At some point Chevy Chase did a tragicomedy movie called, “European Vacation” in which everything that could go wrong, did. Doug’s and my long-anticipated and planned-for trip for our daughter’s and son-in-law’s Big Serbian Wedding was not to play out as we’d hoped. As the best laid plans tend to, things went awry.
When things really don’t go the way I want them to, and it looks like the worst thing happens, I tend to get metaphysical about it. If everything really happens for my good, then I have to trust that and look for the blessings. I mean, actually LOOK. Walk my talk, if you will. If God is all, then just where is Source when the shit hits the fan?
Our European Adventure began with a 2-night stop in Amsterdam, a mixture of jetlag and amazing sightseeing. Doug’s sister Missy joined us, and we took a canal cruise of the city followed by trips through neighborhoods including the Red-Light district and famous coffee houses where one can purchase hashish and loose joints.
We followed this with a short flight to Belgrade and a night in Belgrade at the Hotel Moskva. The next morning, we were back at Nicola Tesla airport for a trip to the jewel of the Balkans, Montenegro, where we were to relax at our waterfront 4-star hotel, taking in good food, sunshine, and the luxury of being waited on. It was not too hot outside during the day and the evenings were balmy. It was good to be there with Dima and Roxanne, the nuptial couple, Missy and Azar (Doug’s former bride), and the always Fun Couple: Arturo and Tyler.
Our first night in Montenegro was beautiful. We ate al fresco in the shadow of an ancient fort while the sun set, and a soft breeze came off the Adriatic Sea. It felt good to be alive.
The next morning, I woke up sick with an overall body malaise including headache, nausea, vertigo, and exhaustion. You get the picture. And it didn’t go away in 24 or 48 or 72 hours. Our darkened hotel room at Hotel Perla was where I spent most of my time in Montenegro until it was time to return to Belgrade.
Doug was honor/duty-bound to spend most of his time with me while I slept, sometimes pedaling the Hotel Perla bicycle down the long promenade to find some sort of medicine to relieve what ailed me. We both missed out on a boat trip, touring, and just laying around in the shade and the breeze watching the warm blue Adriatic Sea.
My COVID test came out negative, though.
On day 5 in Montenegro, I was coming around physically and felt lucky for it because we had to fly back to Belgrade. It was time to get together with all the other travelling wedding guests as well as Dima’s parents, so we gathered at the tiny airport with the holidaying hoards, backbone to bellybutton, off to our next destination.
We spent the first couple of days in Belgrade touring a tremendous fort and enjoying the company of all our fellow weddinggoers, who were rolling in from abroad. Our crowd of travelers swelled to 15, and everyone was happy to be there and enjoying the socializing and meals together. Serbia’s history is peppered with wars, the most recent of which was about 20 years ago, so it was interesting to be amongst those natives with marked experiences and witness the different cultural perspectives those experiences have had on Serbian people.
I was privileged to be a part of the immediate family wedding photo shoot with Roxanne, Dima, and their parents. It didn’t occur to me that I was an extra, mostly because I wasn’t made to feel that way by anyone. Kinship ran through all of us in a way that I’m grateful for. It’s good to feel a part of something bigger than oneself.
Then came the day for THE BIG FIELD TRIP in Serbia that Dima’s family planned for all of us. It was two days before the wedding when eighteen of us, family, wedding party and guests from the US piled into a van that took us a couple of hours out of Belgrade to Viminacium park, a place where we could see ancient Roman ruins being excavated, mammoth skeletons, and have fun with the on-site fitness course and zip line. It was a great plan.
Doug was feeling poorly in our seats at the back of the van that morning on the hour and a half ride, and we brushed it off to being car sick. He felt better once we were out of the van, but still queasy. I chose to watch while most everyone else participated in the obstacle course and rode the zip line. It was almost time for lunch when Dima, the groom, took his turn to ride the zip line. Doug was recording Dima’s ride on a phone when the huge wooden pole that held up the zip line on the far end snapped in half and fell forward. Dima fell about 20 feet to the ground about two thirds of the way through the ride.
