There was so much more -- so much more -- today that, at 11:59, I don't care to cover. But this was the most insignificant event of the day.
Wypasiona Dolina Plus
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Trzy Korony
Climbing mountains is something my mind loves but my body questions. Ever since I seriously injured my knee about 25 years ago hiking in the Tatra Mountains, I’ve been wary of mountains. The way up is not the issue. In fact, it’s a great relief sometimes to be heading up. No, it’s the way down – that crash! crash! crash! against the knees. Almost 190 pounds dropping on knees time and time again.
So when we started our trek up to Trzy Korony today, I was a little concerned about the effect it might have on my knee. I was more concerned when I saw just how steep it was. Fortunately, we all made it fine.
And I'm so exhausted that I can't say much more than that about the whole day.
First Saturday
Originally, the plan was to meet with K's brother's family and head out for an adventure on the Dunajec River this afternoon after a morning hike around the Three Crowns Mountains. But in fairly typical Podhale fashion, the weather turned suddenly overcast, threatening rain. We decided it wasn't worth it: what's the point of hiking up a mountain if you can't see any views? And we always have tomorrow.
So since we were all up (meaning, the adults and the Boy) early, we went ahead and had an early breakfast. And as we had nothing else to do in the morning, I went out for a walk in the hilly fields just west of the village.
I saw a gentleman sweeping hay from the floor of his barn with an old-fashioned twig broom. I thought to ask him if he would mind me taking a picture of him, but I didn't. Why? I really don't know. What's the worst that could have happened? He would have laughed, said "No," and I would have gone on about my walk. Instead, I am writing about it hours later with just a little regret. Next time.
After lunch, the plan was to head to Wypasiona Dolina for a little line-park action, but just as the weather put a quick end to our river plans, the rain put an unforeseen end to our afternoon adventures: though the park is only a few kilometers from Jablonka, and though it didn't rain all day today, it poured there apparently, and the owner, seeing that all the wood was wet and thus slippery, sent all the workers home.
Instead, we went to the outdoor museum that we almost always seem to visit while here. It seems to grow each time we go.
On the way back to Babcia's to pick her up for church, we stopped at a new place that had -- strangely enough for a small village -- a small bowling alley. It was not quite a normal bowling alley: the pins were suspended by strings and seemed to be lighter plastic. The Boy managed to win the first game but didn't do so well with the second game.
After bowling, we rushed to pick up Babcia to head to church so that we can have tomorrow completely free. Afterward, we dropped by the cemetery to tidy up around Dziadek's grave and pay our respects. As always happens at the cemetery, we met an old friend of Babcia's, a former teacher of K's.
And finally, back home, Babcia began teaching the Boy how to make a fire for hot water -- a basic skill in old-school rural Poland
Friday Afternoon Walk
First Day 2022
Coming to Poland is always the same old new: it is always a question of what has changed and what has not changed. The things you would think are timeless are just that: without change from who knows when. Yet some of these things for our kids are indeed new — at least, they don’t remember doing them.
Like drinking hot black tea with breakfast. Admittedly, we don’t even really have that with breakfast in the States. We generally have spiced Indian tea — close to the traditional breakfast drink here, but taken in an entirely different direction.
The food largely stays the same, too, yet completely different from our everyday reality. Boczek, for example, is the impossible dream where we live in South Carolina. Sure, there’s bacon, but that’s hardly the same.
These differences create differences in L’s breakfast patterns, too. Smoothies are out. Scrambled eggs z boczkiem are definitely in.
Or just some slices of boczek on some good Polish bread with a little butter.
After breakfast, a bit of unpacking, and some ironing (everything we packed of course is now too wrinkled to wear around here — what a shame that would be), we head to the store to do some shopping after dropping in at the kantor to get some zloty. Another different-same: while the stores in Jablonka are much bigger than what they used to be but still much smaller than what we’re used too. Granted, such mega-shops exist in cities, but your average rural sklep here will be only a fraction the size of its American counterpart.
On the way home, we stop at Pasieka, the small restaurant where K and I met when dating, for some afternoon refreshments. We look over the menu, commenting on how much inflation is evidence from the time we left in 2005. Beer now costs double what it was, for example.
“Prices are starting to equalize” seems to be our mantra this trip. It’s not so ridiculously cheep for someone earning in dollars despite the generous exchange rate.
