There is an urban myth with some science to back it up which I always feared would lead to alcoholism if I ever believed it enough to try.  On the morning after you’ve had more alcohol than wisdom might ever whisper encouragement of, it is best to pound a can of beer.  A pilsner like Pabst or Bittburger would be best, never a 211 Steel Reserve or Mickeys Ice; just a primer to wake up one’s liver and to have it communicate to the brain that seeing straight really is preferable to having one’s breakfast spun all over the floor of the Denny’s bathroom.

I am composing this on Sunday morning.  Three mornings ago I caught the 4:40 AM bus at Termini Station, Rome to take me to Fiumicino Airport for my flight home to Seattle.  I didn’t think it was possible to be tired of travelling, not for me.  I have always had a mocking tone to my sympathy for friends of mine who complain about having to fly Seattle to Washington D.C., D.C. to Austin, Austin to Philadelphia, Philadelphia to Seattle, all in the same week.  “You poor dear,” my tone implies “how awful to have to see three great cities in one week.  Is there no end to the sacrifices we must make for the sake of our careers?”

I can appreciate now the limited joy of travel.  There is a comfort and rejuvenating effect to being in one, known, predictable place for some days.  The shower is hot, the toilet works, the bed is yours, choose your own coffee mug.  The scars in the sidewalks could never trip your well trained feet, the neighbors are reliably hostile, friendly or benign as you recall, you are in a world you helped to create and then chose to inhabit.

At home we buy into the madness and sanity every day, sacrificing excitement for control.  Travel is the taking of sweets into the mouth, chewing, washing down with pear nectar; a moment to moment sour stomach making pint of ice cream, the lid discarded, the spoon becoming sticky down to the handle.  Eventually you get tired of licking your fingers, can’t stay ahead of the warming treat, and begin looking for a place to set the spoon down.  By the time I left Rome I was so very ready for a clean pair of underwear.

And now I am home.

Rome is like a giant treasure chest, the coins piled one on top of the other in a disorganized heap. Take a handful of thin, gold disks off of the top and inspect them closely for a short time.  Or discard the first handful for the layer below or the layer below that.  In time, you would realize that there is more treasure than one person can scoop up in handfuls, more to the heap than is possible to catalog or appreciate.

My hostel is located on Via Cavour, which is one of the main streets near Termini Roma; the end of the line for any trains travelling in the direction of Rome.  I went in search for coffee on my first morning here and, seeing a staircase, decided to climb the steps.  Stairs are always worth taking, offering at the very least a new perspective.  At the top of this particular staircase was a church named Basilica di San Pietri in Vincoli or The Basilica of Saint Peter in Chains.  Inside this church were the first sculptures by Michelangelo Bounarroti that I have ever seen in person.  

Moses sits aloof, looking off to the left, holding the tablets under his right arm as he plays with the tangles of his beard between his fingers.  His hair is a loose bed of unkempt curls with two odd protrusions peeking out of the crown like horns; his face that of a young man.  His beard is an impressive series of silken ropes beginning just above his jaw-line which are easily of a length to be tucked into his waistband.  He seems confident, patient, and sure yet tired somehow.  You really must come and see him for yourself.

I am sitting on the bed I’ve rented at a hostel in Rome.  I am going to take my final leg home from Europe in two more days.  I feel like I am heading into the unknown even more so than I was a year ago.  If a fish can be happy to travel with the whims of the ocean in its ever surging and chaos spreading form, knowing that it will have a home in the ocean and food enough, then I can be happy in the arms of God.

Saying goodbye to my Albanian family did not feel entirely dishonest, but it did not feel as clean as the period at the end of a sentence either.  A cornerstone has been laid for a house for me in Albania; will I ever return to complete the house I’ve begun there?  Is it my lot in life to have a home at all?  Will I find myself planted firmly like a precious, rooting seed when God’s preparation of me is complete?  I could make a happy life for myself among the people of Albania.  Is a happy life the life for me?

Journey and sail with wind or against it, break the kite-string and fly off into lightning and savage excitement.  There is more to living than I ever expected.  Life is so abundant with God.

Duomo means cathedral in Italian.  Contained within the word is the idea of “house,” (domus in Latin) the house of God.  How ornate might God’s own dwelling be if we were to imagine that God had come to live on Earth?  We know that Jesus lived his first moments among animals in a barn.  As a man, he was a vagabond, taking his rest in ships and in the houses of friends and acquaintances.  After his ascension, it seems that barns, boats and simple dwellings would no longer do.

