der Abenteurers

I watch my sons as they move into a new life here in Germany. They are 12 and 15 - not easy ages to make major life changes. Not easy ages even when changes are not made. They have never learned a new language. They have never lived in the different city - with the exception of holiday travel. And yet they have embraced our new life so whole-heartedly it makes me amazed at their spirit and encourages my own.

It is not all sweet, this spirit of abentuer (Adventure). When one ventures out into a new world, the first thing one must do is to leave the shores of your own world - this can be figurative or in our case quite literal.

We have left not only the very real land and belongings and home which we had created for ourselves, but the also the many habits, likes and loves of our lives - from our toys (yes even dads have toys - of course we do) to our personal spaces to our dearest ones. All gone from the daily touches we so easily took for granted.

Meeting a friend for lunch or coffee, spending the night with his best buddy, eating sweet potatoes, our favorite restaurants (Mai's, Kalichandgis), watching TV and understanding every word, moments spent lazily going through life not having to work at every conversation, rare moments spent alone by choice, not by the lack of dear ones near, having a shopping list of our normal buys that we knew would be in the shop...all replaced by an uneasy sensation of constant newness and discovery.

This is abentuer - and it takes a certain amount of backbone and fortitude to not become overwhelmed by the constant struggle to learn and adapt. For me this comes from having a perspective of the longer term, some inner voice that keeps telling me in my moments of frustration and wanting to run away - to run home - that this will make me stronger and in time this too will become the familiar. But this is the mind of an adult, not the mind of a adolescent turning into a young man or a boy turning into an adolescent.

I watch my sons embrace their life here and like me they struggle with the frustrations of language and differences. Language is the biggest barrier and in two months they will begin high school - difficult high school all taught in German language. I see them struggle with learning the language when it is supposed to be summer holidays. I see their young minds not fully embracing the serious nature and benefit of this time of learning - they are after all boys. I see them taste the anger of change when things here are not like home and do not serve them - when they are refused entrance to a movie rated "18" - even with their father's permission, because it is not allowed here because of violence in the movie, a movie that would be easily accepted as PG13 in America.

And I see them seek out and embrace those things which are new to them and offer them more than their old life did. There is more freedom and mobility for them here. They are mastering maps and subways as they become more independent. Yesterday they became lost in the subway - taking the wrong line. But before they entered the train, they realized their mistake and found their way to the right train. They bicycle around the city and yesterday did all the shopping for and prepared dinner - a combination of familiar and new. They prepared chicken wings (but with a curry baste), brussel sprouts and butter vegetables. They were so proud of themselves for purchasing our entire meal for under 4 Euros - quite a feat!

A huge desire of mine as a parent has always been to give my sons a wonderlust - a sense of abenteur for the worlds beyond the ones we know. When they were very little I fed this desire by excitedly asking them if they would like to go to "a restaurant with food from a whole different country?" And their excited looks and energy matching my "put on" and the fun we had in Indian and Hindu and Thai and German and Irish and other restaurants as we began exploring other worlds through food alone - in Dallas. .

Even these early voyages gave us lessons of the abenteurer. On one such exoctic trip to the Far East - our neighborhood Chinese restaurant, I ordered a "Pu-Pu" Platter for my sons. They giggled with glee as dad said a dirty word and joked about eating "Pooh-Pooh." Later when the waitress took the order in all seriousness and went off to get them their meal, fear set in. Dad was going to make us eat "pooh-Pooh." It took several minutes of calming them to get them to ease up a bit, but it was not until they actually saw their meal, that they really relaxed. .

Every voyage outside familiarity has some thing to teach us and we ourselves direct this - by either acepting or rejecting what goes on arround us. Either we grow bigger and braver or we shrink. Later we took bigger voyages through holidays in America at unusual places like a Buddhist retreat in New Mexico or in several visits to Europe.

I love the way they have embraced the change in our life and it encourages me for the life view that they might have when they become men. I love to think that now when they think of what kind of life they want to live, that it will be one with no borders - they may choose to live as Americans or maybe not. I love that I live with abentuerers. And I am so very proud.

SOME PICTURES

SOME PHOTOS TO SHARE:

Our Home
Around Munich
Our 7 Hour Hike over 7 mountains in the Alps!

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FATHER KNOWS BEST...NOT ALWAYS.

I am amazed at how easy it is to get so caught up in my life that I expect everyone should surely see the world as I do, I mean after all it is so crystal clear. Right?

It's really amusing, because I get this with other people, that is, I really don't expect them to see the world as I do and I even allow them this luxury of looking at the world with a different set of...what is it... a different set of rules? No, maybe priorities and values.

