A Postscript: Thank You, Brenda Riggs

In the late 1980’s I was transferred to Sparrows Point Middle School and assigned to a classroom next door to a high school classmate of mine named Brenda Riggs. I have Brenda to thank for several things including almost weekly practical joke battles and general foolishness that can make a job seem like play, and I probably did thank her for allowing me the opportunity to transform into Dickensian bad-boy, Bill Sikes in one of her stage productions, but none of that compares to what she did for me without even knowing she did it. She introduced me to Jim Canavan.

Jim, 1992

Jim was Brenda’s student teacher or Brenda was Jim’s cooperating teacher, but either way one thing was for certain: Jim’s personality could not have been more mismatched than it was with Brenda’s. I’m not quite sure, but I think the two of them were the original source of the expression “oil and water.” Six months later I was the department chair, and Brenda had moved on. When the principal asked me if I could recommend anyone to take her spot, I did not hesitate. We found him working at a sports camp in Maine, and with the help of the BCPS Human Resources he joined us full time. To celebrate, off to Europe he went.

Jim and Ev in den Haag (2012)

I am convinced that most people confuse destiny with dumb luck. Jim doesn’t make that mistake. When he knocked on the door of a fellow camp counselor who had invited him to the Netherlands, Jim met the woman who would change his life. As Eveline pieced together the story, she realized that although her brother had invited Jim to visit, he was on holiday in Italy. She became Jim’s tour guide. The rest, as they say, is history.

During the next two years Jim and I worked together, and Eveline moved to America to be with him. When I was promoted to Catonsville High School as an administrator, Jim and Ev began their career in international schools. Although they returned to Maryland long enough for Ev to get her teaching certificate (and for Jim and me to work together once again), their experiences overseas would lead them to Brazil, Venezuela, Egypt, Cambodia, and the Netherlands.

1992 (w Paul, Chris, Jesse)

If you ask Jim to describe our friendship, I know what he would say because I would say the same things. If you asked him what memories he would share, I guarantee he would tell you about tennis racquets, and canoes, and soccer balls, and beer glasses. He would include our friends Paul Muller and Chris Battaglia, and he would be sure to thank the people like Don Mohler and Pat Brown who gave him priceless opportunities in Maryland schools. He would tell about trips to New York including the time Paul, Don, Jim, and I asked a gas station operator for directions to Yankee Stadium. He looked over the four of us and instead of answering the question said, “Well, the big one will probably be all right and the little guy can run away…” (On that same trip a soda vendor grew tired of getting hit by ice being thrown at her. She slammed down her tray of drinks on the rail behind me and screamed, “I will fuck you up!” I ducked, covered my head, and whispered to Don asking if he thought she meant me.)

w/ Don and Paul in Yankee Stadium

Jim would describe several canoe trips on the upper Potomac. He might even remember the evening when bike riders using the C&O canal rode by us as we drew water from a well with a hand pump. We still laugh at the notion of one rider saying to the other, “Honest to God! The little one was washing the big one’s back!”

And there’s no doubt that Jim would talk about the canoe trip when Paulie joined us as we chaperoned fifteen high school soccer players. To this day Jim swears that the success they enjoyed on the pitch came from three days on the river. Always trailing the flotilla, on one occasion when we rounded a bend in the river we found their six canoes unattended on the riverbank while they explored one of the summer cottages along the river. Using their poor judgment as a teachable moment, we took all of their paddles and left them behind. Do not ask me how fifteen boys without paddles can catch three grown men with paddles, but they did. They swamped us.

Canoe camping on the Potomac

He might tell you about a day spent together walking through Cambodia’s Killing Fields, but he’s more likely to recount an evening at the Zeppelin Bar in Phnom Penh depleting their supply of Jack Daniels while unsuccessfully attempting to request something that old-school DJ didn’t have on vinyl! Maybe he would talk about several memorable evenings in Amsterdam, especially one when he and I joined hundreds of locals and tourists alike walking on the frozen canals.

If he talked long enough he might even describe an ineffably difficult conversation we had the first time we saw each other after his daughter, Julia died.

