Black & White

 "Mama, you know how God says that he will come back again?" 

"yes" 

"When will that be exactly?" 

"Oh babe, I have no idea, no one knows. God told us to be ready at any hour of any day so it could happen tonight or in a thousand years, we just don't know but we know we need to ready"

"Today would be a good day I think. I wish he would come today and make everything better"

'Today would be a good day I think', where did that come from right? He is barely eleven years old and he has learned that the world is broken and needs to be redeemed today. When I was eleven I was starting to think about boys, clothes, being a famous movie star, collecting tiger beat magazines with my allowance and River Phoenix.  Times have changed so much with the age of the internet. The topic on his mind last night was Philledelphia and yet another black life snuffed out, another death where proper training for mental health could have been avoided, another demonstration of power gone wrong or given to the wrong people. We talked about his friends who are all 'minority groups' though to be honest he is one of a dozen white kids in his school. How is it that his friends can grow up and be afraid of the police, he doesn't understand and sadly neither do I. I don't hate cops, I have had some really good interactions with the cops in our neighbourhood, I have seen them working up in Regent Park, playing basketball with the kids or soccer or just standing around talking with them and getting to know them. I don't think all cops are bad, but cops are human and humans can do horrible things to each other. Christians did/do horrible things to people, white people do horrible things to people, muslims, gangs (of any race), husbands, wives, children, we all have the capacity to do and be wrong, to be mean, cruel, abusive. Words and fists, guns and knives it doesn't matter what weapon you wield you have the power to to hurt and abuse. Privilege then, is knowing you have that power and choosing to use your weapons to protect, to defend and to stand beside the people who need defending, the people who need protection, the people who need to finally feel safe. Privilege is a line of white Moms who stand arm in arm in between the the protestors and the police because they are Moms and any Mom who heard George Floyd call out for his Mom that day in late May immediately wanted to to go to his side, to fight for him, to save him. He was everyone's son when he called for his Mom. Privilege is stepping in because you know that you are safer than the person you are stepping in for. Privilege is coming to understand that you will never know what it is like to be in the another persons shoes, coming to fully understand that I will never have to 'have the talk with my boys' about how to avoid confrontations with the police, how to remain calm, how to do as I am told to avoid trouble, it's knowing that I will never have my 12 year old ask me "will I be next?". 

I have no idea what it is like to be anything other than what I am, a white woman, a Christian, from a nuclear, middle class family, straight, English speaking and able bodied. I can never say I understand and I hate that I can't, but I am thankful as well. I want to learn, I want to understand so that I can know how to take action in a helpful & positive way, I don't want to be afraid that I will say the wrong thing, I want to be the woman standing between the black and blue lines, I want to use what I have through no amount of effort on my part but rather through birth and circumstances, to protect, to defend and to be a compassionate ear and more importantly I want to know how to teach my kids, my two white christian middle class males how to use their privilege for good.  

It is just not good enough anymore to say we care, to send our 'thoughts and prayers' to the victims families, to say we are not racist or to speak into a moment but when the moment passes we move on. There has been hundreds of years of racism and this insanity needs to stop. Our fellow brothers and sisters, these HUMAN beings that we share the planet with need to finally be set free, they need walk down the street and feel safe, they need to be able to BREATHE and they need white people, yeah, us, to start the conversations, to start the change, it's on us, not them to make the difference. If a husband is abusing his wife and she tells him to stop will he? No, he needs to see it in himself and then make a change from within. It starts with me, my kids, it starts with white people making the choice to see, act and think differently. Our black brothers and sisters have been begging us to stop, when will we finally listen, finally act? How many more lives need to be lost before we accept that this is just no okay any more. Why are our children more willing to see the wrong than we are?

I've moved into a rant and that is not what I had intended. I don't know the answers, I too am afraid to ask the questions because I don't want to be misunderstood. This is an open discussion that needs to be had and if our kids are having it then so should we. 

Helpful Information 

What is white privilege?

Understanding white privilege

 

Mark you Calendars!!

Good Words Virtual Book fair

November 18, 2020

With Covid 19 hitting artists, musicians, small businesss and authors particularly hard this year I challenge you to do your Christmas shopping locally or ... HERE AT THIS AWSOME BOOK FAIR!!

Lots of Authors - Lots of books - and you are invited! You will hear from the authors and hear about the books! This is an event for all ages and all categories of books so you don't want to miss out on it! More details to follow but for now, just sign in and make sure you keep NOVEMBER 18th open on your calendar so you don't miss this fantastic way to celebrate the love of reading and to buy those much needed Christmas gifts directly from the people who are behind the magic.

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Part twelve: The end of the beginning

I pull off the road just a mile from the where the castle sits perched on the hill, it seems to glow in the late afternoon sun, the snow sparkles as the light moves over the ground and I can’t catch my breath it’s so beautiful. My hands are still on the wheel as I stare out the window at the view, taking it all in, then I close my eyes and rest my forehead on the wheel. “I don’t get it God, what were you saying to me all week? I didn’t die, I am alive and well and the castle sits before me waiting for me to get home.” I look back into the rearview mirror at the Pass behind me feeling like I had gone into the depths and come out whole but still confused by it all. I felt more alive than ever before, more full of life and joy and peace and now there was something new, a deep knowledge of life and forgiveness that was new to me. A car passed me and brought me from my thoughts, I turned my turning signal on and drove down the final hill towards the castle driveway and there I stopped again not ready to see anyone yet, still not understanding what was happening to me, what had happened. I thought back over the last week and tried to see if I had had any doubts in my mind that I hadn’t recognized but there was none. I thought of the letters on my bed, written with such assurance that I would never see these people again. I think of the feelings I’d had, of all the ways in which I felt God was telling me that today was the day and yet I am sitting here in the castle driveway alive, beautifully alive and unharmed. None of it made sense. Then I think back to his face when he told me that he loved me, the feeling of freedom, of breaking through something and I again think of that egg and chicken, and I understand. I finally understand and as the realization hits me I start laughing and crying and laughing some more. I had died, it had happened just the way that God had said it would. On December 8^th I drove through the mountain Pass one person, at the airport I died and I was reborn and I drove home new, having been born again just like that chicken I had envisioned. I am still laughing when I once again start the car and maneuver it through the castle gates to the courtyard. I see my friend from the night before standing nearby and he smiles at me with a grin that says ‘ told  you so’ and I think of the parting line I had left on his letter and smile back at him. I turn the car off and get out, leaving the bag where the ex had left it and I move to him. He hugs me and says sarcastically that he’s glad I made it home and I laugh too. The truth is, I am glad too because I have so much to share, so much to say and it would have been wasted if I had been found at the bottom of a cliff in the snow. We move to the back of the car and I grab the bag while I tell him all about the trip, and how I was not the Laurie that left, but rather a new, reborn version of her. He looks down at me and smiles, seeing for the first time that I was actually having a very real spiritual experience, that I hadn’t been on drugs last night when I went to him and told him what I was thinking would happen today, his eyes believed me, I could see that and he smiled at me as he threw his arm around me and said ‘sorry I didn’t take you more seriously last night, that was a pretty big deal’ and then we laughed when I told him what I had added to his letter, he pretended to look wounded and I elbowed him in the gut and reiterated that he was an asshole but I loved him.

