Past, present, and future

For a while there, I had wild hopes that March had broken winter's back but it seems that the old man was just lying in wait. The past few days have been windy, wet, and white with barely a moment of sunshine.

The assistant from a few years ago, Amanda from Michigan, was in town this week trying to coordinate her student teaching requirements in Austria (she's a graduate student). I met her very briefly on Tuesday at the BORG (one of my schools) and we immediately connected. How many other Americans have experienced Ried im Innkreis? She knew about everything - from the banshee screaming of the soccer boys upstairs to the radical polarity in the moods of a particular teacher. For the past few months, I seriously thought that I was at times crazy, inhuman and a mostly jumbled collection of depressed emotions. Even though I might have been depressed, I now know that it was NORMAL for the circumstances. Amanda helped me rebuild my notion of my own humanity. I thought that I was sick, weak, and not suited for this job. It seemed that all the other assistants were having a grand time while I was a radioactive sphere of negativity and sadness. Sir M, a friend in Ohio, shared a poem with me and one line really clicked:
I am gall, I am heartburn. God's most deep decree
Bitter would have me taste; my taste was me...
I was trapped within myself. Like a puddle of water in the hot sun, I was turning fetid. Even if I was, Amanda understood inside and out because she has been here before.

Even if there's just ONE person in the world out there who understands and is willing to talk, you're golden. And now I'm golden. I feel so much better.

On Wednesday afternoon I got a call from Hans, the orientation director, that he was going to the nearby hot springs resort in Geinberg with Amanda. We had a great time; Hans is a man with connections. He told us about an endeavor he had a few years ago to unite all the Aschenbergers (his family name) all over the world. Hans was able to uncover the sordid past of an Aschenberger in Brazil. I've never heard such a wild story in my life. It involved Nazis, Auschwitz, polio, suicide, love, America. And somehow Hans was able to bring it all together.

Hans is also well connected with the Von Trappe family. When I first got here, we sang to Maria, one of the Von Trappe children over the phone. It was her birthday. He's very close with the entire family and one of the grandchildren is coming to his school to learn how to cook traditional Austrian meals. I think her name is Melenie. Hans suggested that I help her with her German and she could help me with my guitar. But I've seen videos of this girl, a musical wonder, who travels the world with her siblings.

We ended up, on Wednesday night, grabbing food from the grocery store and cooking Käse spätzle, cheesey Austrian noodles, with salad and wine. After dinner, Hans whipped out an electric lap guitar that he had bought in New Zealand, handed me a guitar and Amanda a set of bongo drums. Musical mayhem? Pretty soon, I was on a marraca/rain stick and Amanda was doing some Ginger Rogers while Hans played piano. Then we watched Oh Brother where art thou to finish up the evening.

Next day, after work, we went to Salzburg in Hans' car so that Hans could check out a few apartments that he was looking at to buy. He dropped Amanda and me off in town and the two of us walked around in the drizzling rain, went dirndl shopping, and finally ended up in an Irish pub called the Shamrock. We sat at the bar in front of a Philadelphia Eagle's poster and ordered something called a Snakebite, a cider beer with a shot of black currant liquer. We talked and talked, Amanda's program is TESOL oriented (teacher of english to speakers of other languages). After Austria, she really wanted to be home and so she bummed for a year getting things straight in her head and heart before grad school. And this is exactly what I would like to do - this is where I am right now. I want to study again BADLY like it's an itch that I just can't reach but I DON'T WANT TO STUDY when I have no inspiration. I don't want to shoot myself down a path when I really don't know where I want to go, not to mention loading myself down with debts and a career that I don't find interesting. For this reason, I would like to put off grad school for a few months to a year and spend some time thinking. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to be a bum or baggage for my parents. I want to find some work and maybe take classes at the local community college at night. I want to talk to people in person and gather more perspective. The eyes that I have now can't see very far and that's the problem. All this occurred to me very suddenly but it seems right. I've been all over the place these past 5 years and maybe what I need is a little time for everything to catch up...