Without Hesitation (Chapter Two)

As time passes and life rambles on, good friends sometimes manage to slip away and get lost in the maze of our memories, especially when the force of life's current causes their path to move in a different direction from yours. When this happens, a touch of serendipity is often required to make possible a reunion of fates, but--with my new approach to life--I would no longer allow my future to be dictated merely by chance and circumstance; I was determined to take an active role in sculpting the shape of my future.




When an old friend told me she would be coming to Europe from South America for a medical conference, and asked if I would come and stay with her in Paris, it gave me an opportunity to act on these new impulses: I would go to Paris to reunite with a woman who, though I had only known her for a matter of days, had several years earlier left me on a train platform in Munich completely captivated by her confession of love, which happened to come--inconveniently-- on the eve of my departure for the United States...but that is another story all together.



In the weeks leading up to this chance at a Parisian tryst I remembered that part of my desire to visit France came from the fact that someone who I had promised to visit, but who I had not been in touch with for so long that I did not even have contact information for him this point, had been living in Paris the last time I heard from him. Years before this took place, when I was but sixteen years old, one of my best friends—Hugh—went through some familial upheaval and was forced to move to France in the middle of our sophomore year of high school. We tried to keep in touch, but, what with my aforementioned tendency to completely consume myself with the clamor of circumstance, and the fact that our paths had been so far removed, we lost contact completely.



By the time I was living in Europe, however, what with it having been more than seven years since we had traded words in any form and my having no way to get in touch with him, I very highly doubted that I would be able to find him in only two weeks. To be honest, I wasn’t sure if he’d be interested in seeing me even if I could find him—especially not on such short notice. Nevertheless, I ventured what I thought would be a futile query on the World Wide Web for “Hugh E____, Paris.”


Low and behold, Google™ got a hit! Someone named Hugh had, at some point, run the American University of Paris’ music club and their website even had his email posted as the contact information for the group. My friend Hugh was a musician and, for all I knew, he could have been a student at AUP. I couldn’t believe it! I immediately sent an email detailing my studies in Germany and my upcoming trip to Paris. I waited eagerly for signs of life from my old friend, but instead I got an automated message saying that the email address was no longer valid and could not be delivered. Damn! With only ten days before my trip to Paris I was running out of time. As a last ditch effort, I then sent a formal email to the registrar’s office of The American University of Paris. The letter inquired about the status of Hugh E____ and if he was by chance a student at AUP. I asked simply if they could put me in contact with him, or at least give me his last known contact information; They sent no response.


Only a week before I was to arrive at Gare de l'Est train station in Paris to meet my friend from Brazil, I got an email from Hugh himself! The office at his school had sent him some seemingly banal message that, once he finally got around to looking at it, gave my email address and said I was looking for him. His response was nothing short of epic: he went over all that had happened with him over the years, what he did in high school and college, and how great Paris was. He lamented on how he had always planned on coming back to the United States to see me and our friends and to go to college in the States, but wound up falling in love with France and had resolved to stay. He asked about all of our old friends, most of whom I was no longer in touch wtih, and—though he was convinced of it being totally impossible—he even invited us to visit him in Paris, assuring me that we could all stay with him if any of us ever made it to Europe.

------- ------- ------- ------- ------- -------

Here is the text of the actual email Hugh sent me that I conveniently have saved:
Von: Hugh E____
Gesendet: Dienstag, 4. November 2003 07:25:24

“WHATS UP MUTHA FUCKA!!!!!!! I've been trying to get a hold of you guys for ever! I've been to the LMHS website and everything and couldn't find anything. That's fucking great to hear from you man!! what's up?! what's happened to you? do you still see any of the old guys anymore? dave, pete, darrin, greg, zohar, shana etc (and anybody else i forgot)?? are you still in Narberth area? shit, it's basically been since 10th grade right?? I have been so pissed cause the past years I've lost COMPLETE contact with everyone back there and I haven't found any info on anyone. shit what's up??

