I wonder if I shouldn’t wait until later today to actually write this, but as it’s fresh on my mind, I think I’ll go ahead and get it out now and we’ll see how the afternoon goes…
This morning I dropped the car off at a mechanic to get the oil changed, the brakes checked and a general “once-over” to assure the car is in good order. We originally stopped by the mechanic’s office on Saturday to make the appointment. At that time, the owner (the handsome and incredibly well-heeled Mr. Nazim) advised us (in halb-und-halb German-English) that he could look the car over, have the oil changed and brakes checked in about one-half hour if we would drop it off around 9am Monday. This sounded good to us, so we took the appointment.
This morning, after rushing Rowan to school and setting the auto-pilot (i.e., Navigation) to Mr. Nazim’s place, I arrived at precisely 8:55am. The lovely secretary speaks excellent English, so it was easy to tell her why I was there.
She smiled and said, “Excellent, you’ll just leave the car then.”
My expression must’ve communicated my instant confusion because she turned to Mr. Nazim who then came over and took over the transaction. “Ah yes, the Opel Astra!” He extended a nicely-manicured and very clean hand, “We’ll take a look at her, change the oil and check the brakes…how soon do you need her back?”
“Well, as soon as possible”, I smiled, suddenly and inexplicably concerned by the appearance of his hands... oh, this is going to be expensive, isn't it, I thought...
“OK….” he turned to the clock, “You come back at 1 o’clock, jah?”
“Um, OK”, I muttered, trying to hide my confusion while trying to remember the discussion on Saturday where I thought he told us he could be done in 30 minutes…
“You will walk home now, jah?” smiled Mr. Nazim. (It wasn’t really a question, more of a suggestion I guess.)
I smiled again (confused), but the obvious way he stated that I would now walk home, coupled with the expression of agreement on the face of the secretary (which actually bordered on an expression indicating that I was being extremely obtuse) made me feel that this simply was not up for further discussion. I handed over my keys and set out for home. It was a lovely 2 mile walk. I’m just really glad it didn’t rain until I got home!
Here in Germany, everyone walks. It’s not something that would ever have even entered my mind in New York. Drop the car off and walk home? Are you kidding? Even if the mechanic in NY was as close to home, I never would’ve considered walking. (Mind you, our mechanic in NY was near Hawthorne, 5 miles from our office and 30 miles from home… these distances are considered ludicrous to Germans who live usually within 10 miles of where they work, and maintain everything else even closer than that.) In Germany, walking (or biking) is completely commonplace. You see everyone from 5 to 95 walking or biking to and from the grocery store, school, the doctor’s office, etc. Here, there are sidewalks everywhere and well travelled paths thru fields (some of which are even paved); well-marked bike paths abound, and the average distance between towns is just a kilometer or less!
In the end, I am actually quite glad of the opportunity for exercise. It is too easy to avoid and I can almost always find an excuse, so I am thankful I wasn’t really given a choice today. Not working outside the home also allows me to take such things in stride... it's not like I have to be somewhere immediately... I can actually take my time. I just hope the rain stops before 1pm as I left both big umbrellas in the car…
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