That night there was a concert at the castle, music filled the cold night air and again it began to snow, I sat listening to the music and I saw the girl I was dancing in the rain all those summers before but this time I didn’t miss her, she had become someone so much more real to me, and though I wasn’t as carefree as I had been back then I was more sure, more confident, more resilient, and while I had always been loved, now I know I am loved and that makes all the difference.

That night as I read the Bible before sleep I read Genesis 17:21 “But I will establish my covenant with Isaac whom Sarah will bear to you at this set time next year” I could almost hear God say this to me as well, I have promised you Isaac, and this time next year I will keep my promise. I went to bed that night, my first night as the new Laurie, the night of December 8^th 2005.

One year later, on December 8^th 2006 God, true to all his promises, kept his word and that night, after decorating a Christmas tree Tim proposed to me. We were not in the most romantic city, sitting on the Eiffel Tower, he wasn’t looking green and ill, I wasn’t feeling doubt or apathetic to the situation. We sat in his living room in Toronto, he sang me a song he had written and asked me to marry him and I didn’t hesitate with my answer,  I didn’t waver through out the engagement, there were no doubts as I dressed in my bridal gown and walked down that long isle towards my best friend. He was the chosen one that God had promised me, the Isaac, and on April 28^th 2007 we joined our lives together and we made a home. The story continues, as life does of course, but to know more you have to read the book because this was just the beginning, the rest of the incredible story unfolds in the pages of Through the Lens of Motherhood (The Book).

 

 

 

 

Tim at the Oakville pier on our third date

April 28th, 2007

Part eleven: Through the Pass

 

 “December 8^th “ I whisper to myself as I lie in bed the next morning, I wiggle my toes and then stretch long and luxuriously.” So this is it, my last day.” Funny how I it just doesn’t feel any different than yesterday but then, life is like that I guess. Someone dies and people mourn but the moon doesn’t stop rotating around the earth and the earth doesn’t stop spinning around the sun.  I look out my window and the snowing has stopped, now it’s a pristine blanket covering the roofs and hills and lawns pillowing the noises into it’s softness so that there is that beautiful quiet that only happens after the snow falls. The sun is shining and causes the snowflakes to sparkle like diamonds on the windowsill, and the sky above the mountains is a perfect blue, not quite the light baby blue that comes with clouds but not the dark either. I think about the day ahead and wonder about the weather, I had expected a terrible snowstorm, which would cause the car to slide or something like that, but this day looked like the perfect winter day. Things in the mountains are different though and while my valley can be still and peaceful a storm can be raging just over the next pass I think to myself while getting dressed. I grab my bag and take the letters from the side pocket, then I lay them out on the neatly made bed ready to be found. I glance around the room, it’s a mess really but then I don’t have time to clean, I’ve slept in and I have to a two hour drive ahead of me to get to the airport on time to meet the exes flight and get my bags. I sigh, feeling sorry for the person who has to clean this up but even as I think it I am closing the door behind me and heading up to the castle to get the car.

 

The drive through Pass Thurn is stunning; it always is but today even more so since the fresh snow is still untouched on the mountains around me. I turn on the music I have planned to listen too and turn the volume up so that I can’t hear anything but the songs. As I make my way through the zigs and zags that are mountain roads I feel al lightness of spirit that I’ve never known before, I am not tense at all as I expected to be, I am not afraid as I thought might happen. I am simply here, in this moment and it’s beautiful. Josh Groban’s song ‘Your raise me up’ comes on and I crank it even louder as I merge onto the autobahn and I can feel God raising me up, lifting me higher, doing all of this for me so that no matter what happens today, with the ex or with me, none of it will matter because I am lifted high enough that it can’t really touch me. I am on God’s shoulders, like a child who is raised on their father’s shoulders I sit and enjoy the new view. I feel safer than I have ever felt before. While on the autobahn I start seeing signs for the Munich airport, I merge into the slower lane and make the exit. I keep waiting, waiting for the accident, for the screech of tires, for the collision, the pain but nothing is happening and the airport is now fast approaching.  As I make my way around the final turn and into the airport parking lot I figure it must mean it will happen on the way home and I am okay with it but mildly disappointed that it means I actually have to face this guy again. I play the song by Josh Groban one more time for a reminder and then grab my purse and keys and walk towards to arrivals entrance.

 

I don’t have to wait long, thankfully it was only a few minutes before I could see him walking through the security gate, my gut sank when I saw only one bag, one that looked only half full. I knew I wasn’t getting most of my things back and my first instinctual feeling was anger but it settled before he arrived in front of me, they were things I kept saying to myself, it’s just things, over and over again. He smiled at me and went for a hug, it was awkard but I guess these things naturally are awkward, it’s not like I have had to do this before to know what normal is. I tells me he has two hours before his flight back and asks me for lunch. I think about this for a moment because I would really just like to get back in the car and leave but he flew across Europe to give me my things, or some of them anyway, the least I could do was have lunch with him. So we went to the café that was closest to the security gate and found a booth to sit in. Everything I think of to say sounds weird so I am keeping quiet, letting him do most of the talking but mostly I am watching the people around me and listening to the song on the radio in the background. It’s about a girl dying and I can’t shake it from my head and then I hear him, he’s fading back into my consciousness and talking about me going to Canada. He’s telling me how stupid it is, that I left it behind for a reason blah blah blah. He says he loves me, he looks at me and says he loves me and I break open, but not in the bad way that happens when something ends, it was more like a birth, like a chicken breaking out of her egg and seeing the world for the first time. I am still not sure why it happened that way, but all of a sudden this man wasn’t someone to hate or be afraid of or even dislike. He was a man, he was human and as such he was as broken as I was, he was someone that God loved and there was a new freedom in that knowledge. I smiled at him, I try explaining my Canada plan to him, but he didn’t understand and I can’t expect him too when I didn’t understand it fully self, especially in light of the last week and the knowledge that I was going to die. Nothing made sense I said to him, but I just know that God has a plan for me and I am following it no matter what. He just nodded and after a few moments they announced that his flight would be boarding soon so he walked me to my car and put my bag in the back seat, we hugged goodbye and I got behind the wheel. He was still standing there when I drove out of the parking lot, staring at me like I was something he couldn’t quite understand.  “Thank you God, for having my back in there, for raising me up and for giving me painless closure” I whispered as I merged back onto the autobahn heading to Austria. This would be it, somewhere between here and the castle I would die.

