Todd, however, had different plans. “You guys, the Gutenberg Museum is here. Mind if we go there before heading to the train station?”
“What’s at the Gutenberg Museum?” Katie asked.
“The first printed Bible. You’ve heard of Gutenberg, haven’t you? He invented the modern printing press. And the first book he printed, of course, was the Bible. I really want to see it.”
Off they went, with their bulky backpacks, to see the first printed Bible and a short movie on Gutenberg’s life. Todd was really into the exhibit. Poor Christy couldn’t help it; she dozed off when the lights went down for the movie.
They bought some cheese and bread at a corner market and walked to the train station, eating as they walked. Christy was happy to let Todd and Katie do all the discussing about which train to take and when. She couldn’t care less where they ended up. The food hadn’t helped make her headache go away, and now her throat hurt when she swallowed.
I wish I could go home to Escondido for one day and sleep in my old bed. My mom would bring me tea with honey for my throat. I would take a long bath before sleeping a full ten hours. Then I would wake up refreshed, clean, and energetic and instantly be transported back here. I wish I could do that. Then I’d be able to finish this journey and appreciate everything I’m seeing.
The train ride to Amsterdam was a blur to Christy. She carried her pack and changed trains when Todd told her to. When the conductor asked for passports and tickets, she automatically pulled her Eurorail pass from her travel pouch the way she had dozens of times before on this trip. The rest of the time, she snoozed.
When Christy finally began to come back around, she opened her eyes and peered out the window. The sun had set. The world they were rolling past was filled with shadows. Darkness covered the horizon.
“Where are we, you guys? Did we miss the stop for Amsterdam?”
She turned, expecting an answer from her travel companions. But they were gone.
18
Christy told herself not to panic. Todd and Katie must have gone for something to eat and didn’t want to wake me. We’ve done that before with each other; this isn’t unusual.
But something didn’t feel right. They should have arrived in Amsterdam before dark. Christy vaguely remembered Todd waking her when they changed trains back in Cologne, around 5:00. He had said something about taking three hours to reach Amsterdam, that they would be there before dark, and he would call his friends when the train arrived to see about staying with them.
Christy looked up and down the long aisle for Todd and Katie. The train was slowing to a stop. All she could think to do was to grab her pack and be ready to exit if this was Amsterdam. She would figure out how to find Todd and Katie later. The worst thing would be to miss getting off at the right place the way Katie had almost done in Naples.
When Christy reached up for her pack on the overhead shelf, she noticed Todd and Katie’s packs were still there. They wouldn’t have left without their packs. They wouldn’t have left without her. But where were they? And more important, what station was the train stopping at?
Christy tried to read the station’s sign as they rolled in. The sign said Nancy. Christy was stunned. How did we end up in France?
Just then Katie came bounding up and said, “Hey, Sleeping Beauty. You decided to wake and face the real world, huh?”
What Christy was experiencing at that moment felt like anything but the real world. “Katie, what are we doing in France?”
Todd was right behind Katie. Following him was a guy wearing a baseball cap and toting a backpack. “Christy, this is Seth. What was your last name?”
“Edwards,” Seth said. He looked a little older than Todd and just as scruffy, evidence that he had been traveling for a while.
“Seth Edwards,” Todd repeated. “This is Christy.”
Then, to Christy’s surprise, Todd added with a gentle smile, “Christy Miller, my girlfriend.” Todd never had described her that way. If she hadn’t still been confused and shocked about being in France instead of Holland, she might have taken Todd’s words deeper into her heart.
“We met Seth in the dining car, and he has lots of great tips on what to see and do in Paris,” Katie said.
“Would someone mind telling me what’s happening?” Christy asked as the three of them sat down. “I thought we were going to Amsterdam.”
“We changed plans,” Katie said brightly. “We told you on the train from Mainz to Cologne, and you said that was fine; whatever we wanted.”
“I don’t remember,” Christy said.
