I was coming off a week where I had averaged four hours of sleep a night, and was looking forward to getting home to my husband, our high-maintenance but loveable dog, and the prospect of sleeping in my own lumpy bed. A screwup in my transportation arrangements would likely mean renting a car to drive myself home in the Friday night New York rush-hour traffic.
Before the dispatcher got back on the line to advise me that the driver was indeed there somewhere, I saw a tall, white-haired older gentleman barely hanging on to a paper sign with my name on it, clutching a bulky bag with the familiar pink and orange logo of Dunkin Donuts.
“I got us some water,” he said, not bothering to introduce himself. “I ended up drinking what was in the car because the wait was long, and I wanted to make sure you had something for the ride home.” He grabbed my rolling travel bags and pointed me toward the exit.
This is the way that Horst and I met. I must admit, any annoyance that had begun to take root instantly disintegrated.
How can you be vexed with a driver for not being right there when you step out of Customs, when the reason he was briefly MIA is that he had run off to get you an ice cold bottle of water after your nine-hour trip?
His casual and friendly manner struck me; I knew this would not be a quiet drive home.
Before we reached the car, Horst had begun telling me how he was crowned the unofficial leader in the “Fastest Ride to JFK” standings, having recently dropped off a group of young men who apparently kept close account of the time it takes from their home in Woodbury.
“I didn’t know I was in the running,” Horst joked, making sure to advise me that he had not been speeding.
We started off with the typical pleasantries: the traffic we were sure to encounter on this Friday evening in June; the rainy weather in the region that apparently mimicked the wet weather I had endured in Paris.
Before long, I was getting a history lesson on international relations. It was better than a high school Global Studies class.
Knowing that I had flown in from Paris, Horst offered his insights that immediately drew me into his life story.
“I lived in Paris for two years,” he said. That was back in September 1972. “I met my future ex-wife on my first day there.”
I laughed. Another driver with an ex-wife story. The irony made me smile. Only this time, the driver did not dwell on his personal life but instead, spun a tale of world travel and life learning that I wasn’t expecting.
“France is amazing, Paris in particular,” he continued.
He suggested that there is much in our American culture through which we might connect with the French. Their gift of the Statue of Liberty is one example of their overture of friendship to our country after the American Revolution.
Horst mentioned a new book by David McCullough that offers an interesting take on how the migration of hundreds of Americans to Paris in the 1800s shaped some of our American art, literature, science, and politics when they returned to the United States. (The book is called, The Greater Journey: Americans in Paris.)
Born at the end of 1948, Horst grew up in Gifhorn, Germany, (“the good side” of the country, he notes) not far from Wolfsburg, where the first Volkswagen factory was built during the Third Reich. “You take 10,000 people, give them shovels, and you can build anything,” he offered. He had heard the familiar tales about America as the land of opportunity, so of course, his curiosity was piqued.
“Everything American was heaven... Elvis Presley, the movies, everything American was ‘it,’” Horst said, picking up his chirping iPhone to check an email.
“I had always heard that in America there is unlimited opportunity. I had to come over here and see it for myself.”
While he spoke, his iPhone rang. He picked it up and had a quick conversation in Spanish. Then he hung up and resumed our chat without missing a beat.
Horst was given a scholarship to the Cornell School of Hotel Adminstration, which meant all expenses including his student visa were covered, with the condition that he return to Europe when he graduated. “I reneged on that. But they didn’t force me,” he said, making no apologies.
He followed his dream of hotel management studies, then decided to become a chef. He finished that training in two years, a year ahead of schedule. But his heart was in hotel management, which required that he learn more languages. Today, he speaks four: English, German, Spanish, and French, perhaps due to his natural ability to do whatever it takes. Horst says the Germans are “very adaptable,” much different from the French, who he says have a strong sense of individuality.
Maybe this is a partial explanation of Napoleon’s aggressive nature in trying to conquer everything he coveted.
“War is the father and mother of all things,” said Horst, moving on to French history again. I reached for my Blackberry to start capturing his quotable quotes. “Napoleon invaded everything under the sun, even Egypt. He was crazy. A complete whack job.”
I wondered aloud whether the French interpret their history in the same way that we Americans view it. This was the second time inside of 10 hours that I had heard someone refer to Napoleon as “crazy,” and it reminded me of a discussion from one of my doctoral class meetings where we examined the idea of “truth,” and how it applies to the recording of historic events. In class, we had all come to see that history is not “fact” so much as interpretation affected by perspective.
Horst would have been a good contributor to that class.
“History is written by the victors,” he said.
As if history weren’t enough of a topic, I was compelled to be nosier about this interesting man whose deftness with the technologies on his dashboard indicated he has made the most of his life learning.
Somehow we got on the subject of email -- his iPhone kept chirping, and he had a natural ability to multitask. He hit upon the essence of my dissertation research question with a brief commentary about the lost art of communication. He lamented the way today’s youth are reluctant to pick up a phone to call and talk, choosing instead to text or email.
“The human touch,” Horst observed. “They don’t know how to communicate in person, and they don’t even know it.”
I practically bolted upright in my seat. I voiced agreement, and made a mental note of reassurance to myself: “This is validation that you are on to something in your work. Get on it.”
The long ride home was over much too fast. As we turned off the main drag onto my street, I asked him if he is now an American citizen. His children had been born here, he said, and had German and American passports, but Horst had never taken that ultimate step even though he had made a life and career for himself here.
“I recently flew home to Germany and was sitting on the plane next to a young woman,” Horst said. “We had been talking for a while and she asked me whether I consider myself to be German or American.”
I was dying to know myself, and waited for the answer.
“They say that wherever you spend the first 21 years of your life, that is what shapes you,” Horst said. “So some would say because I grew up and went to school in Germany, that makes me German. Now, I have spent more than 21 years here in this country, and some would say that makes me American.”
I was not sure which one he was going to pick. He had lived in Brussels for a while, spent two years in London, and of course, those two years in Paris. His company did the catering for the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich. Who knows where else he has traveled, what adventures he has had; our drive had not been long enough to give me a full account.
“I consider myself both, but really, I am a citizen of the world.”
In a way, it’s what we all are called upon to be. Even if we don’t travel, we can learn from the history and cultures of other countries. Then we can take a lesson from Horst: soak it in and let it shine.
Copyright 2011 By Marianne V. Heffernan
