There ARE Such Things as Stupid Questions

(This is a true story I wrote years ago, just after I started teaching. The names have been changed to protect the innocent.  Enjoy) 

A strange looking assortment of students stared at me.  They clearly expected me to say something, but what?  I was reminded of that dream where you find yourself on stage and everyone is waiting for you to start, but why are you on a stage and what are you supposed to say?  Then suddenly you realize you don’t have pants on.  I glanced my eyes southwards and there, just below my belt, were some pants.  Okay, it’s not a dream.

To their credit these kids were spotting me the courtesy that adolescents usually only give teachers on the first day of school. The paper wads on the floor, broken ceiling fan, and unusually high percentage of facial piercings told me that this was not their typical behavior.  The problem was that I had no clue what to say, no idea what to do.  This was not their first day of school.  It was just my first day.  I didn’t have three months of summer holiday to prepare for this. The job had just been offered to me an hour before.

*****

“Good morning, Mr. Showalter,” I heard a vaguely familiar voice say when I answered my phone that morning. “This is Principal Smith from Parkview High School.”  My room was still dark.  I looked at the clock.  6:40 a.m.  Three emptied cans of Busch Beer stood on the nightstand.  I hadn’t planned on an early morning.  “Sorry for calling you so early.  You weren’t asleep were you?”

“Uhm no.” Lie. 

“Good.  Listen, I’ve got an opportunity for you.  I need a teacher to fill in for a class where the teacher has been...well, for a teacher who will be on leave for the rest of the year. Call it a permanent substitute position.  I know you’re looking for an English job, and this isn’t exactly that, but it will get your foot in the door anyway. What do you say?  Would you be…” 

I rolled out of bed, taking the covers with me, and jumped to my feet.  Finally a real job!  No more restaurant work! My bare feet danced up and down on the stained carpet of my apartment floor, and the vibrations sent the empties tumbling. 

“…willing to take the position?

I gathered myself, took a deep breath and then tried to pretend I was an adult. I spoke with what I hoped would sound like dignity.  “Yes, sir.  I’d love to take the position, sir.” Wrong.  Too many sirs – it smacked of desperation.

“Great.  The teachers here tell me you’ve done a fantastic job subbing for them in the past.  I’m glad you’re in.  Again, I’m sorry for calling you so early but it’s kind of an emergency.”

“No problem. When should I come in to get ready?” I asked, scooping up the empty cans off of my floor and opening my shades. 

“Well, here’s the thing. Your first class starts in one hour. Can you be there? It’s late notice, I know.”

I dropped the beer cans back on the floor and rushed to my closet hoping I'd pressed at least one of my three dress shirts.  I opened the closet door to find them rolled up on the ground like ancient scrolls in a cave. 

“Listen, Adam. I feel like I ought to tell you that this will be a challenging position.  Driver’s Ed tends to get last dibs on everything, and that includes students.”

Drivers Ed? Not perfect, but only for a half year until I can get an English job.

He continued, “It’s a bit of a dumping ground for students who don’t really…” and here he paused, “…belong in standard classrooms. 

I nabbed one of the shirts from the floor and unrolled it. “I’m always up for a good challenge, Mr. Smith.”  Well played, Adam.  You're on fire and it's only 6:40 am. Of course, my first good challenge was going to be unraveling some dress clothes.  “What happened to their last teacher, if you don’t mind my asking?” I said as I rifled through my hangers.

“I’ll tell you when you get here, but don’t worry about that – you’ll do great. Welcome to Parkview High School. We’ll see you in an hour okay?”

 *****

“Good Morning, guys. My name is Mr. Showalter,”  I squeezed the words up from my throat like white toothpaste out of a tube of Crest.  The single Windsor knot I’d tied in the car only minutes before felt like a noose.  “Umm…I’ll be the new Driver’s Ed teacher for the rest of the school year.” Well done, Showalter.  Way to open with a bang.  “Umm.”

My shirt looked like I’d ironed it with a cold rolling pin.  My pants didn't match my shoes.  And here I was with a newly discovered stutter.  Nice.  I dug around in the metal tray below the blackboard and found a piece of chalk that someone had colored orange on one end so that it looked like a cigarette.  Pretty clever.

