Trying to plan an adventure with Mary

It’s looking as though Vacation 2008 will meet the same fate as Vacation 2007. Despite research that has our mouths watering, it never seems quite the right time to start packing bags. I went ahead and scheduled knee surgery in the middle of last summer, figuring I wasn’t going anywhere anyhow because of pain, whether arthritis or rehab.

My hunch was right. And while I brag a lot about how much better I am, almost a year later, I’m only just now ready for extensive walking and climbing cathedral towers.

Our daughter Mary (a.k.a. our German daughter) wants to spend some time in France this year and kept looking for summer language courses to save money by consolidating travel and accommodations. She searched out ways for us to join her until I finally told her to make her own plans because it doesn’t look like we’ll be there this year either. If it turns out we can, we’ll just figure out ways to get together with her. A lot of our putting her off has to do with the changes going on at our church this summer. I’ve confessed before that I don’t handle change real well, and these are heart-wrenching.

How on earth did we get off on that tangent? I was trying to share with you Mary’s vacation plans. In an e-mail dated May 1 she greeted her dad:

“Today is May Day, Ascension Day, Labor Day – and was fairly recently declared Father's Day. Here's to you! Hope you are feeling better.

“I got a few days off, rode back to Gelsenkirchen with [Significant Other, Rainer] on the Rhine train. Always a treat even though it takes an hour longer.

“We went to the new Zoom Zoo in Gelsenkirchen today. They replaced the dinky affair they had with two big areas named Alaska and Africa; Asia will open next year. Lots of space and not too many animals, but nicely laid out, especially for kids.”

She suggested that if Europe is too stressful for us (ouch!) we could drive the East Coast of North America and revisit some places we took Mary and her sisters when they were very young. I think she forgets the distances involved (read “money”) and how bad mosquitoes and black flies can be.

“In Europe, there may be a more relaxed, river cruise from Berlin to Prague (Havel and Elba),” she wrote. “Or cruise along the Croatian coast, either with the local little motorized sailboats, or a more regular cruise starting in Venice. Some go further to Greece, and one stops at the ancient city of Ephesus, in Turkey.

“Or a more classic tour of Italy, if you can stand the heat or if you have air conditioning to return to. Or maybe a French course on the French coast where it's cooler, in La Rochelle or Brittany.

“Guess I should go to bed. I'm back in Mannheim and have rehearsals tomorrow.”

I’ve lost count of how many opera companies Mary has worked for since she won her first Fulbright Grant in 1984. Most of her moves were either dissatisfaction where she was or because someone she respects has recommended her.

If she takes a new job more than an hour’s train ride from Gelsenkirchen, she finds a room or two somewhere in the new town. Then comes minimal furnishing (God bless the patient Rainer), and countless bags and boxes hauled to the new place. She has an old futon that Dave and I can (just barely) sleep on.

She still pays her share of their apartment in Gelsenkirchen (a wonderful flat – except for the five flights of stairs), plus the cost of living in Mannheim. At least she lives only a five-minute walk from the theater there, and breaks even, she says. Fortunately for her future, her German pension plan is generous.

Last week:

“Hell has broken loose, since I guess Germany won and is in the [soccer] finals. But with a 20 percent Turkish population, Mannheim wouldn't be much quieter if they had won. Both my bedroom and living room face the street. Fortunately the windows are pretty good, although it's hot and humid when they're closed.

“The other houses are so close that we have to keep the windows closed when we practice. Played some songs and arias with one of our sopranos tonight in a nice museum I haven't visited yet. After we ended, I went to my sport studio [gym], and then practiced some at the theater, taking advantage of all the noise outside to go on past 11, when we're supposed to stop.

“Wagner is nothing compared to the autos whooping.”

She loves to plan. “We'll leave for Italy on July 19, going over the St. Bernadino pass or tunnel to Aosta, near Mont Blanc. Then a week in a farmhouse with studio apartments, south of Turin in the wine hills, with an Italian course for me in the morning. Rainer will check out the nearest train station [his hobby is photographing railroad engines] and we'll explore in the afternoon.

“Then Grenoble, probably for a week in the Auvergne. For the third week, starting Aug. 3, I found a chateau in Roanne, near Lyon, with room and board, and a French class for me (instead of the school in nearby Vichy).

“I am making a quick trip to Gelsenkirchen to go to my tax guy on Friday. Then Rainer will come back with me for my last few weeks of the season in Mannheim. A lot to do right now at the theater….”