 

To be continued…

Part ten: goodbyes

 

On December 7^th I woke up thinking about all the people in my world that I would be leaving behind, my parents, my sister, my Grandpa and aunt and my friends. That was the hard part, saying goodbye to them, knowing they would suffer the agony of death far more than I would. I wasn’t morose, I was enjoying my final days here, enjoying the evenings in the cellar, chatting on the phone with my family, writing, taking photos, spending time with God, I was enjoying myself and it felt new to me somehow. I had always had fun in life but this was different, this was full enjoyment filled with a new joy and a deep sense of peace.

 

I got the ride up the mountain today, it’s easier and I have things to do. As I drive into the courtyard I think of all the memories, the faces come and gone, the dances in rain, the snowy Christmases drinking gluwein, the summer afternoons eating ice-cream, the hours of conversations, the laughter, the tears, the deep discussions, all had on these benches. The fights, the forgiveness, the hugs and the waves, if these walls could talk they would have a million moments to share and the novel would be epic. From the years when it was the court of the valley,  or when they tried witches in the chapel and send them to the dungeon below, or the time when the Nazi’s wandered these halls and did unmentionable things in the cellars below, this place has been witness to the worst of humanity and the best of humanity in the years since it was built, and now it is a simple hospital for the soul, so many souls have been healed here, so many lives touched and I am in awe that I had been allowed to be here, that I was blessed enough to call it home for all this time.

 

I walk into my office, though I am technically not working I still use this space as my office and I sit down at my desk and begin to write. I write to my parents first, a letter each; when they are done I hit print and being the one to my sister and then my Grandpa, Aunt, and then a few friends and one to the entire community in which I live. When the letters are complete and I have printed them all out I fold them and put them into envelopes. With that done I sit back in my chair and stair out the window, fresh snow is falling and I feel the urge to go walking in it. Snow in the mountains is magical, and I grab my coat, hat and earphones and click play as I head outside, taking the back steps that lead to the farmers’ field below the castle.

 

The fear set it around ten o’clock, the entire building seems empty and cold and the clock is ticking closer and closer to December 8th. I walk through the hotel side, open the door to the cellar but tonight it remains dark and empty so I close the door and go to look in the kitchen but again the lights are off and there is no sign of life. I check every possible meeting spot for people but no one is around and then finally I go to the study center’s study hall and find the one person I can always count on for a hug and a prayer. He is sitting hunched up over his computer, his fingers banging away at the keys writing his thesis, well, that is my guess at least from the look of concentration on his face. He looks up at me when I enter and he smiles but I can see I am interrupting his thought flow. Tonight though I don’t care, I grab the chair from the desk beside him and sit down and tell him what is on my mind. He is the first person that I have spoken too about my death tomorrow and I have to admit I was expecting more drama, more concern but he just looks at me like I have lost my mind. Which I guess I probably have but it’s so real, so true to me, a knowledge more than a feeling. I ask him to pray for me and kindly he does but then he’s distracted again and I know he’s thinking of the work on his desk and despite not wanting to leave the comfort of a friend I stand and leave, he doesn’t even look up to say goodbye. The door closes behind me and I walk down the hall to my office where I take his letter out and in handwriting I wrote at the bottom. “I told you I was going to die you asshole” followed by a big smiley face. I placed all the letters in a pile and took them home with me so they would be easily found when the time came.

 

To be continued...

Part Nine: acceptance

 

The rest of the climb is easy because I am not focused on anything but the very real feeling that on December 8^th,  on my drive to Munich something will happen to me, I can’t shake that feeling or maybe I should say I can’t shake the knowledge. It’s as real as the fog in the valley, as real as the village hidden beneath and as real as the sun breaking over the mountain peaks to the east. I walk slowly, trying to figure out what I feel about it, I can’t say I am comfortable with it, not afraid but unsettled. It doesn’t make any sense to me and I can’t fathom all that God has been saying to me in light of this new knowledge. I reach the stone steps and don’t stop, I don’t turn to take in the valley below, with the sun finally burning through the clouds and slowly bringing the village into sight, I don’t pause for oxygen, I just keep going, lost in thought. Through the castle gate, up the long drive to the wooden stairs that lead me to the far side of the courtyard closest to the hotel side where the kaminzimmer is. I pass people on the way and smile and say hello but I don’t stop to talk, I don’t head to the kitchen for a coffee and chit chat with the chef, I am moving on autopilot to the chair before the fireplace where I will sit and spend the day thinking, praying and trying for figure out what this new piece of information reveals.

 

The Kaminzimmer is cool this morning, no fire is lit yet and so I gather a pile of wood, and stoop before the giant stone hearth to light it, blowing it when it finally catches the kindling enough to spread. When the fire is finally large enough that I can leave it untended I grab a blanket and wrap it around myself and settle into my chair. My Bible sits in my lap, but it remains unopened as I stare into the flames, mesmerized by the flickering light. I can hear a vacuum in the hall outside and the gentle clatter of dishes being cleared from tables in the dining room. I listen to the voices of the servers not understanding the polish they are speaking but comforted by the sound of people going about their lives around me and then I go back to that thought. Will I really die? Can that really be what I heard God saying? It can’t be true, I nod as if to reassure myself. No, it’s not true it’s just my silly imagination. I decide I am right and start to read my Bible, looking for more truths, more answers, more information about the rescue plan in place for humanity.

 

As lunch approaches I pull myself from my Bible and make my way through the hotel entrance to the kitchen where I fill my mug with some chicken broth and then quickly leave so as not to have to stop and talk. I place the mug at the hearth and add a log to the fire. The sounds of people working is gone, they are all eating in the student side dining room and I can almost imagine I am alone in this old castle. Three times today while reading and praying God has raised my death as as issue, each time I shrug it off, each time telling myself I am crazy and each time sensing that this is actually something I believe deep down. I sip the hot broth from my mug and allow myself to go there, to really contemplate it in my mind.  I think about the ways in which it could happen, and I finally decide that given the time of year and the roads I will need to travel that it will likely be a car accident. I think about the moment, imagining it in full colour and I surprise myself when I am not afraid. I pray only that it won’t hurt too much, and that I am found quickly so my parents don’t have to live through a search. The idea that death doesn’t scare me is new to me, but in this new place I have found with God I know that no matter how I die, how much it hurts, I will wake up with Jesus and the suffering, all of it, the physical, the mental, the emotional, all of it will end and I will be fully loved, forever.  “OK, I say out loud to God, if that’s what you want then I'm okay with it.” And the strangest part of the whole thing was that I really was okay with it.