M-r-S-h-o-w-a-l-t-e-r.  I wrote meticulously on the board. 

A pimply boy with an Insane Clown Posse backpack rapped his blue Bic against the table.  Other than that, silence.

The fact that the room had a chalk board instead of a marker board told me it was designed to be a classroom eons ago.  Somewhere along the way, someone decided it should be converted into a custodial closet.  Recently, it had become both.  A mop bucket and mop, a yellow WET FLOOR sign, and some paper towels were propped up in the corner.  Shelves of cleaning supplies lined the walls on one side of the room. On the opposite wall, posters displaying pictures of wrecked cars warned students that “Buzzed driving is drunk driving” and “1 in every 7 teens wreck their first car – Buckle Up.” My dream classroom.

I had no experience teaching Driver’s Ed.  There was no note telling me what the students had been learning or what they were supposed to learn.  They didn’t need any lessons on how to look scary though.  Goth kids with black eyes.  Punks. Hippies.  Thugs.  Died hair.  Marilyn Manson Shirt.  Bob Marley-smoking-a-joint shirt.  Flat brim caps with logos I didn’t recognize.  One lonely cheerleader chomped obliviously at a stick of Wrigley’s and smiled at me.  I guess if she feels safe...

They looked like the kind of crew that could whip up anarchy at the drop of a dime, so I needed to do something quick.  First impressions are everything, and if I continued bumbling around and didn’t ask them to do something constructive soon, they’d expect that to be the norm.  Think think think think…I know!

I straightened my back and smiled.  “I know you are all acquainted with each other already.  And now you know me too,” I pointed to my name on the board, “so why don’t we take our first day and make it an introduce-yourself-to-Mr.-Showalter-day.  I’m going to have each of you introduce yourself with your name, and then you can tell me your favorite musical artist.  It can be a singer, rapper, band, whatever.  That will help me remember who you are.”

Silence.  Then suddenly from a back corner of the room – the scrawny blonde girl in a Bob Marley shirt - “Are you going to throw a desk at us?”

What?  Throw a desk at you? And then I remembered.  Minutes before, the principal was rushing me down the corridor trying to get me to class before the first bell rang.  As we hustled through a maze of lockers and students, he filled me in on the last teacher’s early departure.   According to his account, the last Driver’s Ed teacher threatened to assault one of his students which, as the principal pointed out, was ironic because the desk he'd hurled at the student had already pretty much done the deed.

“Yeah, are you going to throw the desks?” This from an overweight kid with dyed black hair and two lip rings.

Chuckles all around. They were testing me – dipping their toes in the water of misbehavior. 

“I’d prefer to throw ninja stars at you,” I answered.  “but if I happen to forget my ninja stars one day, then yes – I will have to throw desks at you.” More chuckles.  Test one – passed.  Stick that one to the refrigerator door, Mom. 

Now it was the gum chomping cheerleader’s turn.  “Well, if you do throw a chair, or ninja stars, throw them at Miss Johnson. She’s got quick hands.  I bet she could catch them.”

“Miss Johnson?” I asked, and the cheerleader pointed to the back of the room.  I followed her finger with my eyes. 

Sure enough, there sat Miss Johnson. She was a small, spruce looking lady with her back to me. She was almost completely hidden behind a rolling janitor’s cart loaded down with rolls of paper towels.  She swiveled her chair around and smiled.

“Good morning, Mr. Shh…” she looked up at my name on the blackboard, “ow-alter.  “I’m the deaf interpreter.”  Then she turned away from me and towards two students, one boy and one girl, who watched as she made a brisk torrent of hand and finger movements.  Both of the deaf students had a grey plastic piece above their ears.

I have deaf students? I’ve never taught deaf students before!  How are you supposed to do that? I thought.  I waved at them stupidly.  “Well, good morning, Miss Johnson.  It’s a pleasure to meet you, and don’t worry about the ninja stars.  I only throw them at kids.”

She smiled and then turned back around to face the deaf students.  I watched carefully.  She fluttered her arms about in a series of waves, finger wags, and what looked to be hail mother Marrys.   