Seth smiled at her. He had nice eyes. They were deep blue and matched the dark blue denim shirt he wore over a stained white T-shirt. “It catches up with you, doesn’t it?”
“What catches up?”
“Travel fatigue. All the new sights and sounds and food. From what Todd and Katie told me, you guys have been going at it pretty hard and fast. I’m on a much slower pace, but it still hits me about every two weeks, and I have to stay somewhere for a few more days before I can go on.”
“Seth has already been to Paris,” Katie said. “He had way more information than our tour book. He’s going back to meet up with some friends. He just spent the last two weeks in Venice. Can you imagine spending two weeks in one place?”
Right now that luxury sounded very nice to Christy. “Did these guys tell you that all we saw was the inside of the Venice train station for a few hours?”
“You have to go back,” Seth said. “You can’t come all this way and not see Venice, even if it’s only for a day. However, fourteen days is better than one.”
“Did you happen to notice a jewelry store called Santini?” Katie asked. “Wasn’t that Marcos’s last name? I have it written down somewhere.”
“Their name is Savini,” Todd corrected her.
“And if you ever want a good place to stay on Capri,” Katie told Seth, “go to the Villa Paradiso and tell them Carlos Savini sent you.” She proceeded to tell Seth all about their free, deluxe hotel room in Capri.
Seth had a story about a Swiss family he had met on the train a few months earlier and how they had invited him to stay with them. After opening his pack and pulling out a small journal with several postcards sticking out, he asked if he could write their name in Christy’s tour book.
“I’m serious,” Seth said, pulling off the pen’s cap with his teeth. “They would love to have you guys stay with them. They live in a chalet in this small Swiss alpine village called Adelboden.” Seth flipped though his journal. “I’ll write it all down here. You take the train from Bern to Thun to Spiez and then to Frutigen. You have to take a bus to Adelboden. The scenery is incredible.”
“How long did you stay there?” Katie asked.
“Five days, I think. I slept in the hayloft, and during the day I helped out on their small farm. It was a kick. You guys would love it. I’m serious. Just tell them Seth Edwards sent you.”
For the next two hours into Paris, they swapped travel stories with Seth. Christy felt a little more awake and coherent by the time they arrived, even though she was sure it was well after midnight.
Seth knew of a reasonable hotel near the train station. The four of them crashed for the night and met up the next morning at eight after taking showers.
“I need to get going,” Seth said. “Sure was great meeting all of you. I hope the rest of your trip goes well.”
“Yours too,” Katie said. “Thanks for all the tips about what to see.”
“I stuck a paper in your tour book with a list of those restaurants I was telling you about in Venice, in case you guys make it there.”
“We will,” Katie said. “If I have anything to say about it, we definitely will.”
After saying good-bye to Seth, Todd suggested they eat something and head for the Eiffel Tower while it was still cool. He had heard someone on the train last night say that a heat wave was expected for the next few days in Paris, which was unusual so early in the
summer. They could tour the air-conditioned Louvre during the hottest part of the day.
Christy hadn’t slept as deeply as she needed to shake the fuzzy-headed feeling that had come over her. Their breakfast pastry and strong coffee didn’t snap her out of her fog, either. She took pictures of the Eiffel Tower and agreed with Katie that it cost too much to tour the top. Todd coaxed them onto the metro, which was a modern subway system under the city, and directed them where to get off for Notre Dame.
As they approached the huge, light gray, west-facing front of the cathedral, Christy asked Katie if she could see the tour book. She wanted to find out how old this church was and how it compared to the cathedral in Cologne. They resembled each other some, but instead of twin spires in the front, Notre Dame had two identical towers that looked like open bell towers.
Katie handed her the book. When Christy opened it, three postcards fell out onto the pavement. The first card was of the Austrian Alps. Another one was of the Seine River in Paris. And the third was a picture of a gondola docked against a red-and-white-striped pole. The gondolier stood on the dock, complete with a wide-brimmed straw hat with a blue ribbon hanging down the back. He leaned casually against the pole and indicated with his hand that his gondola was available for the next rider.
