The day I leave for Greece, I mail a letter to my father's cousin in Switzerland, Niko, and his wife Evelyn, whom I have not seen since 1977 (see Sky). I want to reconnect. I want to share with them the sad news of my father's death, and to let them know how much our travels together meant to me, then and now. I also want them to know that I'm coming to Greece, in the hopes we might have a chance to meet.
Not long after, I receive an email from Niko, Evelyn, and their daughter Aliki, offering condolences as well as an invitation to Switzerland for a visit. Switzerland! How can I afford to take a trip within a trip that I can barely afford? I must be crazy, but for this opportunity, I will spend my last cent if I have to. We may never pass this way again, as the song goes. After a few emails, we settle on March 17-21.
Two days before departing Greece for Switzerland, I surf the Internet to get to know my hosts' town and surrounding area. A little scrolling, a little reading, and one photo jumps out at me...
Murten. Time stands still. A sea of rooftops. Just like my dream. I hold my breath. I blink. No, it's a coincidence. Just a strange coincidence. And then. And then...
...my body lands in the medieval village. My god, this is it. This is not like my dream, this is my dream. My feet are on the ground, and yet I am floating. Nobody seems to notice.
As Evelyn and Aliki show me around Murten, I am filled with the sense that I’ve been here before. I don’t know what’s ahead or around the next corner, I can’t tell you who lived in which house, but every step I take feels familiar, intensely familiar.
Finally, I share my dream. Evelyn and Aliki are fascinated by my vision of rooftops, but when I add the seemingly insignificant detail about the plane flying over a body of water and my turning to see snow-capped mountains behind the plane, their eyes widen. “This is Lake Murten,” Aliki says, pointing, “and beyond the lake are snow-capped mountains.” All I can see are thick clouds. “Yes,” Evelyn says, “when there are no clouds, you can see snow covered mountains, there, over the lake.” To believe that a snow-capped mountain exists beyond the lake, like my dream, is a little too much for me right now. I prefer to believe the clouds.
I don’t know what to make of the dream and my visit two years later to Murten. I don’t know that I need to make anything of it. I will neither force conclusions upon the story nor trivialize it. Maybe my story and someone else’s story crossed paths, intersecting energetically, and some age-old wrong aches to be made right. Maybe it’s a story meant to stir up the story in you. Maybe it’s a story for story’s sake, a story simply to be enjoyed. Maybe all of the above, maybe none.
Whatever the story is or is not, it is this to me: a gift. The dream, the experience, my brief time in Switzerland, connecting and reconnecting with family, this is indeed a gift. And I am blessed.
Not long after, I receive an email from Niko, Evelyn, and their daughter Aliki, offering condolences as well as an invitation to Switzerland for a visit. Switzerland! How can I afford to take a trip within a trip that I can barely afford? I must be crazy, but for this opportunity, I will spend my last cent if I have to. We may never pass this way again, as the song goes. After a few emails, we settle on March 17-21.
Two days before departing Greece for Switzerland, I surf the Internet to get to know my hosts' town and surrounding area. A little scrolling, a little reading, and one photo jumps out at me...
Murten. Time stands still. A sea of rooftops. Just like my dream. I hold my breath. I blink. No, it's a coincidence. Just a strange coincidence. And then. And then...
...my body lands in the medieval village. My god, this is it. This is not like my dream, this is my dream. My feet are on the ground, and yet I am floating. Nobody seems to notice.
As Evelyn and Aliki show me around Murten, I am filled with the sense that I’ve been here before. I don’t know what’s ahead or around the next corner, I can’t tell you who lived in which house, but every step I take feels familiar, intensely familiar.
I don’t know what to make of the dream and my visit two years later to Murten. I don’t know that I need to make anything of it. I will neither force conclusions upon the story nor trivialize it. Maybe my story and someone else’s story crossed paths, intersecting energetically, and some age-old wrong aches to be made right. Maybe it’s a story meant to stir up the story in you. Maybe it’s a story for story’s sake, a story simply to be enjoyed. Maybe all of the above, maybe none.
Whatever the story is or is not, it is this to me: a gift. The dream, the experience, my brief time in Switzerland, connecting and reconnecting with family, this is indeed a gift. And I am blessed.
2 comments:
Beautiful.
Amazing story!
Post a Comment