Here's my story: I'm still in Paris. yeah, I was expecting to get out of here as soon as I finished high school or whatever, but guess what I fucking loved it here, so I've stayed and I'm graduating this spring from the American University. Wow. let me tell you my life has changed since I left. I'm still the same, but I've gotten used to life in France. It's mad cool here and Europe is surprisingly totally fucking awesome. I speak basically fluent french now. I went to an international high school, so that, like AUP, is filled with people from all over the place. even though I'm in France mostly everyone I know speaks english and is not actually french. after high school I was like it's cool here, I'm gonna chill for another semester or two at college, which has turned into the past few years at school. I'm doing a french major (just because it's easy and i can do it) and a film minor.
as you can tell, I'm still into music. i'm running the music studio at school and I have a band wiht some good friends that i've been playing with for the past 3 years. it's totally chill. I'll have to send you a cd. I really don't know what I'm doing after this spring, it's all up in the air. I might stay here, might go somewhere in the states, who knows. I'm seeing this girl right now, she's mad cool, from South Africa. Europe is mad cool man. they're so chill about drinking and chilling and shit. I'm 22 now, and have vague ideas, but nothing concrete whatsoever about what I'm doing next. has everybody stayed in the Philly area? what's happened to everyone?? you have to give me everybody's email that you have. man, you seriously have to get your butt over here and make a trip to visit me and party. free room + board etc. seriously. guess what, my parents are totally down with chillin now, so I chill with them every so often. what ever happened wiht you and Morgan? I thought you guys were gonna get engaged in like 11th grade or something.

shit, it's awesome to hear from you man. I can't believe it's been like 5 or 6 years right?? keep in touch and tell me whats going on.

Hugh”

------- ------- ------- ------- ------- -------

Needless to say, this was good news…


Sure, I could have written back with a quick note outlining what I was doing in Europe and how I was planning on coming to France in a few days, but that wouldn’t be much fun. Instead, I set down a very long and involved letter, detailing exactly what had happened with each and every one of our friends Dave, Pete, Darren, Greg and Shana since he had been in France, and even even mentioned Zohar, who had died a few years earlier.


Naturally, I saved my story for last and only started discussing my studies and where I was living after three or four pages of densely packed pieces of information about everything from our childhood memories to what my favorite band was. Only after having put his memory through a work out of phenomenal proportions did I sneak in the fact that I was at that time living in Germany, that I was already planning on coming to Paris in ten days and that I could not wait to see him.



You know that feeling you get when you see an old friend for the first time in too long? Sometimes that nostalgia hits so hard that it is difficult to accurately gauge (and control) your emotions and act normally; other times, however, the overwhelming sense of wistfulness yields to evocative moments of happiness. I wasn’t sure what would happen, but when I finally met Hugh on the platform of the train station in Paris, where he greeted with a serious hug and a salubrious smile, it was as if no time had passed between us! True, we didn’t look exactly the same after 6 years, and we didn’t know the same people anymore, nor did we really even know each other at that point, but it didn't matter. I mean, a lot happens to a young man between the ages of 6 and 22, but whatever it was that had brought us together in the first place was clearly still there.

Once we boarded the subway—which, by the way, are incredibly treacherous in Paris, what with how hard the doors slam closed—and made our way toward his place, which I half expected to be a dump the size of a shoebox. We broke into such a natural banter that it seemed like we were still back in Philly, and, though we reminisced for a few minutes about what had happened to all of our dearest friends back in the United States, it was no time at all until we started talking about funny things we had heard that week and interesting ideas about what to do over the coming weekend.

Having finally made it to Paris, after hours on the train from Germany engaged in deep philosophical conversation with a lovely young German woman, Hugh took what could already have been described as an idyllic situation and made it truly magical when he lead us back to his place in the center of town to get settled and go out for some culture.


Now, when I say the “center of town” I could be talking about any given neighborhood within the city limits and relatively close to the interesting areas. Not in this case. Here I literally mean the exact geographic center of Paris!


Most people who have been to Paris, whether they are there on vacation or for business, at some point pass by the Cathédrale Notre Dame; very few people, however, get to actually spend their nights within a hundred yards of its gates!