These must be Seth’s postcards. Christy turned over the one of the gondola from Venice. It was addressed to a Franklin Madison in Glenbrooke, Oregon. None of the postcards had a stamp on it. Christy tucked them into the back of the tour book and decided she would be nice and mail the postcards for Seth. They must have ended up in her book when he was sticking the list of restaurants in it.
Turning to the section on Paris, Christy skimmed the information on Notre Dame. “Can you believe this church was built almost a hundred years before the one we saw in Cologne? It says here that people have worshiped on this spot for nearly two thousand years.”
She was struck with awe, the way she had been in Norway when they saw the simple, eight-hundred-year-old church and the sharp contrast it provided to Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome. “People want to meet God, don’t they?” Christy said as they stood gazing up at Notre Dame. “Deep within the human heart is the desire to meet God. I never realized that as clearly as I have while we’ve been traveling.”
“Look at that window,” Katie said. “What does it say about the window?”
Christy read aloud, “ ‘The great rose window contains its original medieval glass. It was the largest such window of its time, and the design is so accomplished that it shows no sign of distortion after seven hundred years.’ ”
“Now, that’s craftsmanship for you,” Todd said. “Has anyone else noticed how art used to be used to demonstrate biblical truths? Man, have we come a long way from that being art’s purpose!”
The three friends took more than two hours to tour the inside of the cathedral. It was dark and solemn. They climbed the winding stairs to the top, and Katie said, “Don’t you feel as if you’re caught inside a snail’s shell when we go up these kinds of stairs?”
“It makes me dizzy,” Christy said.
“I just think about what muscular legs those monks must have hid under their robes after climbing these stairs a couple of times a day to ring the bells,” Todd answered.
At the top, they noticed how hot the day had become. The view of Paris looked hazy in the rising heat. From where they stood, Christy thought the Seine River looked appealing. Any kind of water at this point, either on her or in her, would feel refreshing.
It didn’t take much for Todd to persuade them to descend the stairs and find something to eat before going on to the Louvre. To save money, they bought their food from a vendor’s cart. Christy’s hot dog–like sausage was too spicy for her, and she could only eat half of it. The Coke was as hot as the crate it was pulled from. She downed the hot, fizzy beverage but felt only thirstier.
At least inside the Louvre was cool. Christy felt spacey in the vast palace-turned-museum. She wished they had someone like Marcos to let them in a back door and lead them right to the rooms with the exhibits of greatest interest. As it was, they paid for their admission using their International Student ID cards to receive a discount. They entered through a modern, intricately designed glass pyramid, and from then on, Christy felt disoriented.
Katie was on a mission to find the Mona Lisa. Her determination to locate that famous little lady was much stronger than the interest she had expressed in finding the Little Mermaid. Once they entered the room where the small oil painting hung on the wall, Katie edged her way to the front of the crowd to have a close look. Christy and Todd stood at the fringes and peeked over people’s shoulders.
“It’s a lot smaller than I thought it would be,” Todd said. Christy smiled. “Funny how that goes, isn’t it?”
Katie, still in her spunky mood, turned around at the front of the crowd of Mona Lisa viewers and shot a picture of Todd and Christy.
“That guard is going to take your camera away,” Christy said as Katie came toward them.
“Why? It says not to take flash photographs of the Mona Lisa. It doesn’t say anything about taking pictures of people looking at the Mona Lisa.”
“Where to next?” Todd asked.
“Home,” Christy said wearily.
“You want to go back to the hotel?” Todd asked.
“No, I think I want to go back to Escondido. I officially have hit overload. I don’t think I can take in another wonder of the world. My brain can’t hold it.”
“How about if we get out of town,” Todd suggested. “We could take a train or bus out to Versailles. It’s only about a half hour away.”
