirm that that is not exactly the most direct route to Padua. But, for someone raised in a culture of cars, Europe looked and felt remarkably condensed--all those countries hurled so close together--the same yet different, yet the same. In some ways Europe did not make sense to me--the whole continent and it's various regions seemed like something I could "option" at any time. Back home, I was certifiably addicted to driving. I would drive anywhere at any time for any reason. I'd already crossed the US a few times not to mention the innumerable West Coast road trips, up and down the coast over and over and over--often not actually going anywhere specific. So it does make sense that a train trip a couple hundred miles out of the way would not phase me. Plus, I told myself, I could sleep on the train and save boarding money.
I selected this map because the way it is rendered was pleasing to me. However, the cities are all jumbley and I can't even find Munich. I will have to go with something more contemporary.
Back to the topic: I had purchased the very stylish Eurorail pass--a ticket to everywhere. So it is possible that I thought, "Hey, I'll go to Muncih before going to see Lydia!" However, there is a glaring error in this thinking. Why the fuck, out of the entirety of Europe, would I pick the city of Munich?
The answer is: I wouldn't.
Quick quiz: What European city, related to Munich, is somewhere that someone like myself would most likely to want to see in 1989?
Berlin, of course.
I couldn't really fathom exactly what was happening in Berlin at that very moment--I was, after all from California. All I knew was I had to see this city that was so representative of what my homeland advertised as being decisively and unforgivably un-American. A city divided in two. The Berlin Wall. Who wouldn't want to see this phenomenon? Plus, there was something brewing that I never could have guessed but must have drawn me in: the Berlin Wall was destined to "fall" a mere six months from where I stood in time.
I had a head full of my own anti-American angst---my brain over-sodden with American propaganda about "The Evil of the Other". Clearly, I did not view Berlin as a poster-city for personal and civil liberties; but I had to see it for myself.
But I also had a head full of Milan Kundera's writing--why not Prague? Prague was actually not that much further than Berlin; to a girl raised in California--everything seemed extremely close. However, although I had begun my love affair with the literature of Kundera, it was not yet in it's heyday--that would happen back in Paris, later on. Plus, rowing up at a time of the Cold War, Berlin was the archetypal City of Horrors. I mean really, even if the Cold War had never existed , there was still the lurking echo of Hitler and the Third Reich.
So, my intention was not to go to Munich--I had actually set out to go to Berlin. Had I actually gone to Berlin, I would have probably opened this writing with "Omg, I went to Berlin in 1989" So, you've probably guessed already that I did not make it. I insist that the freedom I felt in Europe, alone,with a train pass at age 19 was undeniably heady---realizing that technically I could go anywhere I wanted and do anything I felt like doing (kind of--I was on a major budget). Similar to when a college freshman realizes that not only can they EAT sugar cereal in the cafeteria every morning, but they can actually BUY their own boxes of sugar cereal and consume it whenever they want--well, it was that type of freedom. There was a drunken quality to it.
You know what has a more drunken quality to it than sugar cereal or access to Europe via train? Alcohol. But that will become relevant later.
February 16-19, 2014
how not to lie or "between two parises" part ii
As this story unfolds, there are parts that interest me more than others. For instance, getting on a train, headed for Berlin but getting off in Munich instead etc.---not only is all that very hazy, but, in my mind, threatens to become tedious.
Here is what is important about Munich in relationship to myself at the time: beer.
I was off, out of Paris, which for all intents and purposes had been my home-base. I had an apartment that came with built-in people and a vague routine--things that keep me attached to the planet. (Some of you may recall my thing about "flying off the face of the Earth") But now, on my way to what I assumed would be another home-type base--Lydia's host family's home in Padua, Italy--I was adrift. And in a completely foreign-foreign environment. At any given moment, I didn't know what the fuck was going on or what the fuck might happen. Beer seemed like a good solution to the anxiety that accompanied this state of "not knowing".
Let Us Pause for an Academic Moment:
It turns out there is a convenient graph that describes the mechanics of the traumatizing anxiety state I was experiencing. I happened to enter grad school soon after the events of "Nine-Eleven." The topic of "wide-scale cultural trauma" was common--especially for a country that has not really ever experienced a physical attack on its own land from a foreign entity.