Then without warning she stopped her signing.  For a brief moment I couldn’t figure out why, and then I realized it was because I’d stopped talking. Miss Johnson looked over her shoulder at me and smiled pleasantly again. Her face seemed to say  It’s okay, new guy - everyone tends to watch the first time they get interpreted.

A demure little girl in the back of the room bent down to pick up a pen from the floor, and I watched her out of the corner of my eye.  While she was doubled over she stealthily dropped a piece of lined paper, folded into a perfect triangle, atop her neighbor’s desk.  Then she scooped up the pen and looked up.  She was caught. She slowly averted her eyes away from her glaring new teacher, letting her dark hair fall into her face, and then sat back down. 

Ah, perfect target. The gazelle with an injury – shyness.  I’ll start with her.  “Young lady who thinks her new teacher won’t notice a bit of note passing, let’s start with you.  What is your name and what is your favorite musical artist? It can be a singer, a rapper, a band, whatever.”

She thought for a moment, then without looking back at me, “Hi, uhm…my name is Bracie and I guess I kinda like all music.”

I waited. 

“Uhm…but I guess maybe my favorite would be like, I don’t know, Red Hot Chilli Peppers, maybe.”

“Very good, Bracie. I also like the Chilli Peppers.” 

No way, you know the Chili Peppers? I imagined all of the students must have been thinking.  That’s awesome.  You probably play guitar and stuff too huh?  You’re so cool, not like our old stupid teachers.  I waited for one of them to speak up about how hip I was. 

Silence.

“And you, sir.  Sitting next to Bracie who likes the Chilli Peppers. What is your name and who is your favorite musical artist? 

“James. And fricken’ Metallica, dude.”

“Thank you, James. And good call on Metallica.  However, I prefer to be called Mr. Showalter over dude.”  Lie. 

I carried on this way, snaking up and down the rows asking each student his or her name and favorite musical artist trying to ascertain something about who they were based on what they listened to.  I reckon it was more like making snap judgments. 

“Nick – Insane Clown Posse.”  Juvenile hall, much?

“Carrie – Brittanie Spears.”  Tighten up that curfew, mom.

“Karlee – Bob Marley.”  Pot Head.

Darren – Tupac – I glanced over at Miss Johnson to see if she’d throw up the west side W with her fingers. No luck

This little game continued nicely as I repeated the students' names and the music they wanted associated with them.  It was actually helping me remember.  There were 30 students in the room, and already I’d memorized 28 names and an artist or band I could associate with each one.

At last I came to the boy and girl who sat in the corner of the room under the cleaning-supply shelves.  Sitting before them was Miss Johnson, who had been translating my wildly successful student-teacher introductions. 

I suddenly recalled hearing somewhere that deaf people actually prefer that you look at them when you speak to them, regardless of whether or not they are watching an interpreter.  Maybe they won't look at you all the time, but when they do, they should catch you looking at them and not the interpreter.  So I spoke slowly and deliberately, facing my two deaf students. 

“What. Is. Your. Name?  And. Who. Is. Your. Favorite. Musical. Artist?”

How it had not occurred to me that a deaf student would most certainly not have a favorite musical artist I cannot begin to say.  I would like to chalk it up to the fact that I hadn’t been properly trained or prepared for this situation, but how much training does it take to know that it’s not okay to ask deaf people about their particular tastes in audible sounds? 

What I can say for sure is that if you are reading this, and you are a deaf interpreter – don’t do what Miss Johnson did.  Please.  What did Miss Johnson do?  She listened to my question, and then without missing a beat, wiggled her fingers around in circles, interpreting every stupid, dumb, insensitive, ludicrous word in my question. 

I wish I could describe the face that the young deaf boy made at me, but I’ve spent a good deal of time trying to forget it.  Imagine the way a jury looks at a man on trial who admits, without guilt, that he killed his wife and daughter with a knife.  If you can imagine that, you’re getting close. Without unlocking his hateful eye contact with me, Brian commenced a series of angry looking hand motions, something akin to typing on a keyboard that is trying to get away from you.