I wonder if he remembers a day soon after Eveline arrived in the USA when we all attended a basketball game at Patapsco High School. It became clear that uniquely American cultural mainstays such as drive-thru windows and supermarkets the sizes of small nations were entirely new to her. It was no wonder and just a little funny that as we sat and watched the action on the floor, Eveline wanted to know the purpose of the girls who were all dressed alike sitting courtside while occasionally standing and performing in unison. (Come to think of it, in my three years in Europe, I don’t remember seeing a cheerleader.)

Ev and Gwaz waiting for Sinterklaus

With Jim in Amsterdam

It’s easy to see why Jim loves Eveline. Heck, Gwaz and I love Eveline. Everybody loves Eveline. She was as patient with the weekly ping-pong tournaments at their house in Loch Raven as she was trying to help me countless times on the phone in Holland trying to buy groceries or turn on the washing machine or any other thing that confounded the heck out of me. For the last nine months it was my privilege to work just down the hall from her at ISA.  We even shared the weekly battle to get Feranmi to Dutch class on time! (By the way, he won.)

Just last summer as I sat in the kitchen of Jim and Eveline’s house at Deep Creek Lake in Maryland, Ev asked me if I would ever consider returning to ISA. I was adamant. Although I treasured my two previous tours in Holland, my overseas service was complete. Uhhh…yeah…about that…I have learned never to say never (again).

Twenty-six years down the road, saying “Thank you” to Jim and Eveline is getting repetitious. Eveline just smiles and says, “You’re welcome.” Jim always says, “Who loves you?”

I cannot count all the ways the two of them have made my life better, but I know one thing for sure: I need to tell Brenda Riggs something.

It’s Coming Back to Me, Pt. 3 (What Remains)

 Look up here, I’m in heaven.

       I’ve got scars that can’t be seen.

    I’ve got drama can’t be stolen.

Everybody knows me now…

                          —David Bowie, Lazarus, from Blackstar

At every European train station I’ve ever seen, there’s a “subway” or system of tunnels that allow travelers to change platforms. You get off the train, you go down, and whether you’re looking for another platform or the exit, you eventually go up again. In many, many stations, especially the ones in larger cities, escalators are available. In small towns such as those along the Amalfi Coast of Italy, good, old-fashioned stairs do the job. You get used to it. On the day we visited Riomaggiore, the first of the five villages of the Cinque Terre, as I approached the subway stairwell along with several hundred others, I came upon a tiny Italian lady with a large and loaded plastic bag at her feet, clearly imploring a man in front of her to help her down the stairs.

For some things you just don’t need a translator.  From behind, I laid my hand on her shoulder and picked up her bag. Raising her face to see me, she said, “Oohhh grazie. Grazie.” She took my arm.

As we slowly but carefully descended the stairs she expressed her extremely positive first impressions of me—OK, OK, who knows what she said, but whatever it was she said it all the way down the stairs. Once at the bottom, she let loose of my arm and reached for her bag. “Grazie,” she repeated.

Riomaggiore

Using one-fourth of my entire Italian vocabulary, I told her, “Preggo, preggo, but I’ll go with you.” I pointed at myself, then toward her, and then to somewhere up ahead. “I’ll help you. Which platform do you need?” I asked as if speaking slowly and emphasizing certain syllables would suddenly make her understand English.

Like I said, sometimes you just don’t need an interpreter.

“Due (two),” she said.

“Si, due. Si, me too, due!” I told her while pointing at my chest and to the sign above.

Then she said, “Ahh, grazie (something, something)” and we walked arm-in-arm up the steps to platform two. When she reached the next to last step she thanked me again and reached for her bag. Together we placed it on the platform directly in front of her. She turned to me, kissed her fingertips, and waved them toward me. Then she said, “Grazie, arrivederci.” (I smiled to myself when she used the back of her kissing hand to wave me away.) My task was done but not before I got me a “kiss” from a beautiful woman.