Apparently, we humans have a sheet of graph paper in our heads. On this sheet of graph paper is outlined a 10x10 grid. On a typical day (and in this case, a day typical to an average American) the level of predictable events--in relationship to time--extends out to the five range (see fig.1)
Here is what is important about Munich in relationship to myself at the time: beer.
I was off, out of Paris, which for all intents and purposes had been my home-base. I had an apartment that came with built-in people and a vague routine--things that keep me attached to the planet. (Some of you may recall my thing about "flying off the face of the Earth") But now, on my way to what I assumed would be another home-type base--Lydia's host family's home in Padua, Italy--I was adrift. And in a completely foreign-foreign environment. At any given moment, I didn't know what the fuck was going on or what the fuck might happen. Beer seemed like a good solution to the anxiety that accompanied this state of "not knowing".
Let Us Pause for an Academic Moment:
It turns out there is a convenient graph that describes the mechanics of the traumatizing anxiety state I was experiencing. I happened to enter grad school soon after the events of "Nine-Eleven." The topic of "wide-scale cultural trauma" was common--especially for a country that has not really ever experienced a physical attack on its own land from a foreign entity.
Apparently, we humans have a sheet of graph paper in our heads. On this sheet of graph paper is outlined a 10x10 grid. On a typical day (and in this case, a day typical to an average American) the level of predictable events--in relationship to time--extends out to the five range (see fig.1)
TYPICAL LEVEL OF PREDICTABILITY
Fig. 1 above is attempting to illustrate how one tends to rely on a certain amount of predictability in one's life--things one takes for granted--in order to navigate with the least amount of anxiety. For instance, on Monday, I usually wake up at 7am, make oatmeal and coffee, meditate for three and a half minutes while the oatmeal cooks, get my child up, eat the oatmeal, drink the coffee, get my child ready for school, take my child to school, etc. Even though I have only described one hour of my life--it already displays a high level of "predictability." Later, if I need to go to the store or get gas for my car or make a phone call, I already predict that I will probably go to THIS store, THIS gas station, use THIS phone AND, most importably, it is likely that these THINGS WILL WORK. On any typical day, week, month, year, certain things have become established patterns; patterns on which one relies. I hesitate to say that these are expectations, because that is not what this is about. Expectations can be subjective, while predicability describes a more universal survival skill. If you think about it, Western culture has kind of been one huge surge towards as much daily predictability as possible.
So, what happens when the level of predictability moves from what is average, to, say, level one--which is almost no predictability?
So, what happens when the level of predictability moves from what is average, to, say, level one--which is almost no predictability?
POST-TRAUMA LEVEL OF PREDICTABILITY
Trauma. Anxiety. Fear. Warped thinking. Violence. The stuff PTSD is made of. If you, the reader, can use what you know about the events of "Nine-Eleven" (and I only used this example because it was the example my professor used) it might be easier to visualize the concept. You get up, make oatmeal, make coffee, mediatate, get child up, eat oatmeal, drink coffee, prepare child, take child to school....and then in an everlasting split-second in time, your whole world shifts----and keeps shifting----and keeps shifting----and keeps shifting until nothing is recognizable anymore--nothing is predictable anymore. Maybe you needed to go to the store, or get gas or make a phone call and it turns out the store has disintegrated, the gas station is mobbed the phones don't work. And the next day it is still unpredictable. And the next day and the next day and the next day. It remains unpredictable, regardless of one's efforts and this "temporary" state of chaos wedges itself in the brain as "permanent". Once one's predictability event horizon collapses, the tools one typically employs to get through the day do not work anymore. AT ALL. In order to survive, one involuntarily defaults to one's survival brain (r-complex)--and some folks don't even know that these things exist! Feelings change, perceptions shift, motivations fracture and relationships are stressed.
This is trauma---according to the graph.
This is trauma---according to the graph.
February 20, 2014
Landing in Munich and experiencing this untethered freedom was really more than I was prepared to handle. But, there was not a whole lot I could do about it, now was there? For some reason I cannot identify (while in my 43-year-old self) why I was so determined to mix it up.
I had this weird plane ticket that could be activated at any time. All I had to do was call and within days I would be booked on a flight home*. So, in a sense there was always an escape--one I never wanted to take, one I barely acknowledged, but there it was, nonetheless.