Miss Johnson, turned around and looked at me with a disapproving face. It was at this point that I realized my mistake - just before she said it.  I wanted badly to suck my words back into my mouth.  I ached for a time machine, a rewind button.

“He says ‘my name is Brian and I don’t hear music because I’m deaf.'”

Silence in the room.  Two seconds of awkward, dare I say deafening, silence.  The students all leaned forward in their desks and waited. Then Brian made one more aggressive movement with his hands – a firm fist and then a circle.  Miss Johnson shook her head no at him.  He repeated his sign again, with even more aggression. He shot glances back and forth between Miss Johnson and I.

Reluctantly, she swiveled around in her chair and faced me. The look of disapproval on her face was now replaced with confusion.  Later that day she told me that she probably shouldn’t have said it, but as an interpreter for the deaf it’s not her duty to censor conversations but simply to interpret them.  It’s part of the moral code of conduct that they are hammered with during their education.

Brian continued to shoot icy stares between Miss Johnson and I, waiting for her to do what her code of conduct required of her.  And then she did. She said what Brian had signed.

“You are really stupid.” The words trickled shakily out of her mouth, but they landed like a grenade.  Suddenly the room roared with laughter.  You are really stupid.  Boisterous, belly laughing.  It bounced off of the cement walls and into my ears.  It was the kind of laughter that haunts middle school nerds in their dreams.  It was the kind of laughter that punches you in the gut.  Loud.  Pointed.  Abandoned.  Brian crossed his arms, leaned back in his desk, and admired his handy work.  Miss Johnson covered her face with her hand and doubled over into her own lap. She wouldn't look up.

And me?  I stood there, dumbstruck and watched.  What else could I do?  The laughter was too loud for me to say anything and be heard.  It was ear-splitting.  Even the two deaf students must have felt the vibrations from the roar.   I wanted to run out the door and never come back.  I wanted to crawl over to the cleaning-supply shelf and chug a bottle of Clorox.  Anything to get me out.  But I didn’t.  I just stood and stared as my students lost themselves in the hilarity of my mistake. 

All about the room, genre-transcending moments were taking place.  I watched  James-the-Metallica fan stand up and high five Darren-the-Tupac guy.  Brittany-Spears-fan-Carrie and Karlee-in-the-Marley-tee actually stood up and hugged.  They clung tight to each other, using the other for support as their uproarious laughter weakened their knees.  All of this at my expense. 

You are stupid, Adam.    


I scanned the room, panning my downcast eyes across the strange looking students who had found their new target.  The cheerleader was actually pointing her finger at me and laughing the way Nelson does on The Simpsons.  I was reminded of that dream where you find yourself on stage and everyone is waiting for you to start and suddenly you realize you don’t have pants on. I guess there are worse things than being pantless though, because I would have gladly traded my pants in for a chance to go back and un-ask that stupid, dumb, insensitive, ludicrous question.

War in Switzerland

Charles sat with his widowed mother in her small home in Lincolnshire, England. It was almost Christmas and the two of them sat alone warming next to the fireplace, Charles on the floor and his mother under a blanket in her recliner. She was 93 years old and her face was wrinkled and thinning.

“Mother,” Charles asked, “What was the happiest time in your life?” He knew this would be the last time he’d see his mother alive. Her health was worsening, and there was a great distance between their homes now. He was certain that the next time he saw her would be at her funeral, and he wanted to make sure he didn’t misuse this visit by talking about trivial things.

His mother had never struck him as a particularly happy person, and he wondered why she hadn’t been happier. It wasn’t that she seemed depressed or unreasonably angry ever; it was just that she never seemed to have much joy in her life. Whatever motherly warmth Charles and his brother got from her seemed to come more from a sense of motherly duty than from a sense of joy or happiness. He looked out the window at the gray afternoon sky and waited for his mother’s response.

She rocked back in her chair and watched the fire. Charles wondered if she’d heard his question. “Mother, what was the…”

“I heard you, Charles.” She interrupted. “I just don’t know if you will understand my answer.”

Charles looked up at her again. Her eyes were closed now and he saw the creases that extended outward from the corners. Not surprisingly they looked just like the ones on his own aging face.  She took in a deep breath and then spoke. “The happiest time in my life was during The War. That was the happiest I ever felt.”