I have come to understand the opulence of these gigantic “houses” as a lasting sign of respect and thankfulness, in the tradition of the temple of Solomon.  The human mind is so small, so inadequate in its capacity to understand the creator of all things.  It is not enough to imagine that God already dwells in all places and at all times; knowing that the mountains, forests, seas and valleys are more beautifully created than anything we might ever design and bring to completion.  The idea is beautiful though: building a house for God.

And the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunto is just that.  It is the finest creation that human kind could design in the years 1063.  It is supremacy, wealth, prosperity and security in the shape of a giant crucifix.  It is easy to get lost in the artistry contained within.  The ceiling is an endless sea of gold on black carvings or castings which flow into a spiraling oil scene of Heaven.  It is craft articulated to the finest point.

As a builder, I also found the Baptistery to be very impressive.  After making my way inside, I simply sat for a minute to get my sense for the size of the place.  It is adorned simply.  The floor has the symmetry of a spider web with lines of black which continue horizontally onto the walls, support columns, and archways.  The black stripes can also be found in other churches in Pisa and on some coats of arms affiliated with the city.

Pausing to appreciate the vigilant, patient craftsmanship that my feet were treading on, the soothing pattern of the unpredictably light and dark carrara marble all around me; I was satisfied to stand for awhile, absorbing.  Some classic creations are nearly as rich in craft as the Word.

After having written about my experience as a traveler star struck by a famous building, I wanted to give at least a token account of the home to that building; the little city of Pisa.  Pisa, like Assisi, is a button of an Italian treasure which it is possible to see entirely in one day.  It would take years of study, however, to understand the importance of Pisa to the history of the Italian people and its effect on the Mediterranean.  I encourage you to research as you have interest.

Pisa has the feel of a small town like so much of Italy.  Most cafes and restaurants do not take credit cards and the citizens I met had little understanding of languages other than their native Italian.  It is a place where things change slowly and that is likely too fast for most of the inhabitants.  If you were to drop 3,000 years of world history on my mother’s home town of Yakima, Washington; you would have Pisa. 

There are extensive remains of an ancient city wall with numerous intact archways and sections of elevated aqueduct marking the old border of the town’s reach.  The heart of Pisa is its center of heritage; the Piazza del Duomo.  Named for the crucifix-shaped cathedral in the center of the grounds, the square also has baptistery and,of course, a bell tower.  The Duomo is the most impressive of the three structures by far; the “Leaning Tower of Pisa” was an afterthought to the cathedral, and was never intended to be the center of attention.

I have not done any research on this point, but the “Leaning Tower of Pisa” must be one of the most recognizable monumental buildings in the world.   I know that in Seattle it is not uncommon for there to be a photograph of the bell tower of the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta hanging on the wall somewhere in an Italian restaurant.  I know of it like I know of the Eiffel Tower; foreign and hugely famous.

People travel from all over the world to have their picture taken in front of the bell tower in some comic, benign or obscene way.  I never expected to visit Pisa myself.  I am a traveler who enjoys seeing new cities and getting my bearings of a place first hand.  A visit to Pisa was certainly not on any kind of list.  I am here today because I need to be in Tirana tomorrow, and coming from Stockholm through Pisa will save me around two-hundred dollars.  

That said, the Leaning Tower of Pisa has been an idea in my head since I was a boy.  It is one of the few things about Italy which I have always had some projected knowledge of; like the space shuttle in Florida or great white sharks in Australia.  I had no idea how deep an imprint the tower had made in my brain before today.  This afternoon, as I was descending the off-kilter spiral staircase around the tower I began to laugh and was inexplicably elated.  

“I am in the Leaning Tower of Pisa,” I told myself.  I may well have been walking atop the Great Wall of China, parachuting out of an airplane or shaking hands with Clint Eastwood.  Life is so truly wonderful and surprising at times, it is difficult to feel anything but joy and excitement at the prospect of living until tomorrow.

There is a cultural phenomena known as the Seattle Freeze in my home city of Seattle, Washington. This metaphorical allusion refers to the attitude of Seattleites towards people they do not know, or have only recently met.  As Seattle has many thousands of citizens who have migrated from other parts of the US, and many thousands who have left Seattle for a short time to attend university in other parts of the country before returning, it is impossible to know who initially coined the term or whence they originated.

My mentor and friend Kurt Plagenhoef believes that this phenomena is entirely related to the geographic location of a place; that throughout the world warmer places have “warmer” people.  Southern hospitality can only be appreciated by someone who has experienced the opposite of it.  Having just come from Albania, where an invitation to coffee (1 to 3 hours of intimate conversation in a person’s home or other private setting where his wife and other family members might be present) from a virtual stranger is not uncommon, to Stockholm has given me eyes to see.