Manarola, Cinque Terre

Six weeks ago while having dinner with my cousin’s husband he asked me a question he’d asked me before: what will you take away? I think my Italian kiss is my answer, or better yet, my Italian kiss is an example of my answer. After nine months from home I’ll take with me an old-world charm that is pervasive in Europe. I will most assuredly take away a fond memory of that woman thanking me with a kiss, but I’ll also take the memories of countless strangers willing to help us find our way. I’ll take with me the connections I made with my colleagues, my students, and their parents after nine months at the International School of Amsterdam, and most of all I’ll take the assurance that my life is better—enriched in ways I can’t easily describe.

I’ll take the Christmas markets in Germany and Austria, Rembrandt’s art and that of Michelangelo, Munch and Klimt. I'll take the canals of Amsterdam and Venice, and the spectacular monuments to man’s faith in God from Rothenburg ob der Tauber to Oporto to Vienna to Florence. I’ll take the sight of the David and a tiny peek into the genius of Filippo Brunelleschi. I take with me the ability to say, “I lived in Europe, and I saw these things for myself.” It’s Coming Back to Me is my statement. It tells what Gwaz and I did. It captured what we saw. It reveals how I felt. 

Three days from home while laying face up on a Mediterranean beach (with Bowie playing in my ear buds) it all seemed to come back to me. Nine months of priceless memories—seemingly insignificant moments of extraordinary importance: watching Gwaz remember how to ride a two-wheeler; Tate handing me a chocolate heart of Valentine’s Day and assuring me it wasn’t given “in a weird way”; showing our adopted home to friends from home; the realization that on Christmas day at Vienna’s St. Stephen’s Cathedral we had “mistakenly” attended a high mass with a real-life, rock-star Cardinal presiding; hugging my colleagues for the last time; and yes, the sweet smile of gratitude that came with my Italian kiss.

Look up here, man. I'm in heaven.

                                           --Bowie

Ostia Antica

The Amphitheater at Osita Antica

We’ve been a lot of places in Europe, and we’ve seen some old stuff. Don’t get me wrong. I know there’s old like the Grand Canyon is old, and there’s old like the Gothic era paintings in the room after room of the Uffizi Gallery, but somewhere in between those two comes Osta Antica.

Storage urns for olive oil

 On the day we visited the 2300 year-old ruins of Ostia Antica, it occurred to me that every place in the world is old. Seriously, every step we take on this earth is on ground that is as old as everywhere else, right? The difference between most places and Ostia Antica is what remains.

Reportedly founded by Ancus Marcius, the fourth king of Rome, the settlement can be dated from the fourth century B.C., but the city that grew from the ancient beginnings was founded between the second and first centuries before Christ. The nearby canal, which allowed shipments from all over the Roman Empire to be transported to smaller boats for transport to Rome, was completed during the reign of Claudius (41-54 A.D.) Ostia reached its greatest prosperity under Trajan and Hadrian when massive construction projects were completed (including the Curia, the Basilica, and the Forum.) Apparently there were a number of reasons for Ostia’s steady decline and eventual collapse in the ninth century, and historians seem to agree that its downfall was prompted by the Vandal invasion in the fifth century.

Seeing the maze of foundations and partial walls alongside more complete structures such as the amphitheater was truly misleading.  Although there is no doubt that the ancient, sprawling city is Nirvana for archeologists, it was not until I saw artistic renderings of the magnificent buildings lost over time that I could better appreciate the gift of a tiny glimpse into Roman history.

Brunelleschi’s Dome

Paris has the Eiffel Tower, New York has the Empire State Building, London has Big Ben, and Florence has Brunelleschi’s Dome—the most recognizable part of what most people call “the Duomo” (the great cathedral, Santa Maria del Fiore).

Construction of the cathedral began one hundred years before construction of the dome was even considered. In fact, until the design competition of 1418, no one was sure how the massive dome could be completed. Filippo Brunelleschi became the man whose name is forever associated with Florence’s most recognizable architectural feature—his dome.

The story of the dome (or more correctly, two domes, one inside of the other), like Brunelleschi, is remarkable. Truly unprecedented in world history, Brunelleschi’s plan for completion of the dome called for no internal scaffolding or support on which or from which masons would build the two brick domes.