I allow them this and in most cases don't try to force my values on them. I am generally gentle with my language and my demeanor, even to the point of owning what I believe as a belief of mine, not as the "truth." Which is what I believe the majority of people do, that is when they speak about how they see the world, they say, "The world is like this." not "I think the world is like this."

But to a couple of people, I am not quite so charitable. I get so caught up in being right that I force feed my view of the world to them and bend them forcefully to go along, willing or not. This couple is my sons, Preston and Random.

Tonight was another version of this as I laid into them with my expectations of them and how they were letting me down and even more they were letting themselves down. Later when i had cooled down, but was still berating my eldest, he confronted me.

He shared how he felt - about the fear he had that he was not living up to the detailed expectations I had of him. How this made him worried about when I would get home and what he had not done right, sometimes to the point that he did not want me to come home.

Sounds like someone needs an attitude adjustment, namely me.

I think what courage this took for him to be so honest with me. I think what clarity he had to speak so truthfully of his feelings. And I think of his ability to own this as his reactions so that I did not feel attacked.

It hurt to know that my son was afraid of my return home. It hurt to know that I caused my son this stress. And it made me so much closer to him, knowing he has the maturity and courage to say these things to me. I want to believe that part of this is due to the father he has.

In order to grow, we need to be able to hear the tough bits and feel the pain these cause -- to ourself and to others. And we need the people in our lives to say these tough things to us, out of love.

I am so amazed at the depth of my son at 15. Something shifted in me in this conversation and I want to create a new way of being with him and his brother. And of this new way of being, I am not sure what it looks like, but I think it will take all 3 of us to define it. Each asking himself, "What do I want? For myself? From my son? From my dad? From my brother?" and "What am I willing to give?"

Something in me cries tonight, but it is a good cry - not a cry of recrimination and shame. Just a cry of sadness, that I did not see this sooner and that I caused pain to someone I love so much.

Germans say, "So ist das lieben." Such is life. And I think this sums it up. We try our best and we make mistakes. If we are willing to listen, we can make changes and become something more, something better than we were before. And sometimes this growth comes through pain.

I am a lucky man to have a son to show me this.

NOMAD...No More

For almost two years, I have lived with one foot on the road or at least waiting to get on the road. In August of 2006, I sold most of belongings - furniture, clothes, dishes, toys, books, movies - in preparation for a move to Ireland. Believing this to be coming in 3-4 months, I moved into a friend's garage apartment - with 2 boys and a dog.

Sure it was small for us, but it was just a couple months and it was paving the way for us to have a grand adventure in Ireland. 16 months later and three failed attempts to secure a Visa, I gave up this dream and began rebuilding my life in Dallas. I began looking for new work, I put a downpayment on a three bedroom home for us and by fluke, two weeks later was accepting a job in Munich Germany.

Fast forward four months, I have now been in Munchen (how we Deutsch - not Dutch - say it) for just over two months. Most of this time has been spent in a one-room apartment, an upgrade to the garage, but not by much. Two weeks ago, my sons arrived in Deutschland and we moved into our new home. Instead of a one-room home, we each have a room of our own and three more to share.

Sometimes the silver lining of clouds has a shadow too...The first few days were actually a bit annoying as not being used to having multiple rooms I kept losing things and had to search every room to find where I put them. It felt like some bad sitcom scene - all I was missing was the fake laugh track.

I love our new home for what it is and what it is not. It is a place unlike any I have ever lived - a top floor apartment in a trendy and busy area of Munchen - Schwabing. I am tempted to say penthouse, but this conjurs up images that are not accurate. It is beautiful and comfortable without being posh or pretentious that I think of as penthouse. We live in the heart of a beautiful and bustling city - well maybe not the heart, but for sure the liver, lungs or other vital organ.

We live a block away from Hohenzollernplatz, a wonderful little plaza with business, shops, cafes and restaurants. And to my delight I found out this morning that we have two bakeries that open on Sunday mornings - not a normal thing in Deutschland.

The sun shines in the wall of glass in my bedroom every morning about 5:00 now that it is summer. I don't mind this. I love waking to the brisk air blowing in through the open door of my balcony and rising before the city does. Perhaps in a prior life I was a rooster.

There is something about a home that nurtures me and makes me safe the way few other things do. And it is hard for me to get my hands around living in transition for so long, waiting for the next move, expecting it constantly and frustrated when it did not come.

Here I have settled again, in a place that truly nutures me and provides space for us all. And though I fell "settled" in a way I haven't for a while, it is still not home because we are as the Deutsch say, "Auslanders" - Foreigners. And as wonderful as my home may be, as comforting and nurturing - as big and spacious - as beautiful and well positioned, until we are no longer auslanders, we won't really be home.

So perhaps I am still a nomad after all, just with a nicer tent.