Turmoil had sent Hugh and his family to Paris in the first place, but the move did not solve all of life’s’ problems; A few years earlier both his mother and father decided to leave Paris in favor of Belgium and Switzerland respectively, which meant that my slacker friend was, at this point, the sole tenant of two beautiful apartments in the spectacular city of Paris, which fully lives up to all the hype that surrounds its legend, and the apartment that he lead me to was actually on the Ile de la Cité in the middle of the Seine. It's not every night that you get to sleep on the island where Paris was originally founded over 2000 years earlier.



Needless to say, the atmosphere was charged with history and culture. It was so wonderful to see my dear, old friend again after so many years; it was like a dream come true: after six years apart, in the dead center of Paris, was extraordinary enough...but it was only the beginning.

Without Hesitation (Chapter One)

Without hesitation, or anxiety, I embark now on of tale of lucid madness. Fraught with foolishness and frivolity, adventures of untold decadence transpired under both exotic suns and bohemian stars. If you will but loose yourself on a whimsical flight of fancy, you will be whisked on a journey that crosses oceans, mountains and deserts.

The suffocating humdrumery of life at home lit the fire in my furnace and set my sights on distant horizons. Crashing waves in the tropics, wandering dunes of deserts, the wind called to me from afar, but, before dancing wildly on moonlit beaches and meditating on misty mountain tops, our story begins in the depths of the Black Forest, nearly frozen and half blinded by blizzard gales, nonetheless not in seek of shelter. 

While meandering through the frosted forests of southern Germany’s fabled Schwarzwald I trudged, knee-deep through snow, in search of what could not be found. The nooks of the mountain, veiled under a blanket of swirling mist and snow, hid that which I sought: respite from the predictable reality that lay ahead of me.

*******

I was studying at Albert- Lüdwigs – Unidversität - Freiburg and living quite well. Having earned a spot on the Baden-Württemberg international fellowship/exchange I was welcomed to the storied university and given full access to its extensive academic catalog. I was also set up to share a flat with a motley international crew: Ziyad, from Lebanon; Mi, from China; Irma, from the Republic of Georgia; Kyung, from Korea, Hannes, Catherine, and Florian from Germany; and myself —the lone American of the group. Among our ranks were forestry students, engineers, mathematicians, musicians, computer programmers and—in Hannes and myself—students of philosophy.

(Solidarity—NOW!—Against Haphazard Politics)

A student of philosophy stands in a unique position at the precipice of adulthood: instead of seeing the world merely as a venue for "success", which often seemed to be based on bank accounts and/or bulging muscles, life is to knowledge seekers an infinite playground to explore, question and comprehend. I studied Gadamer’s hermeneutical methods(φ), read Nietzsche’s brilliance captured in Zarathustra’s words(η), and even made exploratory jaunts into the practically insurmountable enigma of the Tractatus Logico Philosophicus(ψ).

I was adrift in a universe of curious enthusiasm that was piqued by everlasting doubt.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

φ Hermeneutics is essentially the art of understanding. Hans-Georg Gadamer established philosophical hermeneutics in his magnum opus Wahrheit Und Methode (1975); to him, hermeneutics is not a method for understanding but an attempt "to clarify the conditions in which understanding takes place" (Gadamer 1975: 263).
η Nietzsche was one of the most subversive and controversial thinkers in Western philosophy, and Also Sprach Zarathustra (1885) remains his most famous and influential work. It describes how the ancient Persian prophet Zarathustra descends from his solitude in the mountains to tell the world that God is dead. With blazing intensity and poetic brilliance, Nietzsche argues that the meaning of existence is not to be found in religious piety or meek submission, but in the all-powerful energy of life: passionate and free. Although his ideas were often harsh and uncompromising, Nietzsche’s main purpose was not to crush the reader’s spirit into the same mold, but rather to spur each individual to rise above the much-loathed mediocre conformity that plagued society then, as it does now.
ψ Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus is the only book-length philosophical work published by the Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein during his lifetime. He wrote it as a soldier and a prisoner of war during World War I. First published in German in 1921 as Logisch-Philosophische Abhandlung, it is now widely considered one of the most important philosophical works of the twentieth century.
Though Wittgenstein's later works were less austere, and contained notably different philosophical ideas, all of his writing had the same basic writing style of short sentences or paragraphs rather than narrative exposition. It has also been noted that Tractatus contains almost no arguments as such, and is instead comprised of statements that are meant to be self-evident. It is, in essence, an ambitious project to identify the relationship between language and reality and to define the limits of science, but at the same time delves into the nature of spirituality and its place in philosophy.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Unsure whether to follow flights of fancy down Epicurus' path of indulgence (not to be mistaken for the blither of the Cyrinaics and that buffoon Arristipus!) or to undertake more "ambitious" activities, I found myself caught between responsibility and respite. I would often seek escape from the streets of scholarship in the forests of the surrounding mountains. In the silence of the shadows I found clues. I sought perspective with open eyes and an open mind, but my horizons were frequently muddled by distractions ranging from mundane financial concerns and international travel arrangements, to socializing and calamitous carousing.