 

To be continued…

 

Part 8: Really? You sure?

 

My bed is very cozy, I woke up not ago but I can’t seem to drag myself from my bed even with the delicious smell of fresh coffee that my housemate is brewing that I know he will share with me. It’s been one three weeks since that night at the castle, three weeks since that phone call and now plans were underway to meet in Munich airport on December 8^th for a belongings drop and retrieval.. That is just days away now and I lift my hands to my face and rub at my eyes as if I was rubbing it out of my mind for another day. It has been such a great few week, I have spend everyday in the kaminzimmer tucked into chair by the fire reading the Bible and praying for hours and hours on end and I still can’t get enough. I have had my earphones in and listening to worship music and it’s been an amazing restoration time. I have been avoiding people but only because they tend to get in the way of what is happening to me in this space I have found myself. It’s like a birth process in some ways. The more I read and learn and the more I pray the more I find myself so deeply rooted in this new love that I found. I feel so different, so loved, so worthy of the fullness he talks of giving his children. I wish I could do this forever I think to myself, this time is a rare gift and deep down I know it. This morning though I know that if I don’t get that coffee it’ll be cold and coffee is important to me so I push the covers aside and get dressed to go in search of the brew.

 

I turn down the ride to the castle in favor of the walk, and as I climb I think of all the amazing things God has been saying to me this last month. I knew for example that God did indeed have a man already picked out for me, I could stop searching for him because when the time was right God would bring him to me. I also knew that I was to be moving back to Canada, something I hadn’t ever planned to do but which seemed God really wanted, when I begged him to send me anywhere else he gave me a vision. I was walking down a pier I knew well from many visits in the past, as I walked along this pier there was a sailboat and a man with a yellow rain slicker on, it was very windy and the man offered me his hand to pull me on his boat. The pier the Oakville pier, and somehow I knew that the man was the one who would offer me his hand in an entirely different journey. There wasn’t fighting with him after that vision, I knew I would go to Canada and that I was being sent to Oakville of all places. (I have never lived in Oakville before, only ever surrounding it).

There is a bench that sits about half way up the mountain that looks out over the valley, I almost always stop at that bench and contemplate the valley, the way the fog sort of sits down there and the village disappears and I am above the clouds. When you look down the length of the valley towards Zell am See it’s like you are actually looking at a long lake between mountains, and if one was planted here for just a moment they  wouldn’t believe it if you said there was green pastures, a river and a village; it was all gone in the morning, blanketed in the fog until the sun woke up fully and burned it off.

 

I sat on the bench this morning, it wasn’t too cold today but still the seat beneath me was gripping the cold from the night so through my jeans I could feel the chill. A feeling I can’t describe comes over me, it’s a peaceful feeling but there is a message hidden in it that leaves me questioning everything, I question God, ‘what is it? What are you saying?” and that feeling persist. I don’t feel scared or worried or anxious but acceptance that this is what is and I don’t understand all that God has been saying and doing in my life if that is his plan. The feeling, it was that of impending death, my own, on December 8^th.

 

To be continued…

 

*Kaminzimmer means common room or great room, a gathering space of sorts

 

Part seven: look up

 

 

The countryside is dark, I mean, really dark and it’s quiet accept for the occasional sound of a cowbell in the distance letting you know that the cows were close or moving further away as it sounds tonight. It’s late, I stayed too long in the cellar enjoying the company and forgetting everything else for a while but now it is the wee hours of morning and my body is tired. I’m walking a different way home tonight, through the neighbors farm because it’s less steep and though it adds a lot of distance to my walk it is easier in the dark but that doesn’t make it any less dark tonight. I can’t see my hand in front of me, forget trying to see my feet or any possibly pitfalls below me. It’s a long and slow walk. I keep my eyes trained on my feet, sometimes catching the shadow of the moon on the side of a rock and manage to keep from tripping. It’s weird how earlier the moonlight was so bright and now, when I need it most it’s all but gone, hiding as if to laugh at me when I stumble into a cow pie or land in the mud. I think about that stupid mobile phone sitting in my desk drawer and wish for it’s light and then grumble at myself when I remember why it was in the drawer to begin with. I get to what should be the middle of the farmers field, the valley is below me and the castle about a hundred yards behind me and I stop to try to see which direction I’m heading, making sure it’s not into the cows and at least sort of heading towards the narrow cart path that lies about two hundred yards ahead and below me but as I gaze out into the darkness I also happen to look up and then I’m stuck in my spot unable to move. The night sky is pitch black, darker because the moon is lower tonight and hiding just a little behind a mountain top, but as I gaze up I see a million stars and I can’t breathe with the beauty of it. How many years have you been around I wonder when I see one winking at me, are you dying or have you died long ago and I am only now standing witness to it. I don’t know how long I have been standing in the spot but I hear the cow bell again and it’s closer than before so I shake myself from my thoughts and once again turn in the general direction of home. The path doesn’t seem as dark now, it’s crazy but I’m so busy looking up at the stars at first that I don’t notice that I am trusting my feet, I’m trusting the knowledge that I have been here before and know my way, I’m just walking and looking up, and I realize that I have already cross the field and have come to the cart path that will lead me safely down the mountain towards home. My eyes have become adjusted to the light, my feet more confident in their footing I find myself able to think about something other than where I am and where I am going, I can allow myself time to listen to the sounds of the night. It is while I am listening, about half way down the mountain that a strange thought smacks me upside the head. When I was busy looking down, trying to figure my way out and avoid falling I was struggling, grumbling about the lack of the moonlight or that damn phone but when I stopped, when I focused on looking up, trusting my feet, trusting the path that I am on I found my way easily even though it is still dark, even though I can’t see my feet. Life I think to myself, life is just like that sometimes, like now. I have no idea what next week or next month will hold, I have no idea what plans God has for me, I can’t see my footing there any more than I can see it here but if I stop struggling, stop trying to figure out one my own and allow myself to look up, follow God, trusting the path he has me on then it will get easier too. I smile as I reach the final turn in the zigzag path and see the small park where I turn into town, at the opening to the park is a street light and there is comfort in it’s light.  I walk under the light and see the next one seven or eight feet away and so it goes for the rest of the walk into town, through the small village towards home.  When I crawl into bed, thinking about the night I just had I am left in awe that I feel so free, so much more sure of where I am going even as I have no idea where that might lead. I have started on the path, and right now it’s dark but I promise myself that I will keep looking up and deep in my heart I know that it will lead to a street light, and then more street lights and then one day, one day it will lead me home. I close my eyes and allow sleep to claim me.

