Waiting pt 2

I threw my bag over the fence and climbed over after it. I pitched my tent in the rain while the stray dogs took cover under a small overhang nearby. It was mid-afternoon. I sat in the tent, reading “The Grapes of Wrath” and playing solitaire until I fell asleep later that night. The first day of waiting was over, and there was no sign of Adi and Ed.

It rained through the night and into the next day. I stayed in my tent, hopeful that Adi and Ed would see the tent and recognize it as mine. I waited patiently, while the rain hammered the roof of the tent and the floor seams started to leak water. I sat and read. I took naps. I ate the small amount of food that I had carried with me. Boredom and loneliness were starting to set in. Still Adi and Ed didn’t come.

On the third day of waiting I left the tent. My sleeping bag had become wet with rainwater. My book was soaked. I didn’t want to sit in the tent anymore. I unzipped the opening and stepped out into the persistent rain. Two dogs that had been investigating the area around the tent scurried away, their ribs pressing out against their mangled fur and their tails hanging low. The beach was only a few blocks away, so I climbed the fence and walked to it.

As I walked down the beach, soaked and shaking with cold, I reflected back to the expectations that I had had for this trip. I had set out from home determined to see the world. I had been so convinced that I would be gone a long time that I had quit my job. Believing that we wouldn’t see each other again for at least a couple years, my girlfriend and I had broken up. I envisioned circling the globe, learning and working as I went. I pictured picking apples on a farm in France, riding camels through the deserts of Morocco, and sailing a boat through the Pacific Isles.

I was 19 and free to do whatever I wanted. Determined to prove my independence, I had decided to leave home and let my insticts be my guide. A solo trip around the world without the assistance of anyone. No guidebooks, no reservations, no plans; just a one-way ticket to Rome. It had sounded so good.

Now, just three weeks after I left the U.S., I was exhausted, lonely, and out of money. My back was sore from carrying an overstuffed backpack that was filled with enough survival gear to climb Mt. Everest. My stomach was empty. I had lost ten pounds in three weeks. I was stranded in a strange city, sharing the overgrown backyard of an abandoned building with a pack of stray dogs. This wasn’t an apple orchard in France. This wasn’t sailing the Pacific. This was terrible.

I spotted a payphone through the rain from a quarter mile away. At once I knew I had a new decision to make. Arriving at the phone, I picked up the receiver and made a collect call.

“Hello?”

“Hey dad, it’s Adam!”

“Hey, buddy, how are you?

“Oh, I’m great dad. I’m really having a good time.”

We talked for a few minutes before I told him I had to get off and continue exploring this interesting new town. We said goodbye, I hung up, and started to walk back to my muddy purgatory. Then I paused, turned around, returned to the phone and made another call.

“Hello?”

“Dad…”

“Yeah buddy?”

“I want to come home”

Years later I recalled my disastrous visit to Bari to a group of friends and someone asked what the moral of the story was. “The moral?” I asked, stumped. Then it dawned on me. “It’s better to risk everything for a chance to move forward than it is to risk nothing and stay with yesterday’s comforts.”

As for Adi and Ed, I never found out if they showed up or not. If they did, I hope they brought raincoats.