It wasn’t what he expected her to say, and certainly it was not what he wanted to hear either. Surely her happiest time was when he and his brother were innocent little boys who wrestled about on the ground and begged their mum to come join them. If not then, maybe her honeymoon with his father. Charles poked a stick into the fire and stiffened his back. How could the happiest time in her life be during World War II? 

“The war, mother? The happiest time in your life was during World War II? When the world was consumed by death and violence?”

“I was 20 years old when the war started.  In all of my life since then, I’ve never felt so intensely alive,” She said. Charles focused on keeping the fire alive rather than looking at his mother.  “I felt so…I don’t know - there was such a sense of unity. We all knew what we had to do. We didn’t have to question our purpose. We knew. Every day, when we woke up, we knew what our purpose was. To fight Germany. To beat the Germans. We had a clearly defined enemy.”

“Wartime, mother?  That’s the happiest you ever felt?”

“You’ve not had a war of your own, so I don’t expect you to understand, Charles.”

*****

“And I reckon I won’t ever completely understand it,” He tells me.

Charles is one of the most fascinating people I’ve met in the UAE, and he’s one of my best friends, despite the fact that he’s much older than I am. Almost 30 years older in fact. He is another English teacher at the school where I work.

We’re sitting alone in his classroom when he tells me about his visit home and the conversation he had with his mother. He is still wrestling with it - trying to make sense of it.  The white hairs on his short beard hug thoughtful lines that cut deeply across his face and out from his eyes.  Sunlight streams in through the open door to his classroom, and it lights up the student papers that are taped up haphazardly on his wall. We are worlds away from Lincolnshire, England but his mind is still there.

A thoughtful speaker with a sturdy British accent, Charles doesn’t tell stories, he paints pictures with words. And that is probably why I tend to gravitate to him when I don’t have a class. I often find myself sitting in his room wishing I were one of his students. A Cambridge graduate who has worked and traveled about the world, he’s intensely knowledgeable and wonderfully thoughtful - a brilliant speaker, and an equally talented listener.

“It’s a bit jolting to hear your mum admit that she felt the happiest amidst the longest and most violent war the world has ever seen.” He says.

“I can see how that would throw you for a loop,” I tell him.  “It seems kinda morbid.”

“I suppose it makes sense though,” He says. “Most of us go though life wondering what it is we’re meant to do here. But when England was at war, mum didn’t have to wonder.  She had a clearly defined purpose and a clearly defined enemy.” He leans back in his chair and clasps his hands together behind his head. We both sit and silently for a moment and think.

A couple of boys laugh as they walk past the door to Charles’s classroom. One of them punches the other in the arm, and a playful wrestling match ensues in the sunlit corridor outside.

Charles and I spectate as the two playfully fight each other.

“There are a couple of young men who know how vital a war is to their happiness.” I say lightly, hoping to clear the air of lingering sadness Charles’s story left. “Look how happy they are when they fight each other.”

“I apologize. That was a bit dreary wasn’t it?  Not, perhaps, my most uplifting of tales. It’s just something I’ve been thinking about. Shall we talk about something a shade less depressing? Have you decided what you’ll do with your summer holiday? I reckon you’ll do something more pleasant than visiting your dying mother on a gray day in England.”

I turn away from the playful scuffle in the hallway and look back at Charles. He’s smiling now and leaning back in his chair, the solemn look on his face replaced by a sideways grin.

“I’m going to fly to Switzerland for a week, and then I’m heading back to the States,” I tell him.

“Oh, wonderful. I love Switzerland!" Charles has been just about everywhere and done just about everything, so that he's been to Switzerland surprises me none at all. "What will you do there?” He asks.

“I’m going to run a half marathon in the Alps,” I spill, unable to hide my enthusiasm. I’ve never been to Europe and I’ve never run a half marathon either, so I'm really looking forward to my summer holiday.  “I’ve been training for the race for a month, but just last night that I booked my flight to Zurich.”

“My goodness. You do realize that a marathon is twenty-two kilometers, yes?”

“Ya, but it’s only thirteen miles.”