 

To be continued...

Part six: making the call

My office sits on the second floor of what is called the ‘Student side’, I share it with two others and often one of them works late but she isn’t here tonight, and I’m grateful,  though her conversations always either soothe me or make me laugh but tonight I need the quiet office to myself. I move to the desk, put my coat on the back of my chair and I sit. I pick up my phone and dial. My fingers play with the cord as I wait for the ringing to start and when it does my I can feel my pulse quicken, nerves have me pulling the cord more taught and I have to stop myself before it pulls from the wall entirely. When I hear his voice I pause a beat before saying hello. “Breathe” I tell myself and then I begin the conversation that had been weighing on me all day. I had already moved many of my things to England in anticipation of the move but now I had decided I wasn’t moving and I needed a plan to retrieve my things, it wasn’t going to be an easy conversation so I stalled a little while and asked how his day was going. He was short with me, not wanting to chit chat so finally I had to just come out and say it. “I’m not coming to England.”. I blurted it out by accident in my haste to get it over with and the speech I had previously prepared was gone out the window. I paused; he paused, and then I heard the audible exhale of breath. We talked at length about how we had planned to try to work things through, I try to explain what’s been happening to me, how God has been showing me that I have been looking in the wrong places for love, that he is speaking to me, calling me to him, and that I needed to follow him but nothing was coming out right. I try telling him about how God has been using the story of Abraham and Sarah to talk to me about love, and his promises, how they had tried to maneuver to make the promise happen which ended with Ishmael but that wasn’t God’s plan, he had promised them a child through Sarah, and when they accepted that promise God delivered.  I twist the phone cord more and more in my hand and my fingers turn white, nothing was coming out right, he’s angry with me, he isn’t yelling but I can hear the unspoken words, the clipped way says ‘uh huh’ as I try to tell him what’s happening to me. I tell him how I think we had been trying to create the promise of love and marriage through each other when actually God had something else planned for us, that God had promised it yes but it had to be his choosing but all he hears is me saying that he is Ishmael and he begins screaming about me calling him a bastard. I hold the phone away from my ear, the peace from the chapel is dissipating and I close my eyes willing it to come back, I try assuring him that I don’t think he’s a bastard, that it was meant as a metaphor but he’s beyond hearing me now. I sit, listening to the screaming until finally his temper begins to cool and then I tell him I need to get my stuff back and he hangs up. I put the receiver back in the cradle and lay my head down on my desk, deep breaths, I have to count them because ten just isn’t cutting it and I wonder how many it will take to get my own blood pressure to lower. Nothing about that had gone according to plan I think to myself as I lie with my cheek pressed against the coolness of my desk, my arms hung limp beside me and I must have looked a little like a cartoon character from an office comic strip. I have no energy, only questions and frustrations and yet, beneath it all I also have a sense of ‘okayness’ that I didn’t possess before tonight. I wasn’t happy, but there was a peace and joy that I’m struggling to define.  I had been lying like that for another ten minutes when my phone rang, it was the mobile one this time so I knew immediately who it was and though I didn’t want to be screamed at anymore I also felt a calmness wash over me and I answered despite my misgivings. I knew immediately that he had cooled, he apologized, and then shocking me, he told me that he would pack my things and fly them out to me. Part of me would have rather thrown everything away rather than have to face him again but then the calmness comes, it covers me like a blanket and I find myself agreeing. He says he will get back to me when he knows when he can come and I say thank you and we end the call.  I throw the mobile into the desk drawer beside the discarded ring and quickly grab my jacket and leave so that he doesn’t have a chance to call back while I am in hearing distance, best to leave it on a decent note I think to myself as I head back to the cellar to forget the call and enjoy the people in my life that I love.

 

 

 

To be continued…

Part Five: dancing moonlight

The day after I took the ring off my finger I remember walking into my bosses office feeling like I was going to throw up, how do I begin I kept thinking to myself. I sat in his chair and he smiled at me, knowing something was wrong and not pushing me to start until I was ready,  he was always so patient. When I finally sputtered out that I wasn’t getting married, that the whole ‘Im leaving in October thing isn’t happening’ he listened with no words and then he nodded and said ‘ it sounds like what you need is some time to think. This is your home Laurie, we won’t kick you out. Take whatever time you need to stop and pray and think and then we can talk again”.  I think about that statement a lot these days, it was the same man who told me four years before when I had been looking to leave Canada again ‘you always have a home here, just say the word’ and here he was still saying the same thing. This man, who was always so gracious, so humble and loving was giving me breathing room for the third time in my life. The first, when I was nineteen and not knowing what I wanted in the world, the second when I needed a fresh start somewhere other than Canada and now again, when I felt most alone and unsure he was offering me safe haven. “Sounds like you need time to think” echoes in the darkness around me and I turn back towards the steps of the tower that would lead me back to the chapel.  They are old wooden steps, and the middle of each step is deeply grooved with hundreds of years of use. I have sat on them countless times, running my hands over the smooth wood and wondered about who came before me, and who would come after me. Tonight though, I don’t notice the grooves,  where I was reluctant before I now feel a fresh urgency to seek the chapel and pray about the phone call. I moved quietly, not wanting to be seen, not wanting company, just wanting time alone with God. The door of the chapel is always a little bit open, as if inviting people to come and spend time within it’s walls, it’s unheated but you don’t ever feel cold in there. The ceiling is tall, the windows small, allowing for only a small slit of moonlight. I slide into the pew behind the door on the off chance someone peaks in; I just desperately want to be alone in this moment.  I stare up at the moonlight on the wall, it’s almost dancing up there, I start to pray but falter, what is it I can possibly say to the maker of the Universe that would make any sense. There are so many unknowns right now and all I really want are answers. I try again, and then bow my head in frustration. “I wish I had the words Lord.” I muttered to myself, to the walls and ultimately to God himself. Then, deep inside me an old hymn started to come out from the shadows, reminding me of the beautiful love and mercy and faithfulness of this God who loves me so much, of this God who I have so recently come to love as my own.

 

 

Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father;

There is no shadow of turning with Thee;

Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not;

As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.

Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness!

Morning by morning new mercies I see.

All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;

Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

Summer and winter and springtime and harvest,

Sun, moon, and stars in their courses above;

Join with all nature in manifold witness

To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth,

Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide;

Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,

Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!

