Munich

Back to work Monday. Tried to retain the scent and sense of self evoked by my brief escape.

Within those walls the steady heartbeat, ominous realization that this is what I do now. This is my commute. My office. My colleagues. My tedious, boring, never-ending, relentless work. External pulse I must follow. Discordant strike against my private heart. Inside, I am fighting back.

Munich. Wanted to see the city. Walk in the autumn air and maybe go for a run but felt too sick. Sore throat could go either way. Also I had work and, from her distant vantage point, the gremlin watched and monitored. Detailed, exhaustive e-mails; implications of my deficiency. I can fight it with my intellect and self-awareness but she wears me down.  I had to work. Had to finish the analysis. Did not visit the city. Stayed in my hotel room with the laptop open, ate a Kaiser roll from a local bakery, drank kefir from a local grocery store, and was hungry.

Munich. The last time I was here I was on my way to Garmisch. Planning conference. I ran with Dutch Marines in the snow. Before that, another work trip. And another with high alpine climbs. And once he drove me to Stuttgart and we visited Marie and ate German food and visited a military museum.

In Germany always there was him: the longing, the anguish, the inability to surrender hope. And so I am again. He is here, as I feel the resonant echoes of past pain in the autumn air. When I remember this, I welcome the pain because it has always been the Janus coin – and on the other face was exultant Joy.  And my anguish is still so deep because, in another world I am with him and my joy is equally deep. I like to know this. Even when it burns.

At night I dream of him and wake with the distinctive sensation that I have spent time in his presence and I still feel the residual sensation of soul, his laughter, his smile, his conversation, all sitting with me. Please don’t go away. Not yet. But it is a dream and it is gone. And I look at my life and I hate it because he is not here. I've become an eater of ashes. I love his ghost because it is all I was able to keep.

I call Willem once. Twice. Try to talk. But all I can do is suffer. He loves me. Doesn’t want me to suffer. I have lost the knack for artifice. I cannot reassure him. We do not talk long and I cry.

Meetings during the day. Charts and powerpoint and database checking. Logistics. Vehicle traffic. Projections on science payloads. Ascent and descent manifests. Coffee in little ceramic cups. Not enough coffee.  Dinner and beers with the folks from the other agency. Networking. Conversation and collegial laughter.

There were six of them. They were nice. But nice is not what I crave. I crave kin. I crave the passion and discourse of shared work that stimulates and drives me. But if I have lost him whom I love, I have also lost the work and camaraderie I loved. And this is a dull and lifeless shadow world. My new colleagues are excited to be in Germany, glad for the glamor away from satisfying lives with wives and children and weekend yardwork, want to eat Spatzle and schnitzel and drink beer and sauerkraut and, because I live in Europe and am not afraid to find things, they follow me and we drink far too much beer. They are only mildly interested in me - the way you are interested in a waiter while he takes your order. I am genial, try to pay attention to what they are saying but I might as well be a robot for all that I am able to form attachments to them. They are satisfied with this work and I cannot be.

Today, the friendly roly-poly one asks, “How do you like your work with MSO?” and I am caught off guard. Do I dare confess the abuse and pain? Tell them I am trapped in hell and eager for escape?

No.
 

I talk around the subject, change it quickly. I tell them about a man I went to school with who went to a federal penitentiary for stealing moon rocks. We move along. They drink their beer and I am friendly and engaging. I am numb.

We part ways near the Glockenspiel. American hugs all around. I have a flight to catch.

Cordoba

There was such peace in the Mesquita Mosque-Cathedral of Cordoba. Willem and I stayed for hours and when it came time to leave, neither of us wanted to go. We wandered back into the cool darkness between the pillars, and through the pools of colored light on the floor. I meant to make a deliberate meditation, but this seemed unnecessary. It felt like a meditation to just be there. Afterwards, yesterday, for the first time in nearly a year, I felt part of my old joy and creativity stirring.
Tonight, Willem said, "I've felt that before. What was it? Deja-vu?"
Apart from the historical significance, I felt to cover my head, wash my feet. Even with the other tourists clustered around, snapping photos and talking, there was something of the sacred.
It seems that this reality has been worn thin by millions of souls and millions of prayers and the part of the spirit that recognizes heaven edges just a little closer, filling the heart with peace and a longing for home.

Last night, Willem paid for us to visit the Arabic baths of the Hamam. We were laid on a heated marble slab, rubbed over with rose scented soap and bubbles, scrubbed down, and massaged. Then we moved from one bath room to the next. Refreshment for the body as well as the soul.

In Spain with Willem

“It’s not you – it’s not peeling an onion – but some similarity. I can’t make myself more clear.”

- Willem

Without the second-order effects of my stress to bother him, Willem is very funny when he’s relaxed. He quips jokes and lopes around on his long legs with a shit-eating grin. His version of problem solving is a lot like my dad’s. For example: he wanted to bring the whole loaf of bread with us today, along with a six-inch bread knife. This rather than pre-slicing the bread before we left the house.

We are hot during the days and Willam skirts the border between well and fucked-up. We’ve learned that he can stay cooler when he dunks his shirt in water. Usually a public fountain. He prefers this to a bathroom sink or water bottle. He is incapable of feeling embarrassed about anything. And everything is negotiable. So he takes off his shirt, wanders to a public fountain and dunks the whole thing. It drips and squelches as he puts it back on (he doesn’t wring it out first). Yesterday, there was the necessary shirt-dunking in the Royal courtyard of Alcazar and he was scolded by one of the security personnel. But his response to authoritarian reprobation is so good natured and friendly, the security folks can’t stay angry at him. 

The first moments alone

Willem and I are on vacation. I brought him with me to Spain.  I need to get away. To run from the horror that is my job. I also want to give him this chance and he is so excited to be here. Everything is new. Everything is wonderful to him. And he is excited to be here with me.
We are trying to discover if our difficulties getting along are due to the stressful situation at work. He thinks so.
In part, the answer is "yes". So I'm searching for another job.
But I also feel something more fundamental that is difficult to ignore now that there are actual moments alone with few distractions. He reaches out to me, loves me with his whole soul. I see it in his eyes, in his face. I am so grateful for his love; grateful for the comfort he gives me in my pain. But I feel my inadequacy, the stingy amount of love I can give in return.
I am reaching to someone else - an involuntary action as necessary as breathing. Even if it is lost. Even if that relationship exists only in some shattered past. I cannot feel settled in this moment with those beautiful, kind grey eyes looking into mine. But when I turn to where I breathe, as I did just now when I ran alone, turn inward to the place in my soul where I am connected to another man, I feel right again.
How is this fair? How can I be here with this beautiful man and unable to be with him? If love was a choice, this would be the right choice because he is true. Because he is good. Because he is kind. Because he loves me.
Tell me what to do, God. Please.