The lines around his beard creep upwards into a big smile. “A very American way to look at it, indeed. And you’ve already registered for the race?”

“I’ve registered for the race, booked the flight, and started the training. I’ve been running well over 50 kilometers every week for the last month,” I tell him.

“That sounds awful, but good for you. That’s splendid. Well, no actually I think you’re quite mad. I admire your gumption, but I think you’re mad. Why are you doing it?”

“What do you mean, why?” I ask.

“I mean why do you want to run 22 kilometers,” He pauses and grins, “Or 13 miles?  It’s not something most people would do voluntarily.”

Strangely enough - I never though about it and suddenly I see what he means. What struck me as a perfectly reasonable fitness goal now strikes me as odd too. What sick personality trait do I possess that makes me want to wreck my body for 3 months in preparation for a race that will take less than 2 hours? Why do I feel satisfaction when I see my laundry basket full of sweat-drenched headbands and t-shirts?  Why do my sore knees feel like badges? Why does this training make me happy?

“I’m not exactly sure,” I admit to Charles. “If I’m honest, the training is physically exhausting.  Last night I waited until 8:00 p.m and when I went outside to run my 11 kilometers for the day, it was still over ninety degrees.  My throat was so dry when I finished that I could barely swallow any water. My heart rate was so jacked up last night that I rolled around in bed unable to relax or fall asleep. My knees feel like they have cement in them.  So I guess I don’t really know why I’m doing it…except that I love it.  It makes me happy.”

Charles unfolds his hands from behind his head and leans in towards me; a mischievous smile dashes across his eyes, but it disappears as quickly as it appeared. I wonder what’s on his mind. He doesn’t talk though; he simply waits for me to carry on.

“It sounds miserable, I know. And it is. But somehow it also feels really good.  When I run it’s like there’s this voice in my head that says you can’t do it, and it’s really fun to try and defeat it. I feel like I’m just rambling. What were you smiling about a second ago?”

“Tell me more about the voice, then I’ll tell you why I was smiling.”

“You know the voice. It’s the thing that tells you that you can’t do something. Honestly, Charles, that voice is probably the reason I’m here right now. It’s always been in my head telling me I can’t do things.”

"Really? How is responsible for you being here?"

“It told me I was too small-town and too scared to ever go live in another part of the world. It told me I was stuck in Missouri, and I might as well accept it. I hate that part of myself - that voice.  I’ve always felt compelled to fight it.  That’s why I started looking for ways to get out of America and experience the world. I wanted to broaden my perspective yes, but I also wanted to squelch that stupid voice. A lot of what I do in my life is about killing that voice. Seriously, what were you smiling about?”

“I'll tell you after you finish telling me about this voice.”

“Well, I always try to prove it wrong, but it never really goes away. It's my biggest enemy. It tells me I’m a lousy teacher. It tells me I’ll never be a good musician. It tells me I’ll never be able to do certain tricks on a wakeboard. It tells me I can’t write well. I'm always trying to prove it wrong, and nothing feels better than when I do prove it wrong. That’s probably the main reason why I’m running this race. I want to prove it wrong."

Charles smiles and loosens up his necktie. “It sounds like you have a clearly defined enemy. Just like Mother did during the war.  And it seems to make you very happy to fight that enemy.” He pauses for a second to let me think about it.  “Do you see why I’m smiling now?”

And I do see. My war with the voice is just like his mother’s war with Germany. That voice in my head is what the German’s were for his mother. It is my clearly-defined enemy. It gives me purpose. I don’t have to wonder what I’m meant to do with my life right now. When I finish with work I glance at my training program, write the day’s regimen on my hand with a blue pen, lace up my Nikes, and then go running.

It gives me a purpose, just like the war gave Charles’s mother a purpose. It gives me a clearly defined enemy. I’m not just swinging blindly at an enemy that I can’t see; I know what I’m fighting just like she knew what she was fighting. I’ve waged a war on the part of myself that I hate - that voice. And the war with that stupid voice is making me feel happy.

Most people couldn’t understand why Charles’s mom would identify wartime as the happiest stretch of her life. Most wouldn’t understand why I want to run a half marathon in the oxygen-starved altitudes of the Swiss Alps. But I see a connection.