 

Sitting in the darkness of the chapel that night, watching the dust dance in the moonlight, singing quietly the words to that old hymn I had a renewing in my spirit. I was loved but more than that I had finally found the love that I had always been searching for and I was flooded with emotions, I wanted to know everything I could about this God who could love me so much, who would pursue me and romance me and fight for me, the God who believed me to be beautiful, the God who made me and signed me with his signature as if I was his greatest masterpiece. At once the unknowns that plagued me, the loneliness that I feared would define me were gone and I was full of joy. I sit here, still watching the moonlight dancing, a smile on my lips knowing for the first time that joy isn’t ‘happy’, it is so much deeper. I gave myself completely to his will, right there on the cool stone seat in the chapel. I was his, whatever plan he had for me would be revealed when the timing was right and until then this was my home, and I was safe here. I had time, time to breathe and time to really dive in deep to finding out who this magnificent God is. For now, the only thing on the agenda was a phone call and for the first time I didn’t dread it, there was a new sense of peace in all that I was doing, all the decisions I had made. Standing in the path that God had placed me on, waiting on him for my next steps was the very first time in my life that I wasn’t afraid, it was the very first time I have felt true peace and yes, joy.

 

To be continued…

Part four: what is love?

I can feel the weariness from the day setting in, I had made my first climb that morning at 6:00 that morning, the second one came at 4:00 in the afternoon and then my third of the day just an hour ago, but I hadn’t just come for the company or the beer. I had a phone call to make and I needed to pray first and tonight in the clear dark night the only place I could think of to do that was in the chapel, built back in the 1600’s, tucked safely into the castle wall behind me in the tower. I didn’t move though, not wanting to do something always makes me a great procrastinator and tonight is no exception. On the last night in August, right before I was to fly back to Austria I had a fight with the man who had given me the ring in June. It started as a stupid argument about something I can’t even remember just a few months later but it quickly escalated into a full on screaming match. He spouted all the reasons I was a terrible fiancé, and finally stopped worrying about conflict and threw it right back at him. I even got the courage to give that stupid ring back but he wouldn’t take it, he wouldn’t concede. In the end we agreed to postpone the wedding until we could sort through our issues but we were still engaged and when I got on the plane it was the first time in a month that I felt free again. I knew in the deepest part of my heart that I couldn’t marry him, that I wouldn’t marry him but getting out of it was still an unknown. Things carried on, texts by the hundreds would come in and if I was busy and didn’t respond they got heated, then the phone would ring. Id take to leaving it at home if I knew I was going to be busy so that I wouldn’t be worried about upsetting him. He started to question my feelings about every male friend I had at the castle, and given that there were a lot of males, all of whom I loved deeply, it seemed I was always upsetting him. One night, back in late September we had a girls night out, Id forgotten to remove the phone from my bag and as I sat in the restaraunt I had so many calls from him that everyone started to comment, when I got home and finally returned his calls I was screamed at for over an hour. He just couldn’t seem to grasp that I thought it was rude to be talking to him while I was out with friends. His jealousy and insecurity started to shine through his anger, he started to make me the bad guy, nothing I did was right, nothing I said was good enough, and yet in his mind at least calling off the engagement wasn’t the right call. I remember listening to him subtly tear me down one night, thinking if I am so awful, so unlovable, so ugly and uncouth then why on earth would you want to marry me? None of it made sense and still I couldn’t bring myself to take that ring off my finger and end it. I stick my hand in my pocket and dig out a cigarette, lighting it in the dark spaces of the wall tower. The end of it glows brightly and I just stare at it, both loving it and loathing it. It gives me more time here, if I smoke this then I am avoiding what really needs doing and I smile when I find myself considering smoking the entire pack rather than get up and make that phone call. In October I was sitting in the glasshouse, a small room made entirely of glass windows that is perched on top of the gatehouse below. I was talking to a friend, trying to explain myself, trying to answer her questions about why I have been doing this for so long and I said to her “I am so tired of thinking someone might love me, then finding out that they don’t. Tired of seeing their backs as they leave” and then I whispered “There is a part of me that actually hates him”, and there it happened, the moment of clarity that I hadn’t known I needed. God whispered to me “You have done this to me your entire life, and yet I will never leave you, I will love you always, no matter how many times I see your back leave, I will always stay close, loving you.” And damn, even now as I puff away on this stupid smoke I can’t believe how clear it all became. My whole life I had been searching for love, unconditional love, from a man, when the entire time it was God who was offering it to me, willing me to accept it, hurting every time I rejected him but never hating me, never giving up on me, always there, always waiting, always loving me. That was when I started to change, when things started to shift inside me and I no longer felt like I fit in this place anymore, that was when I knew he had another plan for me, even if I didn’t like it, or want it , or even know what that plan was. I stub out the half smoked cigarette and stand up, both unwilling to move but also needing too. Sometimes I am like a hamster in a wheel whose legs can’t keep up with the speed of the wheel and then has to stop and roll back and forth a few times in order to stop. This is my brain lately, since that day in June it seems. I go back and forth, up and down and yet, just like the hamster I never get anywhere. I move back to the wall and lean against it, remembering that day when I felt for the first time how much God loved me. The day I knew I was actually loveable and I smile because for the first time I also knew that I loved him too, and that I wouldn’t ever turn my back on him again. That night I finally called the engagement off for good, took the ring off and placed it in the drawer of my desk, the details didn’t matter somehow, what mattered was that I was loved and having finally seen what that should look like, this ‘love’ being offered to me wasn’t it. The biggest hurdle had been jumped but looking at the calendar had chills of fear running down my spine. It was October and I was supposed to be leaving for England, my job, my life here was supposed to be over. To be continued…