He lay on the ground on his back, and I kept expecting him to get up. The fall didn’t appear to be that far, and he was moving his legs as if preparing to stand. People from our group began running to where Dima lay. There were 3 MD’s and an RN in our party and word was that he was in considerable pain and couldn’t get up. A Serbian ambulance from a nearby power plant arrived and took Dima off, along with his bride and his mother, to a hospital for further diagnosis and treatment.
Long story short: Though not seriously and permanently injured, Dima was in excruciating pain with fractured vertebrae and tailbone. Any position but supine for any period of time was out of the question.
The Big Serbian Wedding and reception on a party boat cruising the Danube were officially cancelled that day, and Doug tested positive for COVID. The bride and groom were confined to their suite at the Hotel Moskva, and Doug and I followed suit in Room 404 and extended our stay another 6 days of quarantine. Love and honor bound, I skipped the sightseeing and partying with the other guests and quarantined with my husband while he rested and watched westerns on Serbian television while dining on room service. It was my turn to visit the pharmacy.
Our trip to Florence, much anticipated, was cancelled. It was, for me, a dashed dream, being there with Doug, but I accepted it and told myself that there’s an upside to it that we just don’t see…yet. And I was actively looking for it, because C’mon. This sucks.
After a week of quarantine Doug was feeling well enough to travel and do the three days we had planned in Rome, and we left Belgrade on WizzAir. That’s another story but suffice to say that no matter the base fare on WizzAir, plan on spending at least 3 times that on seats and luggage.
And the 3 days in Rome were wonderful. We felt good, we ate well, and we walked and talked and saw some amazing things. Doug is my all-time favorite person, and we had a blast together. We did get three magical days in a row.
Leaving Rome, we did an overnight in Keflavik, Iceland to break up the journey home at a very unique and hospitable guesthouse before an arduous passage through the airport in Keflavik and flight to Seattle.
So, the upshot of the European vacation is that people, places and things didn’t show up the way we’d planned. But I don’t want to chalk the vacation up to a bad trip.
I think that if we pay attention to what’s happening around us and how it affects our head and heart spaces, especially when things go “wrong”, we can choose to show up in a different way than when things go our way. It’s an opportunity to ask, “What am I being brought here for? How do I show up for what’s occurring?”
Am I choosing to feel sorry for myself and other people, and perpetuate some kind of victimhood with that line of thinking? Do I act like everything’s okay and brush aside my disappointment? Or do I make a choice to move into acceptance of the situation while still honoring the sadness of hopes dashed?
Where do I want my attention to go? Which of the infinite possibilities of perspectives will I take? It’s easy to fall into the familiar pattern of focusing on what’s negative. It’s a human survival instinct we’ve honed since the beginning of our species, and we love to talk to ourselves and others about our misfortune ad nauseum. It keeps us stuck and it’s boring.
Somehow, I needed to look at these series of misfortunes and disappointments in a way that I could use the catalysts for some kind of growth and understanding to give meaning other than bad luck. I have to believe that there are no mistakes in the lessons that life serves to each of us. Our lessons are tailor-made to teach us something we need to know. What that something is, is up to each of us to figure out. And I know from experience that every misfortune holds the golden promise of benefits, even if those benefits take years to recognize. Sometimes I get it right away, but more often than not I’m a slow learner, only seeing the beauty of God’s plan until much later.
If I can step away from myself enough to objectively observe the feelings that arise and remind myself that it’s my choice to accept things as they are, in all the perfect mess that it is, I can go easier on myself and my expectations of myself and the world around me. I can find the beauty in what is if I look for it.
Can I expand to be more receptive to people, places, and situations that aren’t behaving as I would have them? Can I just pay attention and practice being the witness, again and again and again, and observe my reactions and responses, again and again and again, until I start to have an idea where I need to let go? What is it in me that is disturbed? Where does that come from? Can I hold it up for healing?
And by letting go, I mean accepting and finding the good in what’s happening now. There’s humor, always, although wry, and always something to be grateful for, even if it’s only someone who smiles at you on the street. Moment by moment, circumstance by circumstance, we have a choice in how to perceive life and how to show up for it. Where will I choose to put focus? What facets will I choose to grow?
We all inherently want to give back to this life and serve in some way. So many wonderful things happen to be grateful for, yet we focus on what goes wrong. It’s human nature, but if we soften our thinking and veer away from our dedication to victimhood, we can re-orient ourselves and know a different kind of perspective and freedom.