Growing Pains (and a rant)

When I was about 21, I read a book of poetry by Galway Kinnell for a class (A New Selected Poems, left).  I remember really liking it at the time, which was surprising, because I wasn’t particularly interested in much poetry back then.  But as is often the case with books you read for school, I eventually kind of forgot about it. Then, out of nowhere, about three years ago or so, while I was in law school, a line from one of the poems came into my head while I was studying, and I couldn’t stop thinking about it, trying to remember exactly what it was.  There was nothing for it but to go look it up.  Here it is:

“ …Carriages we were babies in,

Springs that used to resist love, that gave in

And were thrown out like whores – the black

Irreducible heap, mausoleum of what we were –

It is cold suddenly, we feel chilled,

Nobody knows for sure what is left of him.”

Anyway, at the time, this line haunted me.  I remember thinking, “Yeah.  That’s it.  This is what growing up is.”  You give in to other people, to yourself, to your “future” and you become this vacant, tossed-out, wasteland that you can practically hear the wind whistling through, cold and numb and just plain finished with the world. 

Cut to today.  I woke up this morning and I was excited to start the day.  I went for a rambling run in the snow.  I had coffee with a friend, and we talked about how change happens in society.  (I’ll get to that in a minute – it ties into all of this.)  We also talked about how long I plan to stay in Szczecin, Poland, or Europe.  I went to school and talked to Zenon about arrangements for my visa.  He gave me a work permission form to take to the consulate that is valid for up to two years, should I choose to stay.  And I’m not 100% sure of much about my life right now, but I’m pretty sure of this: I’m not going back to living in the States anytime soon. 

Why?  On my walk home, the snow was driving into my face, and I was thinking about how annoyed I would have been about the weather last winter, but how beautiful I find it now.  I even took the long way home so I could walk around a bit more and take a few snow photos.  And I realized that this is how change happens in a person.  You do things that are hard.  You make friends who open your world up.  You figure out what’s important to you, and you do something about it.  I’m actually going back to being the person I was before I began wondering ‘what was left of me.’  I’ve been thinking about all the ways I can try to do some good in the world again, focusing in like a laser on all the things that are truly important and trying to let the rest of it go.  Caring about other people is important (that includes family, friends, students, co-workers, random people on the street, whoever).  How I spend the minutes and hours of my life is important.  What I look like, how much money I make, or my “career path” are not important.  

Actually, I’ve been anxious lately. My roommate is moving to Gdańsk at the end of the month.  I have a trip back to the US ahead of me, and when I come back from the States, life is going to be different than it is now.  Honestly, I’ve kind of been dreading Christmas coming.  (Sorry, everyone back home.  I really love you and I am absolutely looking forward to seeing you all again, I promise.)  And I’ve been a little worried about what’s going on with some people I care about, both here and at home.  It's been sort of painful to see how when you really care about things again, when you really love your life, you have more to lose when things change.  But today I realized this is all the way it's supposed to be.  If your life does change, and they aren't the changes you wanted, or if you get hurt, or if you have to find your bearings again, that doesn’t mean that you’ve made the wrong decisions, or that you shouldn’t have let people in, or that you failed.  It just means you have to be strong and make some new decisions.  And all  these things I care about are the things that have made me stronger.  The ability to really care about my life again has made me stronger.

And I’m not saying I have to be in Poland to feel this way, but I don’t think I can be in the US.  And here’s why: when I was talking to my friend about how change happens in society, I told him how pissed off I am at the culture of apathy back home.  We didn’t get the health-care bill we wanted?  Oh, let’s just bitch about it over a beer and then vote for basically the same people again in four years.  Hmm, or maybe we could sue someone about it… Our food has disgusting amounts of chemicals and pesticides in it, but I’ll feed it to my kid anyway, because it’s cheaper, and we’ve gotta pay for our two cars, the home we can’t afford, and all of this shit we think we need.  The only group of people raising any kind of fuss right now in the States is the goddamned Tea Party.  The people who actually have the fewest problems to bitch about.  I hate almost everything they stand for, but I can admit to grudging respect for them right now, because at least they actually care about something.  Enough to do something – anything – about it.  People in the UK have been pouring into the streets by the thousands because the government is cutting funding for education.  They don’t think it’s a privilege that only the rich should be able to take advantage of.  When I first heard about it, I thought ‘Oh, please.  You should see how bad it is in my country.’  But that’s bullshit.  It’s that bad back home because nobody bothered to stand up and fight about it.  Nobody cared if poor people went to school.  They didn't think it would be their kids.  The American Dream, and all.

