APRIL 7, SUNDAY

ADVENTURE IN AUCKLAND

Today, I went on an adventure. I woke up early, sat at the table in the kitchen area of my Airbnb all day and didn‘t go outside until dinner time, the whole adventure was in my head.

Last night I went to Heinrich and Elke‘s house for dinner. Elke was my wife Kathe‘s best German friend. As girls in Winsen they were inseparable and then Elke married Heinrich, ten years older than her, who soon became a school principal. Her whole life she has lived in Winsen except a spell when Heinrich taught in a nearby village. She always dreamed of travel but stayed at home.

Kathe met me and made the huge leap to the United States almost on a whim. For many years they both were raising families and travel was expensive and difficult. But when their children left home 30 years ago they reconnected. Kathe visited Winsen a number of times and Elke visited us in Swannanoa a number of times. With the arrival of inexpensive phone calls they connected at least once a week and with free Facetime calls they were in each other‘s presence, although thousands of miles apart, almost every day.

This is my third visit to Winsen since Kathe died three years ago. Elke and Heinrich are good friends and I feel Kathe‘s presence here. So I am here for three weeks.

But my adventure today was a trip to New Zealand. Day before yesterday going.com informed me that for a day or two I could get an inexpenive round trip ticket from Asheville to New Zealand in November for $815, spring time in New Zealand as it is springtime here now. I had always wanted to go to New Zealand, I think for the natural beauty of the place and because they speak English there. This was my chance. I tried to explore possibilities on Google Flights, but the wifi in Aschaffenburg was too slow and I kept getting tangled up. But today I decided to try again, thinking that these inexpensive tickets would be gone. A flight to New Zealand is usually $1500, so these half price tickets would be sold out. If they weren‘t that would be an omen that I should go. They weren‘t sold out. I could go on October 27 and return on November 28 for $820. With such a good omen I bought the ticket. It even included a checked bag. For the rest of the morning I checked my feelings to see if I was getting buyer‘s remorse. I wasn‘t. I was ready to go.

This afternoon I decided to learn about New Zealand, knowing nothing about it except that it was a beautiful place. I discovered that it is also an expensive place, more expensive than Germany but less than Norway. And it is a beautiful place, attracting campers and backpackers. I learned that Auckland, the largest city, where the flight was to, is the largest city in New Zealand and that it has many restaurants and a vibrant night life.

And then it dawned on me that I wasn‘t going to go camping or backpacking, I wasn‘t going to go to night clubs, or even eating out very much, and that New Zealand food wouldn‘t be that different from English food. It also dawned on me that New Zealand like Montevideo is a new country with no deep traditions because both countries, like the United States, had wiped out the original inhabitants and their cultures and traditions. After a week of feeling the ancient culture of France and now Germany I didn‘t want newness and all the seduction of capitalism with its rapid change, everything now. In addition, I wouldn‘t know a soul there and no one was going to go with me half way around the world.

Suddenly, I was just as certain that I didn‘t want to go to New Zealand in November as I was satisfied this morning that I did want to go to New Zealand in November. It took buying the ticket to concentrate my thinking and to turn dream to actuality. So buying the ticket was a good thing, it forced me to examine what I was doing.

But going.com had also advised me that when you see a very good deal, buy the ticket before it vanishes and then think about it for twenty hours under the 24 hour rule. If you cancel an airline ticket within 24 hours you get a full refund, no questions asked.

So this afternoon I cancelled the ticket and cancelled the Allianz insurance I bought with it and got a full refund for each. No remorse this time. It was the right thing to do, it just felt right.

But, of course, what this reveals is that it was my current feeling that led me to buy the ticket and my current feeling that led me to cancel it. I felt high this morning so jumped at the chance, I feel flattened this afternoon and backed out. But is either feeling about an event that is 6 months away even relevant? It is how I might feel in 6 months when I land in Auckland that matters, not how I feel now. And I will never find out how landing in Auckland feels. How many of our choices in life are like that. My trip to Sri Lanka and India was based on vague feelings and so is this trip. Marriage is like that, having a first, second or third child is like that, changing jobs is like that, buying a house is like that, religious fervor is a feeling and most political convictions including conspiracy theories feel right. Whatever feels right at the moment determines how we will act, with lasting consequences.