So, how did I handle the pressure--the collapsed event horizon? THAT quickly became a no brainer: alcohol.
It was an easy fix, and it worked every time. There was this internal fear that had a grip on me, but you would almost never know it to look at me. I did everything and went everywhere. In fact, the persistent, lurking fear almost compelled me to do even more than I normally might of--as if I could eradicate it by swinging in the direction of fear-less.
I did a lot in Munich, the best things being hooking up with a Swedish girl for a few days. (And no, I don't mean "hooking up" with a Swedish girl), I went record hunting (I am talking about the large black musical discs) and mailed a bunch of stuff home, and I road public transportation. (To reiterate, I was from California, urban and suburban, and I practically lived in my crappy car with the eight track tape player [that was unusual for the time---I am not THAT old] I preferred to stay as far away from PubTrans as possible)
But enough of this! The point is, once I realized I could drink....and not feel the fear so acutely, I embraced it whole heartedly.
As you can imagine, this was not a hugely sustainable solution, but it didn't stop me from trying to make it work for a long time after it turned into something else all together. And, you might also, imagine, that this did not make for completely well thought-out decision making and, as a result, I put myself into some really uncool situations. The details of these things are not as important as the result of these things. And the results were mixed: while I was drinking in order to escape the Fear, the drinking put me in more fearful situations. This would not be true for most!! But the alcohol coupled with my own fierce determination to see what I had never seen before, to go to dark out-of-the-way places, to experience what I had dubbed "real"--the "real" Germany, the "real" Austria, the "real" Italy, etc just put my already scared self in some genuinely scary situations.
But I did survive, now........didn't I....?
*This is a very important fact. While I know striving to be understood is a waste of time, I hope you might understand this: I had an out. At any given time as I describe hopefulness or despair, fear and more fear, joy and warm fuzziness, I had this piece of paper (paper!) that was always there, always reminding me: you can leave. I never forgot and have never forgotten that all of my time spent in Europe was spent by choice and that, technically, I could go home anytime.
I had this weird plane ticket that could be activated at any time. All I had to do was call and within days I would be booked on a flight home*. So, in a sense there was always an escape--one I never wanted to take, one I barely acknowledged, but there it was, nonetheless.
So, how did I handle the pressure--the collapsed event horizon? THAT quickly became a no brainer: alcohol.
It was an easy fix, and it worked every time. There was this internal fear that had a grip on me, but you would almost never know it to look at me. I did everything and went everywhere. In fact, the persistent, lurking fear almost compelled me to do even more than I normally might of--as if I could eradicate it by swinging in the direction of fear-less.
I did a lot in Munich, the best things being hooking up with a Swedish girl for a few days. (And no, I don't mean "hooking up" with a Swedish girl), I went record hunting (I am talking about the large black musical discs) and mailed a bunch of stuff home, and I road public transportation. (To reiterate, I was from California, urban and suburban, and I practically lived in my crappy car with the eight track tape player [that was unusual for the time---I am not THAT old] I preferred to stay as far away from PubTrans as possible)
But enough of this! The point is, once I realized I could drink....and not feel the fear so acutely, I embraced it whole heartedly.
As you can imagine, this was not a hugely sustainable solution, but it didn't stop me from trying to make it work for a long time after it turned into something else all together. And, you might also, imagine, that this did not make for completely well thought-out decision making and, as a result, I put myself into some really uncool situations. The details of these things are not as important as the result of these things. And the results were mixed: while I was drinking in order to escape the Fear, the drinking put me in more fearful situations. This would not be true for most!! But the alcohol coupled with my own fierce determination to see what I had never seen before, to go to dark out-of-the-way places, to experience what I had dubbed "real"--the "real" Germany, the "real" Austria, the "real" Italy, etc just put my already scared self in some genuinely scary situations.
But I did survive, now........didn't I....?
*This is a very important fact. While I know striving to be understood is a waste of time, I hope you might understand this: I had an out. At any given time as I describe hopefulness or despair, fear and more fear, joy and warm fuzziness, I had this piece of paper (paper!) that was always there, always reminding me: you can leave. I never forgot and have never forgotten that all of my time spent in Europe was spent by choice and that, technically, I could go home anytime.