Basically, the American Dream killed America (and it made me feel pretty much dead inside, too).  It’s all about the idea that if you keep your head down and work your ass off for your entire life at a ‘good’ job, maybe you can ‘own’ property (as if you can ever really own anything), maybe you’ll be one of the elite that has enough money to send your kids to school and look down your nose at the people who “didn’t work hard enough.”  No thought to things like community, compassion, passion or (heaven forbid) finding some meaning in life. No thought to anything other than material success.  And even those people who don't believe in it don't want to get off of their comfy sofas and fight back. Well, if America can’t dream any better than that, I don’t ever want to go back. I don't belong there anymore.  I care too much.

Mam Rację

Another day is come and gone here, and it's been the best one so far.  I've had some trouble sleeping the last couple of nights (whether it's the jet lag or stress, I'm not sure), but today I got up reasonably early, determined to spend another full day out in the city, exploring and enjoying it.  I ate breakfast and left my hostel, determined to make it to the Botanical Garden today.  The garden is right near the Wroclaw Cathedral on Ostrow Tumski, so far my favorite part of this city, so I began by heading toward the Cathedral.  On the way, I got sidetracked about 8 times by beautiful things I just had to see.  One thing I didn't see, though, was a lot of people.  By this time, it was almost 10:00, and on weekdays, the streets were buzzing.  I had thought that a Saturday would mean that many more people about.  In my world, Saturdays are for running errands, and beautiful Saturdays are for walking around, so I wondered just what Polish people do on Saturdays. I was just getting to the bridge when I spotted the Hala Targowa, a beautiful old building that appeared to have been converted into some kind of market.  I stepped inside and was convinced that I had found the answer to my question.  Shopping!  Obviously, they were all shopping.  This was not just a market.  It was Wroclaw's answer to the Super Walmart: you could buy anything there.  Of course, it didn't have the same atmosphere...

I didn't really want to buy anything that I'd have to lug around with me all day, and I didn't have any plans of heading back to my hostel anytime soon, so I cleared out after a brief look around.  Before long, I was back in Ostrow Tumski, standing in front of the Wroclaw Cathedral again.  I don't think I could ever get tired of looking at it.  This time, though, I went in and paid a tiny 5 zloty fee to climb a few flights of stairs and then catch an elevator to the top of one of the massive towers.  As soon as I stepped out into the open air, I saw this:

 and this:

and a whole lot more. 

My time at the top of the cathedral convinced me that I needed to get my butt to the botanical garden pronto, so I did.  And it was stunning.  Quiet, peaceful, beauty everywhere I looked.  I wandered for hours, then found a quiet place to eat lunch and read for a while.  I stopped at the cafe on the way out and ran into a couple, maybe a bit older than my parents, who clearly did not speak any Polish.  The woman sounded North American, so I asked her where she was from.  It turned out that she was from San Diego, and her husband was British.  We talked, and laughed and made travel suggestions to one another.  Pretty soon, we'd been talking for almost an hour.  Our coffee was gone.  They gave me their email address and told me to keep in touch, and they both hugged me when they left.  It is so amazing how being thrown together in a different culture is a good enough reason to be the best of friends with people you wouldn't have had anything in common with back home, after only 45 minutes.  I was incredibly glad to have met them, because it got rid of a bit of the loneliness that had been nagging at me.  After all, how long do you think you could spend with only yourself to have long conversations with?  

Anyway, after I left the gardens, I walked around some more, I went grocery shopping, and I sat down with myself at a cafe for a while, watching the people walk by two by two, almost as if onto the ark.  Young couples, old couples, new parents, skinny couples, fat couples, pairs of young women and pairs of old men.  A deaf couple even sat next to me, and when a beggar approached everyone on the patio in turn and tried to coax us into parting with our hard-earned zlotys, the deaf woman caught my eye and made a funny face at me.  I laughed, and thought that some things are universal, whether you are Polish, American, deaf, hearing, whatever... And it was then that I first thought about how little my own troubles with language really counted for anything.  They couldn't speak or hear at all, and they'd gone into the same cafe as I had and successfully ordered coffee as well.  

Walking home, I was very content about my day, but I realized something.  I hadn't fallen in love with Wroclaw on Thursday.  That was just infatuation.  It's like the sexy stranger you want to know better, but who intimidates you a bit.  Love requires knowing someone more.  And I want to love Wroclaw, which means I've got to get to know it better.  I've got to reach out and really explore and see it for what it is.

To that end, I've got to run now.  I'm going to find a new bar and grab a drink with my new Canadian friend, who I just met in my hostel common room.  More later!