Without Reservations_ The Travels of an Independent Woman - Alice Steinbach [65]
It was this last category that, ultimately, interested me most. I found myself observing each classmate from this angle, looking for signs—I gradually came to think of them as symptoms—that identified them as either fun-seekers or complainers. The fun-seekers, I noted, were spontaneous and flexible. They approached each day and each situation with a willingness to ride whatever wave came along, just for the experience of it. The complainers, on the other hand, would only catch a wave if it was exactly to their liking. Anything else drew loud protestations about how it was not what they expected.
I wanted to be a fun-seeker. Not only because I just plain wanted more fun in my life, but because intuitively I knew my energies were working in that direction. To my surprise, it was Albert who gave me my first lesson in how to seek out fun.
Albert, along with the rest of us, had been sucked into the vortex of this purloined family. He spent a lot of time with us, eating meals, going out in the evenings, acting as a sort of guide and concierge. His role was that of the Oxford insider; the one who knows the system and how it operates. My guess was that the insider role was not the one usually assumed by Albert, who seemed a reserved, almost shy young man. But as time passed he seemed to grow into it. And to enjoy it.
Albert, the son of psychiatrists, liked to tell stories about Oxford and, as he grew more comfortable with us, about himself. Although he was probably not aware of it, his personal stories often opened up a view, for those who cared to look, into the inner Albert.
One late afternoon while sharing a glass of sherry with a half-dozen of us, Albert recalled a temporary job he’d had in London, one ruled over by a difficult, demanding, never-satisfied boss. He commuted by train to London every day. One day his train was late. “By the time I arrived at the station in London I was already fifteen minutes late,” Albert told us. “And I knew when I got to work I would be fired. So I thought about it for a few minutes. Then I thought, ‘Why not turn this mishap into an adventure?’ So I decided to go to Cornwall right from Paddington Station.”
He never returned to the job. “But,” he said, “I had a wonderful time in Cornwall.”
For some reason I was quite taken with Albert’s philosophy of turning a mishap into an adventure. When I returned to my rooms that evening I, who never took notes in class, got out my spiral binder and wrote, “Must experimentally test Albert’s Theorem of M=EA (Mishap equals Excellent Adventure).”
However, I didn’t realize fully how much it impressed me until several weeks later in Italy when I found myself, by mistake, on a train going to Assisi instead of Arezzo.
Dumped out of the train, standing in the station at the foot of Monte Subasio, three miles below the Umbrian town of Assisi, I thought, “Why not turn this mishap into an adventure?” On an earlier day trip to Assisi I’d explored a charming small hotel that hung over the mountain’s edge, thinking that someday I would return for a longer visit.
Fate, or so I convinced myself, had plunked me down in Assisi sooner rather than later for that visit. I decided to stay for a few days.
That night, as I sat on the outdoor terrace of the hotel, I silently toasted Albert, the man who turned a mishap into an adventure. And who not so incidentally made me realize how simple it is to do. How simple and how necessary. It seemed an important lesson.
As things turned out, it was not the only lesson I was to learn from Albert during my stay at Brasenose. It was through Albert that I met Barry, the Oxford instructor I would remember above all others.
10
A COTSWOLD ENCOUNTER
Dear Alice,
How odd that a chance meeting with a woman named Letty