 

Brunelleschi admiring his dome

The architectural genius of Brunelleschi—a goldsmith and clockmaker by trade—called for eight teams of masons, each working on a different panel of the dome(s), to raise their separate portion so that they all converged at the top. Precise measurements of each successive layer of bricks, which were gradually diminishing, as the dome grew taller, required perfect horizontal and perpendicular coordination (while using the precise sloping inward angle).

Brunelleschi’s solution to this essential dilemma remains a mystery although in 1490 historian, Bartolomeo Scala theorized that Brunelleschi stretched a stiffened cord from the precise center point to mark the radius of the circle, which would mark the location and angle of each brick relative to the midpoint. He believed the cord was shortened in successive layers as the radius decreased from 70’ at the bottom to only 10’ at the top of the outer dome. Several theories exist regarding how Brunelleschi could have avoided slack in the cord, but no one has determined how he marked the centerline of the dome. (Consider this: wooden poles, like ship’s masts were used on smaller domes throughout Europe and the Middle East, but Brunelleschi’s dome would have required a tree the size of a California Redwood!)

A secretive, rather mysterious man, Brunelleschi was responsible for many, many contributing designs as well. For example, he created an ox-driven wench to lift massive sandstone “belts” hundreds of feet into the air (as well as more than 4,000,000 bricks). He designed the crane to lift and center the cupola and lantern that sit atop the outer dome. (He was even hired to design the massive—and massively unsuccessful—ship that carried and sank losing hundreds of tons of granite in the River Arno. He then designed the salvage efforts.)

Brunelleschi lived just long enough to see the cathedral consecrated by St. Antoninus, the Archbishop of Florence in 1446. He died one month later.

On a related note:

I’m on record regarding my thoughts on the connectivity of life. Get this:

Filipo Brunelleschi was a friend of renowned mathematician, Paolo Toscanelli. Having taught Brunelleschi the geometry of Euclid, Toscanelli was repaid years in ways that truly changed the world.

As a hermit-like loner, Toscanelli spent most of his adult life completing complex mathematical operations and studying the celestial heavens. In 1475 when given the chance to climb to the top of Brunelleschi’s dome, (with permission, of course) Toscanelli placed a bronze plate at the base of the lantern at the apex. Designed to direct the sun’s rays to the floor of the cathedral 300’ below, Toscanelli transformed the Duomo into a massive sundial. Due to the dome’s height and stability, Toscanelli’s “sundial” allowed him to gain unprecedented knowledge of the sun’s motions (and that of the earth traveling around it) resulting in greater accuracy of the summer solstice and vernal equinox (which made the church people happy because it resulted in a more accurate determination of the date of Easter each year).

Toscanelli’s “sundial went beyond that. In the modern age of global positioning it might be easy to forget that maritime navigation, especially in the vastness of the open ocean, was once a very tricky and often lethal business. Long-range navigation was accomplished with the aid of an astrolabe, an instrument that astronomers used to calculate the position of the sun and other stars relative to the horizon. By 1252 Spanish astronomers had compiled the Alfonsine Tables, which were used by sailors to calculate relative positions. Two hundred years later, navigation was still dependent on the Tables, and inaccuracies made trans-oceanic travel dubious at best. Toscanelli was able to correct and refine the Alfonsine Tables through the data collected by his “sundial.”

As far back as 1459 Toscanelli interviewed a number of Portuguese sailors familiar with India and the west coast of Africa in an attempt to create an accurate world map. In 1474 Toscanelli was convinced that access to India was possible via the Atlantic. His pleas to the king of Portugal fell on deaf ears, but in 1481 a Genoese sea captain named Christopher Columbus contacted Toscanelli regarding his theory. (Toscanelli estimated the distance at approximately 6,500 miles. It's more like 25,000. Hey, even Babe Ruth struck our some of the time.)

Despite Columbus’s claim that neither maps not mathematics were of any use to him, there is very little doubt that Columbus’s historic voyages were made possible because of Toscanelli’s calculations taken from data compiled under Brunelleschi’s dome.