Mann im Dunkeln, Street in Delft

Mann im Dunkeln, by Max Beckmann

Peter, Linda and I went to Germany on June 3. We spent a couple of days in Frankfurt, then drove to Koblenz, to Essen, to Dortmund, flew to Vienna (Austria), and back to Dortmund three days later, then to Frankfurt – stopping in Stiegen along the way, for lunch – to pick up Chase and Britta. All five together, we drove to Hamburg. After two days in Hamburg we drove to Lüneburg, to Leer, to Emmen (Netherlands), Appledoorn (Netherlands), and Amsterdam. After two days in Amsterdam we drove to Utrecht, had lunch all together, and dropped Peter and Chase off at the train station. Britta, Linda and I drove back to Frankfurt and flew home the next day, June 18.

I remember the trip for three things.

First is survival in a foreign land. Of course Germany, Austria and the Netherlands are not difficult places. For a trip overseas this was about as easy as I can imagine. But I wouldn’t have made the trip on my own. Not yet. I’m not strong enough. I can’t be in a different city every day. I can’t spend 8½ hours on a plane. I can’t spend a half-day in a car. I can’t walk all around town and through museums and back again. I just can’t do it.

But I did. My daughter and my wife and my doctor persuaded me that even half days were better than sitting home alone. And that’s not far from what I had. I spent a lot of mornings and some evenings in a hotel room. But I did travel, I saw a lot, I ate and slept and walked and learned.

Second is the sights and sounds and people of Peter’s and Chase’s missions: Peter for two years in Northern Germany centered on Hamburg, and Chase for two years in the Netherlands. Of course they lived it 24 hours a day for two years, and I just saw a few buildings and met a few people. But I can now picture their work, the streets they walked, the people they met, the churches they helped. I’m glad I have that picture in mind.

Third is art. In Frankfurt at the Städel Museum I got to see Max Beckmann’s 8 bronzes, including Mann im Dunkeln.

In Vienna, at the Albertina, I spent some a long time with one of Monet’s water lilly paintings

One of approximately 250 in the Water Lilies series, by Claude Monet

and kept coming back to a Kandinsky.

A Kandinsky of the style but not the very one in the Albertina

In Amsterdam, at the Rijks museum, after rooms full of Rembrandts, I came upon three Vermeer paintings and my brain lit up. It was a surprise. Even with Rembrandt’s work as a backdrop (what a backdrop!), the Vermeer paintings seemed like coming upon the real thing, life in oils.

Street in Delft, by Vermeer

Standing in front of Mann im Dunkeln, and Street in Delft, I had the same feeling that came when I saw El Capitan in Yosemite, and a sunset over the Wasatch mountains, and my son talking to a stranger on the street, and Linda's smile in the morning: "This is a piece of heaven on earth; I'm glad I have lived to see this; I'm glad this sight and experience is part of my life."

(We've traveled so much in the last month that I haven't posted blogs that are on my mind. I'm dating these where they belong, not when they were actually posted.)