Wait only for my boot heels, to be wanderin’

To my dear readers of my blog, I owe two apologies.

The first apology is that I have not updated a wholly accurate portrayal of my life and times–this is because for the past week or so, I have been in the Czech Republic, having various adventures and misadventures in the first week of my three-week spring break, which will be spent touring various parts of Europe. I promise to give a more anecdotal and appropriate update of my life at the end of the break.

The second apology is now that I have the opportunity (hurray for internet access in Czech hostels!) and the time (I really don’t have anything to do and it’s far too early to call it a night) to give my readers that update, I am choosing instead to record, word for word and with very little editting, a stream-of-consciousness-esque piece of writing that I wrote tonight in a Czech bar after my friend Luci had left me and I still had a beer to finish.

So here goes:

March 29th, 2009, 11 pm:

This is really my firs attempt being the eccentric American in a European place that my sister suggested I adopt as a role to integrate myself within the foreign community*.  So here I sit in a bar likely designed for English customers in the heart of Prague*, drinking the remnants of Bernard dark, a combination of my beer and that left behidn by my friend Luci as she dashed off to meet the controversial Czech sculptor David Cerny (I drink a toast to both Cerny and Luci, for her steel and ambition in setting up the meeting with him). The conversation aroudn me is alrgely a blur; perhaps English is a part of the commotion but I cannot isolate it, and so remain absorbed in the movement of my fingers and the occasionally-sipped Bernard dark, the taste of which is dulled by the cold from which I am still recovering (which, by the way, I blame on the initial 12-hour bus ride from Copenhagen to Prague). Th Danish identity which I have tentatively yet aggressively adopted tempts me to bellow “Skål!” (the Danish equivalent of “Cheers!”) and see who joins in with tht toast of an ethnicity to which I belong at best tangentially. But I remain quiet, once again reminded of the speech John Hodgen gave at the New England Young Writers’ Conference many years ago: to be a writer is to separate yourself from the group and be along, to be the one away from the bonfire on the beach, looking at the stars while your friends drink beer around the bonfire. A song starts (sung among the patrons of the bar) in a language I cannot recognize. I’ve always had a soft spot for people singing together regardless of motivation, purpose, or language. A brief toast to singing together as a group and a good group of fellowship knowing the words as a bass carries the lyrics along, even though I cannot piece them together. And a brief moment of homesickness for Alpha Delta Phi. Admittedly,  a voice speaking unnaccented English cuts through the din, asking without context “Remember? Remember?” I think I am doing my best to do so, is the answer I am tempted to give back, but the question is addressed to me only by coincidence, not by intent. So I stay silent with my voice while my pen still moves, always self-aware (at times painfully so). I tipped my bartenders (who were grateful–maybe I’m not expected to do so? Tipping in Europe is so inconsistent–it is its own set of rules, as complicated and as important as European Union development policy for Eastern Europe), so I think I have gained engouh good will from the gentlemen in tight red t-shirts (nice uniform, don’t you think?) to keep going, at least until my (tasty!) Bernard dark runs out. I see a warm embrace to my right and wonder what it’s like for expatriates and travelers to meet friendly faces in situations that hover between expected and unexpected. Yes, the bar offers Guiness on an English-speaking menu, but it’s still Prague. Whom do we expect to meet? I have used the Danish “unskylld” this evening to pass by strangers on my excursions throughout this bar–whom am I trying to deceive? And what motivates my fear or discomfort to the extent that I mask my English? Luci has made a point of learning “excuse me” and “thank you” in Czech and using them situationally, but my discomfort with the language is so great that I cannot bring myself to write down the actual Czech words. So why Danish? It’s a rare language, but far from exoticized–better to use English and better my chances of actually being understood. But with echoes of Joni Mitchell’s “Carey” in my head (I get that song stuck in my head a great deal, especially whenever I talk about my travel plans, mostly because of the lyrics “Maybe I’ll go to Amsterdam, or maybe I’ll go to Rome”), I won’t think about such things right now. I have my finished my beer (it was pretty good but not as good as the Czech Kozel) and I have a road well worth walking. In all languages, I wish to say that life is beautiful, and here I close.

p.s. The title of this post comes from Bob Dylan’s “Mr. Tambourine Man”, which is an extraordinary song the only way that Dylan can make one. And it’s surprisingly accurate–I’ve been wearing the same pair of boots my entire time in Europe. The boots are some of the closest friends I’ve made.

 

*My sister’s suggestion came from her text message, sent to me shortly after my departure. It reads as follows: “You’d better be the eccentric American to the point where everyone knows you don’t have any money and aren’t worth robbing, educated enough to know you can’t be swindled or bamboozled, and crazy enough that no one messes with you in any way. If they do…may God have mercy on them because I sure as hell will not. If you at any point need anything you call. Don’t worry about long distance or waking me up or anything. I will be on the next flight without question, a roll of cash in one pocket, a list of ‘special’ numbers in my other and a big sister’s ‘Get the hell away from my brother’ attitude in full force. It will not be pretty but it will happen. Be safe. Have fun. Be safe. Don’t be generous or stupid or caught up in group mentality. Be safe.” My sister is a wonderful, wonderful human being.

*I assume the bar is designed for English customers because it offers Guiness. If a place offers Guiness, it’s probably reaching out to the homesick heartstrings of someone who knows English as their first language.