The Long Haul

I’ve been back in the U.S. for 43 days now, and I can’t decide if I miss Europe or not. On one hand, I miss the bathroom stall doors that didn’t have cracks and being able to travel anywhere cool on the weekend. On the other… well I don’t think I can ever live again without AC and my own car. Although the public transportation was wonderful in Europe, I like being on my own schedule and going wherever I want when I feel like it. But I wouldn’t trade this experience for anything and I’m grateful for the 2 months I spent there. 

When I arrived back, the next day I had an early morning shift for work. So I was tired and jet lagged, but I found myself being more decisive in decision making and relying less on other people to lead. On the trip, I didn’t make that many friends and that lead to me depending on myself to pick and choose how I want to spend my free time. I didn’t have the luxury of having people to pitch in ideas or someone making the decision to go somewhere, I had to make quick decisions to go left when everyone was going right. And it lead to me having a lot of introspection of what I liked and didn’t like. But more often than not, I was trying out new experiences that I wouldn’t have gotten surrounded by a group of people. On Norderney, after freezing on the mud flats for 2 hours, I made my way as fast as possible back to the hostel and then to the Bade Haus. If I had waited for people, I would have been freezing for hours more. I wouldn’t have gotten to experience the all female sauna and participated in a löyly ceremony. Coming home to my management job where everyone looked to everyone else for decision making, it had me taking action and completing tasks faster. My employees were happier because they had a more solid sense of direction and their time was not wasted in the summer heat. 

Recently I visited my friend in Houston for a weekend of fun before school started. Her family was very nice but very conservative. Her dad and I got into a conversation about the German healthcare system, and I’m sure Dr. Wasser would be mortified as to how I presented it. I did my best to explained why I liked the system so much and how it worked, but I couldn’t do the system justice and her dad tore my argument to pieces. My one point of pride is that I would state a fact and he would do silent for a few minutes googling it on his phone until he was deep into the search results, finding some obscure article that refuted that fact. Although the conversation was frustrating, it reinforced my view that most Americans, specifically the older generations, do not have the same compassion and vision the younger do of a public health system. Yes we would have to pay higher taxes, and possibly never reap the benefits, but millions of Americans overall would be better off for it and would strengthen our country. I wish I had my notes in front of me during this discussion with him, but even then I don’t think he would have been convinced that the German system is miles better than our greedy, fractured and leaky American mess. Maybe Dr. Wasser could’ve made a dent in his mind. 

All in all, my bank account was lightened while my mind was weighted down with a whole new way of thinking. Not weighted down with stress, but knowledge of a wider world that is growing and changing with every new person that experiences it.