Part three: Red flags

I walk through the courtyard and up the stairs at the back corner of the wall, towards the old tower lookout. It’s colder up here, the wind is stronger but I am sheltered by the overhang and it’s quiet. I look out over the village below and spot my home on the far side of the valley. I love this place, the mountains, the castle, the snowboarding in the winter and the summer nights full of laughter and warmth. When I had come back from England I had spoken to my boss and told him that I would be leaving my job in Austria to start a new life in England with the man who I planned to marry. I physically cringe every time I think of it, what had I been thinking? I didn’t want to leave this place, I didn’t want to say goodbye to a community who took me in and accepted me so completely. This was my new home, but now, now I was standing before an abyss of unknowns and I felt frozen to the spot not wanting to move and not knowing where to move too. I felt broken and lost and very alone as I stood there, the mountains so huge standing before me, with every peak I was reminded how small I really was in the world. At first, I would notice little yellow flags, like the tiniest sensation that things weren’t quite as they should be. It was the changes in the promises that the man I was planning on spending my life with was making, he had said of course a dog in the house in something I would want, but after we got engaged it changed to ‘no I would never have a dog’. It seemed at the time like something I could talk him into later so I left it alone when it started to become an argument. He bought me a mobile phone so that I he could call me and we could text each other, but then if I forgot to charge it, or if I didn’t pick it up while I was having dinner with friends it became an argument. I put my elbows on the edge of the stone parapet and stretched, again cringing at the thought. I had taken August off to spend the month in England and it was there that I finally allowed myself to really opening and honestly look at the commitment I was about to make. It left me hallow, how do I back out of this was all I could think, we had a venue, we had a dress, a church, he had bought a ring, his parents were so excited, mine were excited. How could I change my mind? It would just be viewed as another ‘Laurie runs from commitment’ moment in my life, no one would understand, they never have. When I was nineteen a really lovely guy from Scotland had wanted to marry me, but I was nineteen and I panicked at the thought of settling down at so young an age. I hated hurting him, I had honestly cared about him but I couldn’t marry him. I started dating someone I knew wouldn’t want to marry me, and that dragged me into a long drawn out pathetic mess that left me, leaves me still as I stand here on this cold November night a sad reflection of the girl who once danced in the rain believing the world was hers. I sit on the old bench behind me, unable now to see the valley but with a whole view of the night sky, it’s so beautiful that it catches my breath, yes, it’s one of the most beautiful places on earth. The cold air isn’t the same here as it is in Toronto where I grew up, there is no humidity so the cold doesn’t seep into your bones, you don’t sit and shiver, you just bundle up and enjoy. I lean back and close my eyes thinking about all the mistakes I had made that led me here. There were so many thousands of little mistakes, so many compromises of myself that chipped away at me until I was soon tiny little broken pieces lying all over Canada, Austria and now England. In August I was told my long hair would look better cut shorter, my clothes would suit me more if I wore ‘these ones’, I would not embarrass myself if I were less ‘Canadian’, if I tried to be a little more British. By the end of August he announced he would never dream of living in Canada, which had been a promise he had made me before the ring, before Paris, before that day in June when everything changed. I remember begging God earlier in August to give me peace about my decision to marry this man but each day my heart grew more and more unsettled, until finally I couldn’t sleep or eat, red flags seemed to pop up daily but all I could thin was 'how am I supposed to end this when so many things had already been planned, and yes, there was a part of me that has to admit that I wanted to be married and I was afraid that if I said no, if I backed out, then this time I would never get another chance. He had corroded my self-esteem by then (already a quite battered from the non-committal guy in Canada) to a place where I honestly believed no one would or could ever really want me. I open my eyes, not being able to help the tears that had formed at that thought, the idea that I might be unlovable hurt to my core, it’s all I had ever really wanted from anyone. To be loved.

To be continued...

(Part 2) Paris in June

The cold beer tastes good as the flavours rush over my tongue, the liquid is bitter and strong, cold and perfect. I stand watching for a while as people talk, or laugh, there is a group of four playing Settlers in the corner and a full table at the back arguing theology in high spirited friendliness. It's like being at a huge family reunion and feeling oddly alone for the first time. Things have changed, and I have known it for months but have been unwilling to actually admit it to myself. Somehow I had changed, I had become a new version of myself and I didn't fit in here any longer. Yes, I knew every single nook and cranny of this beautiful space, every room, every nic in the floor, all the traditions, all the people. This place had been home for much longer than the last three years. It stole my heart when I was a silly nineteen year old girl who believed she could do anything, be anyone, conqure anything, and 7 years later when I returned it had soothed my soul after learning life just didn't work that way. I couldn't just be anyone, conqure anything, do whatever I pleased and get my way whenever I wanted. These walls had stood witness to two me(s), and here I am yet again, merging into a new, older, wiser, somehow different version of myself all over again. I lean back on the 'bar' which is actually just a counter, the beer resting in my hand, the condensation is dripping onto my fingers, the smoke in the air gets thicker as two people huddle in the door light up. It isn't a smoking area really, but that doesn't really stop people, it's the space where freedom is explored, rules broken and life lived. Still standing at the counter I try to figure out what is causing the deep lonliness tonight, here, where so many people are gathered, people I love, people I enjoy. It started in June I realize, things all started to change back in Paris, in June; yes I think to myself, that was when it all began to unravel so to speak. Everything had been so great before that, everything had been so normal before that. I had my life ahead of me before that, I knew where I was, where I was going (or staying as the case may be) and now it's all so different, forever changed. I take another pull from the beer, not moving to join a table, not really wanting to start a conversation, just standing witness to the life I used to feel so fully apart of. I move my damp fingers down my jeans and place the beer back on the counter, then I pull myself up to sit on the bar so I can just sit, part of the throng but also alone, watching, thinking. It still beat sitting alone at home I thought to myself, being alone makes it all so much more real, more painful, more desperate. "The Bible is clear on this, God predesined our lives, our salvation is predistined" The theology argument heats up and catches my attention, the person in the seat beside the speaker turns to him and with exasperation she practically yells "you aren't leaving room for free will in there! There is no way that God would pre-ordain someone to hell!" her eyes are on fire as her Ukrainian accent becomes thicker in her passionate argument. The two start quoting Bible verses at each other, the others sit and either remain quiet, or simply nod in agreement or disagreement depending on where they sat in the argument. It's always been like this, the deep thinking is just as much a part of the community life here as the laughter and love. It's been this way since the sixties when it became a safe place on the western side of the iron curtain to learn theology, and it remains this way today as these two argue in the cellar. While so many things seem to change, it seems that many things remain the same through out time, there really is nothing new under the sun, not even my current circumstances I assume. Change is never comfortable and I once again return to my thoughts I try to think back to that day in June when things changed and my life was turned upside down. The air in Paris in June is fresh, scented lightly with flowers blooming, it's warm breezes flow down the streets and whisper love songs to the lovers walking the lane ways or sitting at sidewalk cafes, the fashionable ladies, the men who look like they belong on magazine covers (and probably actually do). The children playing in parks after a long day at school. It is not like any city I have ever been in before, there is romance there, alive and breathing, thick with passion and promises of love. It sounds silly to me now, it's just a city after all and promises made are not always promises kept. I held the hand of the man beside me as we made our way up the Eiffel Tower, the view quickly coming in sight, all around me I could see the beautiful old buildings that had long ago captured my romantic imagination. We walked to the platform viewing the city from all sides, it was breathtaking. He wasn't acting normally, if I hadn't known better I would have thought he had a sever case of sudden fear of heights so I moved back from the fence a little and asked him if he was okay. He muttered something and took me to a bench close to the middle of the platform, well away from the splendour of the views, we sat and I turned to watch the people coming out, seeing the first moment that they saw the whole of Paris at their feet in their eyes and their smiles. It was a beautiful day to be in love in the city of love I was thinking. I turned back to the man beside me and he looked a little ill, in his hand was a box, and his words though I assume he'd planned something, came out like "so, will you?". I stared at him, this is the moment that most little girls think about their whole lives; finding the man who will promise to love them forever, it should feel different somehow is a thought that flashes through my mind. I should be exstatic, right?. I do love this man, though I haven't known him long, he is offering me what I have been wanting. A family of my own, a place to call home. I smile at him, and whisper just one word. "Yes". The green shade lessens on his face and he opens the ring box and slips the solitaire diamond on my finger, then he leans in and kisses me. The commitment is made. The beer is now starting to lose the crisp coldness that I tend to enjoy so I tip the bottle up and chug the rest down before it has a chance to warm up anymore. Knowing that I wasn't going to find here what I had thought I was looking for I head back up the stairs of the cellar and through the entrance to the courtyard. I stand in the cold for a while staring up at the black night sky, every star perfectly visable. I wish I could think back to Paris and at least have a memory so filled with love and happiness that the rest would feel worth it, but the truth, even then, was that I knew it was wrong. I was making the wrong decision but I had made a commitment and that meant something to me. I also really wanted to be married, I wanted a family and home and this was my way to achieve those goals; right? "Ugh", I think to myself. "You're such an idiot"! We had only been in Paris for the day, we were heading back to where he lived in England where we made all the announcements. I lay in bed staring at the ring on my finger, twisting it round and round and telling myself it would be wonderful, I was just nervous. We planned, set a date, we booked a venue, his mother and sister took me to buy a dress. Then it was time for me to return home to Austria, it was while I was on the train that I started having the worst doubts, the awful thoughts, the fears, the panic that I had made the very worst decision for myself and yet every single time I would talk myself down from it. I allowed everyone's' excitement to fuel my own excitement and I went on as engaged woman planning her wedding. 