Charles shuffles some papers around on his desk and then looks up at me, still smiling.

It’s funny though,” He says, “You’re going to Switzerland to fight the war with your voice. Switzerland is the one place that managed to stay neutral during my mother’s war.”

*****

My conversation with Charles has me thinking about the wars I’ve fought, and how often my happiness is hanging on the coattails of “war.”

When I was in my early 20’s I started a band with my brother and my three best friends. Against everyone’s advice, we set out to “make it” in the most unforgiving industry that exists, and we started at the rock bottom.  We were only average musicians then, we knew nobody in the music industry, and we were all small-town Missouri boys. But we wanted rock and roll success, so we waged war on the people who said it was impossible.

Every month, we loaded our red and white tour van down with banged up amplifiers and guitars.  I remember setting off for tours with as little as a single twenty dollar bill to last the week.  My face burned with embarrassment when I had to ask gas station cashiers for free cups of hot water so I could dump a package of Raman noodles in and quiet my hunger.

Sometimes we had to borrow money to pay the $50 monthly rent we owed for our practice space – an old storage locker in an unheated concrete building.   We practiced every night in that horrible room.  During the winter it got so cold that I played guitar with numb fingers.  I could see our singer’s breath come out of his mouth like smoke over the microphone.

But it was our war, and as uncomfortable as it was it gave us purpose.  We had a clearly defined enemy.  Our enemy was that mass of people who told us we couldn’t make it - the people who thought we were stupid for trying.   We were happy because we had a common goal and when we suffered we did it together.  When we slept on strangers’ cold floors without blankets in cities thousands of miles from home, we were not doing it alone.  We were, like Charles’s mom and the rest of England during WWII, unified.

And once we started experiencing success, we knew we were defeating the enemy.  When we found our own sound and started gelling together on stage we sold thousands of CDs.  We made fans all over the country.  We recorded songs with award-winning producers and played to packed crowds who knew every word.   We would go to malls in other states and see total strangers wearing our Tshirts.  Before it was all said and done we were playing shows in front of massive crowds in huge venues and even putting money in our own pockets after big shows.  Every person who listened to us was a strike against our common enemy.  Each success we had was a loss for the people we’d gone to war with - the naysayers.

Although we had some amazing successes, we never “made it,” at least not in the MTV sense of the word.  What we got from the band though, is the most important thing.  It gave us purpose, and to quote Charles’s mother, “…There was such a sense of unity.  We all knew what we had to do.  We didn’t have to question our purpose.  We knew.  Every day, when we woke up, we knew what our purpose was.  We had a clearly defined enemy.”

And I think that maybe we all tend to miss the point when we search for happiness.  We tend to think that happiness will come when we no longer have any struggles - when we don’t have to wake up every day and battle. When my life is easy, we tell ourselves, then I’ll be happy.

But I think that’s the wrong way to look for purpose or happiness.  What we should be doing is searching for new struggles, new battles, and new wars.  Our wars give us purpose.  And if we can’t find an external enemy to go to war with, it’s time to look inside and find the parts of ourselves that we don’t like and go to war with them.  Maybe the problem is that too many of us are trying to find happiness by avoiding conflict when what we should be doing is looking for our next war.

Maybe there’s a reason Charles’s mother never seemed particularly happy after the war.  Maybe she never felt so intensely alive again because she needed a war to give her life purpose, and after The War was over she couldn’t find a foe. The world no longer provided an enemy, so she didn't know what to do. Perhaps she never thought to look inward  and she failed to realize that we all have a perfectly good enemy to fight inside of us.

I’m fighting my internal enemy - that voice - by training for a half marathon that goes straight up a mountain.  I fight him every time I sit down to write.  I battle him every time I practice my instrument.  And even though I may never beat that voice in my head completely, I will continue to battle it every day of my life.  And that battle gives me great joy.

This blog entry is dedicated to my old bandmates who fought alongside me (great friends from my old life) and to Charles (a great friend in my new life).  Andy, Jacob, Jake, Derek, Joe Willy, and Charles - this one's for you.