On returning, we resort to one of our favorite pastimes: sitting at the table and chatting with Babcia. I don’t know how many times I’ve taken this same picture.
Babcia is so easy to talk to that it’s hard not just to sit around and talk about anything and everything.
After dinner, the Boy, K, and I head out for a walk to the river, stopping to talk to an old childhood friend of K’s for some time.
All in all, a perfect first day — and only the second post on this site that I’ve completed completely on my telephone, pictures and all. The ease and convenience of it all…hard to beat.
Arrival 2022
The trip here seems endless — completely
Coming to Poland is always worse than returning as far as the travel itself goes. Returning to America, due to the time change, only feels like a really long day. The sun just never seems to set. Going, however, is deceptive because you have that night in the middle, but in reality, it’s not much more than a short nap at best. So you feel cheated, tricked — and your body does not appreciate it. It was not expecting one long day with the illusion of sleep in the middle.
Having a six-hour layover after an eight-hour flight doesn’t help much either. It seems like that will be long enough to catch up on sleep just a bit, but just like the night itself, it only teases.
So we board the plane from Munich to Krakow some twenty hours after we began the whole adventure with eyes barely open. K and L try to nap on the flight, but it’s of little use. E and I, each having a window seat, spend the flight looking out the windows at the shapes below.
Anyone flying into Poland with a window seat as we have knows exactly when we’re over the border. The shapes change immediately and drastically. The irregular, large shapes of fields and forest interspersed with houses and towns disappear, and in their place stretch long, narrow fields, one beside another. This is Poland from the air.
Departure 2022
We're in the air at the moment; I write this still sitting at my desk in South Carolina, the whole adventure still ahead of us all. The waiting, the sitting, the endless masks -- they're all ahead of us.
All our indoor plants are behind us -- on the kitchen counter.
But best of all, Babcia awaits
Packing
Tonight is our last night in the States for a little while. Four suitcases and four carry-ons are ready to go. The Boy is going around the house constantly saying, "We're leaving for Poland tomorrow!" K is going around the house saying, "I can't believe we're leaving for Poland tomorrow." I'm going around the house saying, "Does anyone know where the bladder for our backpack is?" And L -- she's been at work, so she hasn't been saying anything this evening.
Driver
The Girl got her restricted license today. This means that, once we have her covered on our insurance, she can drive alone during daylight hours.
It's not that big of a change, I guess. She's been driving for six months now. Ah, but it is a big change: she'll soon be doing it alone.
The Boy learned about the joys of putting together furniture.
The Girl
When I got my current job teaching eighth graders, Nana said to me, "I don't know how I survived your eighth-grade year. I wanted to strangle you every other day." I can't say that I've been as upset and frustrated with teaching eighth graders as Nana might have suggested. Indeed, I've come to love it, and I don't really have any desire to teach any other grade.
My own child, though, was a different story. I began to understand Nana's hyperbole. I haven't written much about the Girl here because it's been a typical period of growth, which means frustration for parents. What are we doing wrong? Why is she pushing us away? What can we do differently? We knew the answers to those questions (Nothing; Because she's thirteen/fourteen; Nothing -- just be there unconditionally), but that didn't make it any easier.
In the last few weeks (or even months), though, since she's started driving, since she went back to work, since she's made it through her first year of high school, it's like she's taken a deep breath and made peace with us and herself.
I knew it was coming: the transformation eighth graders go through is amazing, and I know it continues through ninth grade (until they're sophomores and temporarily revert because they're sophomores and know everything -- or is that just a cliche?), but to experience it has been refreshing. To begin seeing what kind of an adult she will be: a valiant defender of anyone facing injustice, a friend who sometimes lets her love for her friend overshadow reason (not always a good thing, not always a bad thing), self-reflective and self-aware -- to see this change really start to kick in just makes me smile.
Tonight, we finished watching Schindler's List. The reason (other than it's a moving film that everyone should see) is that L and I are planning on visiting Auschwitz while we're in Poland, and I wanted her to have an idea of what the scale of the Holocaust in real, human terms. Tomorrow, we will watch Conspiracy, a film about the Wannsee conference so she can get an idea of the "logic" that drove the Nazis.
That I am comfortable letting her watch such a film is a testament to her maturity.