To be continued...

The beginning

The climb is hard, not because the mountain is actually really a mountain, it's really more of a quarter of one if you really think about it, but no matter how many times I have started out to make this climb I find myself winded and puffing by the time I reach the final steps that lead to the castle gate. Twice a day I do this, my thigh muscles are strong, my calfs are strong, and yet they still burn with every step. Just at the final turn, where the dirt path turns to stone steps I stop, I tell myself that it's to take a moment to glance down at the beautiful view below me, the small village at dusk, the lights in homes and the surrounding mountains peaked in snow. The truth is more that I need a moment to breathe, to stand and fill my lungs, to ease the burn in my thighs and wipe the glisten from my brow, not quite sweat in the brisk November breeze but damp just the same. My Grandmother once sat a much younger me down and told me that women never sweat, they glisten; and while I don't buy into that at all, I have certainly sweat like a pig doing this walk in the summer, today it seems to fit and so I stand, taking in the valley below me and I fill my lungs with the cool, fresh alpine air. When I have had my fill I turn again to the stone steps before me and make the final ascent to the gates of the old castle. Once, this place was pink, I kid you not. The first time I ever stepped foot on these stones the walls around me were petpo bismal pink, all covered in an ivy that turned the brightest red in the fall. I don't remember hating it, but I remember thinking it an odd colour for an old castle in the middle of the Austrian alps. By the time I left a year later I couldn't imagine it another colour if my life depended on it. When I came back years later those walls were white, and far more asthetically pleasing to the eye but secretly the old pink was missed. On entering those old halls though, you quickly forget the outside wall colour in favour of the creaking wood floors, the deep scent of wood fire smoke that pours from the Kaminzimmer, and the laughter, those halls are almost always filled with laughter. Today, as I step from the wooden stairs leading from the gatehouse to the main courtyard I feel the old ghosts of friends who came and went and I feel a sadness that is now familiar to me when I remember. Things have changed, that is life here in these walls and I always wonder when I will get used to it and yet somehow I never seem to find a way to do it. The sadness lingers there, fond memories yes, but tinted with bittersweet longings for the days gone by. With each new crop of volunteers it becomes harder to open my heart to them, not wanting the inevitable pain that comes when their term is up and they get back on a plane or train to resume their lives, but with every single one I forget somwhere along the way and my heart lets them in, another goodbye always inevitable. The courtyard is getting dark, the air is colder and I see the puffs of air as they vaporize in front of me. There is the distinct smell of a woodfire and I can't help but be transported back years to a summer when I was nineteen and serving champagne to guests who had come for a concert in this very same courtyard. There were people everywhere, all wearing traditional Austrian garb, all laughing and clapping. We had other guests too, they were english speaking guests and they stayed at the back of the courtyard, they were the ones I had come to call friends in the short week conference they were attending. That was before I had learned to protect my heart from the goodbyes, back when every week brought new friends with each new conference. With each break I got I would head over and stand with them watching the muscians and enjoying the long summer night. Just when things were really heating up though it started to rain, not just rain, it poured! The muscians grabbed their instruments and hid under the balconies, guests all dove for whatever cover they could find and the laughter continued. One of the musicians decided to continue and he picked up his instrument and soon the concert was once again in full swing. I remember my friend and I running into the rain and dancing the waltz through the rain. We must have looked so silly, our servicing skirts stuck to our legs, our hair hanging long and loose, dripping and flying behind us as we danced but we didn't care. We had been so happy, so into the moment that we just didn't care about anything else. I stand there, looking at the ghost of that girl who once danced in the rain and I smile at her. Where did she go I wonder to myself? The memories of that long ago summer night are fading into the dark night and I turn to the Hotel side door, pulling the heavy door open to step into it's warmth. I can hear people talking in the Kaminzimmer, the clatter of breakfast dishes being set in the dining room, the quiet chatter of life inside this space. I cross the stone floor, heading to the ancient wooden door across the main entrance. Years ago this was a dirty, cob web filled bat cellar but now it is the heart of the castle in the evening hours. The cellar cafe, the space to sit and chat about it all, to say the goodbyes, to offer new hello's, to be reunited, to talk about how to fix the worlds problems or to just be silly and dance or play games. This was the pub of the castle though it was never once called a pub, it was simply the cellar. I open the door and the cloud of cigarette smoke filled the air around me, I can hear the voices below me, the laughter and the chatter that I knew I would find here, the reason I climbed that quarter mountain long after my work day was through. One can never be lonely here, you only ever had to make your way to the cellar. Like 'Cheers', it's the one place in the world where everyone knows your name, and even if you aren't their favorite person, they care about you. I climb down the wooden steps, smile and greet those at the tables and make my way to the counter to order my Stiegl. I take a sip and let my eyes wander to the people around me. I Take a second sip of the beer, swallowing and then sighing. It may take more than this tonight to fight off the lonliness that surrounds me. 

To be continued...