A year ago this week I flew to Germany to join my daughter and travel around Europe.   It was the most exciting and frightening thing I’ve done.   Just the flight alone — 9-1/2 hours to Frankhurt (hint: buy the mid-level seat upgrade) — was out of the box for a claustrophobic anxiety junky like myself.   I sat next to a guy on the plane who lived part time in Germany.  I told him I’d never flown a transcontinental flight before and I was nervous.  He told me that when he flies he imagines that he’s inside a bus.  I found this extremely comforting imagery and it got me through the flight.

There were a lot of problems on the trip.   In retrospect, I was ill-equipped to plan and execute my own tour of Europe.   My poor daughter was relying on me to be well-informed and in control of our environment, which was not the case.   There were some rough bumps that I regret.

All in all though, it was an education in so many ways.  I think one of the most expansive things I learned is that here in America we live in a bubble of newness.   Our country is a toddler in the spectrum of time.  The buildings in Europe are thousands of years old and have survived bombs, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis, fires, wars.   And granted they haven’t survived them all that well, but they’re essentially standing in whole or part.   They were built by hand; by stone masons, carpenters, laborers who spent 40 years building a structure that may not have been completed in their lifetimes.  Those buildings housed emperors and slaves.  They saw animal sacrifices and chariot races.  As you walk through Italy you see the history of the Golden Ages laid out before you.   The cab drivers know the history of Pompeii, that volcanic ash from Mount Vesuvius buried the town until it was discovered and excavated.   My cab driver knew that the people of the neighboring towns nearly survived unscathed but those who were trying to evacuate as Pompeii was swallowed in ash, soon found themselves awash in the second wave of the eruption.

Here at home these days we’re just trying to build modern day homes that can survive tornados and hurricanes.