Christy didn’t much care at this point. Sitting down for a half hour was what appealed to her the most. They briefly toured the Egyptian exhibit and several other rooms in the Louvre before Todd led the way back outside into the stifling afternoon heat.
After asking four people, Todd finally decided he knew where they should go to catch a bus to Versailles. They waited twenty minutes in the heat, rode forty minutes in air-conditioned comfort, and bought large bottles of water from a vendor immediately on arriving.
Standing back and surveying the massive, yellowish-cream-colored palace, Christy felt as if what she stared at couldn’t be real. It was so perfectly balanced. Every window, column, and roof line seemed to be matched perfectly with the rest of the huge structure. Instead of being one long building with a flat front, the palace was constructed with stairstep-like indentations of buildings that led in tandem to the center.
Katie, who had been reading about this seventeenth-century home of the French monarchy, said, “Just look at that place. Can you image all those peasants starving to death and Marie Antoinette sitting somewhere inside that palace?”
Christy didn’t know what Katie was getting at. Katie apparently read Christy’s confused expression and said, “You remember, they came to her and said the starving citizens of France had no bread; so Marie Antoinette said, ‘Let them eat cake.’ ”
For perhaps the first time on this trip, Christy wasn’t intrigued by the history lesson. She liked the idea of cake, though. Or pastry. Or even a humble cookie. The half of a hot dog she had eaten for lunch wasn’t doing her stomach any favors.
Blessedly, it felt cooler inside the gigantic palace. The water Christy had gulped also helped her to cool off. She found herself settling into a strange, robotic mode. Her feet moved her from room to room. Her eyes took in the sights. Each bedroom seemed more magnificent than the last. The ballroom made her think of something out of a Cinderella movie. She saw it all and took it in, but as she had told Todd earlier, she was on overload.
“Are you okay?” he asked on the bus ride back to Paris.
“I don’t know,” she said. “How can you take it all in? Doesn’t everything you see make you feel something? And don’t you reach the point where you don’t have any feelings left to invest?”
Todd didn’t answer right away. He seemed to be thinking abo
ut her questions. His answer came in the form of a few more questions for Christy. “Do you think that’s why the work at the orphanage has been so draining this year? Do you think you take it all in and feel something deep every day about those kids? I wonder if that’s what’s been happening. Then you reach the point where you can’t invest any more emotionally because you’ve spent so much of yourself.”
“Todd,” Christy said, leaning her weary head against his shoulder, “I think you have just figured out the answer to what has plagued me for months.”
“I know you’ve been struggling with it because of your emails.”
“The need is so great . . .” she said.
Todd turned his chin and gently kissed the top of her head. “But, Christy, the need is not the call. You are uniquely gifted by God. The key is finding out what it is you are uniquely gifted to do, and that’s what you pour out of yourself. If you’re operating within your gifts, you will feel energized, not emptied.”
Christy pulled up her head and looked at Todd. “Are you saying I’m not gifted to work with children?” That possibility felt like a blow. For several years she had thought that was what she was supposed to do. It had started when Katie talked her into helping in the nursery class at church. Christy liked helping out. Ever since then, she had been making decisions about what to do with her life based on what she thought was a talent of working with children.
“I don’t know exactly what God has gifted you to do or called you to do. That’s something between Him and you. Ask Him. He’ll tell you.”
Christy leaned her head back on Todd’s shoulder. Until this moment, she had thought her future was nicely structured. Her plans had been set long ago. She would earn a degree in early childhood education. Then she might be a preschool teacher, which was a plan she liked because she could do that no matter where she lived or if she was single or married or had children of her own.
“All I know,” Todd said, leaning his chin against her head, “is that the future is wide open to you, Christina Juliet Miller. You are gifted by God, and He has called you to serve Him in a unique way. A verse in Romans says that the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. No one can ever take away from you who you are. You are free to dream as big a dream as you dare to dream.”