As paradoxical as it may seem, the moment of clarity that would eventually lead to my deliverance from a pigeonholed sense of purpose did not come until I was, for all intents and purposes, completely lost in the mire.

When the last whit of reason seemed to have retreated—once all hope of finding happiness in the humdrum had been lost—only then was I ready and able to acknowledge and accept the new possibilities on the distant horizon.

It took a genuine condemnation, a full throated embrace of the absurd, and an absolute acceptance of the ceaseless change that is the cornerstone of life.

*******

I was gradually enlightened to the value of life’s details—I began noticing the beauty, appreciating the significance and understanding the nature of the phenomena that fill our lives, and I also began to grasp the fundamental structure of how I (mis)understood everything around me—it was as if the sky cleared and the sun began to shine on a world full of fresh opportunity, mountains in the distance...

I climbed through the Slovenian Alps with my friend, sliding down avalanches of pebbles into nooks a valleys, peering over the edges of an abyss into a sea of clouds. Nothing could touch us. I was alone next to him, always on my own path, and I was heading the same direction, but to a different destination.  We have not spoken for years.

The world I descended into was ripe, though not for my picking, and in those months of recovery I found new ailments. Picking up bad habits is a hobby of mine, but I managed to leave behind a few and pick up only the best available. That said, while I was wandering through mountains, blind to all but what was inside of me, I was able to see myself for what I was becoming.  No one but myself could have convinced me of it, but it was true.  I was alone in a crowd and I was struggling to find purchase in the muck and filth of a path well trodden.

I needed to go, so I went, without hesitation.

Lost in the Dark; Looking for Light

Without the slightest inkling of doubt, I am confident of what I must do: I must, nay, I will, strive to remain en-route to my full potential.

Life has its ups and downs, of that there is no doubt, but timidity is nothing but fear manifest as action, or the lack there of, and who has the time for that? Instead, obviously, one must persist.
Hubris breeds contempt in its purest and most vicious form, so it seems clear that the only reasonable course of action is one of tenacity with a healthy dose of humility.

Though I try to conduct my interpersonal relations with scrupulous truthfulness, the fact is, I fail; in order to address that iniquity, I desperately need to engage in some profound intrapersonal exploration. I have, for too long, been at the beck and call of my desires. Much has been said, by many a wise man, of how desire is the root of all suffering. Desire, when left unchecked, leads invariably to spiritual (and financial) ruin. But, when harnessed appropriately--i.e., with prudence,  pragmatism and patience--acceptance and pursuit of desires can lead to untold insights and rewards, both in terms of one's material comforts as well as regarding one's personal character, thus serving as a catalyst for growth and fulfillment on multiple levels.  Desire is, indeed, the root of great suffering, but also of fulfillment of a different sort.

I am in no way advocating, or condoning, the frivolous vanity of the fast fashion, click-bait culture or anything like the greedy self-aggrandizing that is instantiated in everything from luxury cars and boats, to high-tech gadgets and gawdy accessories that serve hardly any purpose (other than to distract both their owners and observers with the petty insubstantiality of a little glitz).

Remember, "all that glitters is not gold."

Although I truly intend on seeking out my muse and pursuing my passions with gusto, I am utterly lost...

I cannot see any light in this vast dimness; it may be a tunnel, closed on the sides, leading me to the destiny that I have created for myself, or, then again, I may indeed be as lost as I feel in the abyss that is the status quo.

...

If found, please return to reality.