A warning to my readers as I attempt to broadly generalize a major city and its population in a few sentences with only my limited experience to guide me.  Stockholm is much larger than Seattle, much wealthier, and much, much older, but the attitude of the two peoples towards strangers is similar.  The people here are very polite in a functional way, acting out of an expectation of being treated in kind.  The people of Seattle are only functionally kind aswell.

There seems to be a reluctance to extend the hand of friendship, to close the distance between, to smile or even acknowledge the existence of me as we pass each other on the sidewalk.  I find myself making clear eye contact with other men, nodding to them or saying “Hej,” (Swedish for hello) and their response is no response.  They simply stare into and past me like one who has already had their energies exhausted by a particularly irksome and challenging interloper.

Some time ago NPR reported on an ad-hock experiment which took place in the Washington D.C. subway in 2007.  The Washington Post reported that world famous violinist Joshua Bell had played before an open instrument case for 45 minutes to whomever should happen by.  At the end of his performance, Mr. Bell had been tipped around $27 dollars and no one had lingered to listen long.  Bell sells out entire concert halls in cities all over the world, and yet his gift was squandered when offered for free.

Dublin is a musical city with a tradition of producing some great talent.  In the bars of the Temple Bar neighborhood on any given night you will find professional level acts performing live for their whiskey and Smithwick’s sipping patrons.  As I was perusing a table of used books on Friday afternoon, I heard the steady, soothing flits of a young man singing.  I took my seat on a honed-granite step and enjoyed the music for a set.

At the conclusion of his performance, I met Iron Fin(n?).  I have since searched the web to match some of his lyrics with famous songs.  Ed Sheeran is the only name I’ve been able to harvest.  Having good art around a city is like having good tasting water out of a tap or blooming flowers within view.  Is it essential to life?  I suppose that depends on how one chooses to define life.

At a coffee shop in Dublin on Saturday the 25th I met a person travelling from Toronto, Canada.  I mentioned that I had only seen the city of Dublin since arriving in Ireland, and that I would like to see some of the countryside.  The young woman proposed that I take the train north to a little fishing village on the coast.  I recently began actively looking for more opportunities to put the travel advice of strangers to use.  Naturally, I soon found myself aboard a train for Howth.

At this time of year beauty is springing up from everywhere in Ireland.  Howth is a little town which would be at home on the Oregon coast or in Puget Sound.  Once getting there I found it possible to take one of four predetermined hiking routes around the peninsula. An older gentleman warned me that I would need my rain jacket, but that turned out to be advice for another day.  Saturday was one of the fairest days I’ve seen in my travels.

While in Ireland I found myself singing wherever I went.  Sinead O’connor, The Pogues, and Brett Dennen all provided lyrics for me as I walked about.  Ireland leads itself to both joy and melancholy, hope and sadness.  A ballad can be in one moment optimistic, and at the next sorrowful.  Ireland is going through a decade with a bit of both feelings at present.

I did not come to any great conclusions as I walked along the cliff-top trail.  The ocean was the ocean; wild and without master, loud and full of energy.  The grasses too were just as they always are; flexible, bending with the wind, beautiful and temporary.  And I was Joshua; a curious man without anchor or purpose in this time.

There is a cold and rainy city called Seattle, which is located in Washington State in the U.S.  I might have thought that living in such a place would prepare me for the cold and rainy city of Dublin.  I might have thought wrong.  I found myself waking up around 5AM most mornings, without anything to do until the hour of 7.  Walking without shelter for hours at a time in a Dublin where the sun has yet to rise will remind one of that time they forgot their windbreaker on a hike above the frost-line in the Olympics.

Dublin is littered with old churches, angry youth, monuments to fine artists, pubs with gilded signage, and emigrant workers from all over our world.  I enjoy cosmopolitan cities because I always feel like I fit in while touring there.  In a homogeneous place like Kiev or Bizerte, a foreigner can be a point of fascination with the natives; like an exotic hominid walking among his human betters.  French, Mexican, German, Mozambican, Brazilian, and Canadian permit-workers and other visitors give Dublin an almost Istanbul-like feel.

Dublin combines the hustle of New York City with the literary tradition and vision of Ljubljana, the flat expanse of Rome with the confused streets of Brussels.  It is a delightful and unpredictable mix of tradition and modern influences.  It does not bear its scars openly, but the motif of suffering is an inescapable part of Irish identity.  It is a place of music, poetry, desperation, heart-break, genius and faith.