My 20s
- October 02, 2004
- 5 comments
My 30th birthday is only a couple days away. As I get closer and closer to it, I’ve begun going over all the things I’ve done in my 20s. This post is rather long, and was written as much for me as for others to read. I didn’t write everything I’ve done down (that would take a book!), but I have written some highlights.
I can remember exactly where I was and what I was doing the last few hours of my teens. I was at a camp retreat on the east side of the Big Island of Hawaii in the first few days of my Communication Core Course (an intensive course where I went to college). I had my feet up on the table, talking with some friends and having a good time. I watched the clock on the wall as the clock struck midnight, and I was no longer a teenager. It was both exciting and a little scary. I was no longer a kid.
Early on in my 20s, I was dating a Brazilian girl who I thought I would marry. She was my best friend, at the time, and we could talk about anything. She was the one who made me fall in love with Brazil, its people and culture and football (soccer), all of which I still love to this day. She was five years older than me, which seemed to be a mental block for her. I think in the end, it was a combination of that and I wasn’t ready to get married. I was too immature, although I didn’t know it at the time. The last I saw her was almost three years ago in Hawaii. She was married and pregnant with her first kid. She looked happy, and I was glad to see her that way. Then again, she was always smiling and happy. That’s what attracted me to her in the first place.
Soon after, when I was 21, my health went in decline. I lost so much weight, I was down to 125 lbs! At 6 feet tall, I looked like a bean pole. It was a combination of a poor college diet, anxiety and depression. I didn’t realize it was depression and anxiety at the time. I thought I was just really sick.
I moved back to Austin, Texas with my family. Instead of getting better, I got worse. I had no friends, and was too scared to go out anywhere thinking I would have some kind of “attack” and embarrass myself publicly. After a few months, we packed everything up, and moved to a hole in the ground called Lockesburg, Arkansas. My depression was bad enough in Hawaii and Austin, but now that we were isolated in a place with no one my age, my depression hit rock bottom. I contemplated suicide, and it made perfect sense. It didn’t seem illogical or selfish in any way. It seemed like a way out. I think the only reason I didn’t do it was because I was too scared. I’m glad I was.
At my lowest point, a friend of mine I had made in Hawaii called me from Germany. He was taking a class there on graphic design at a place called Media Village Europe. He had also had bouts of depression, so he knew I was bad off and needed new surroundings. He convinced me to head to Germany, to a small village in the heart of the Black Forest called Altensteig. That decision changed my life, and probably saved it too.
I spent four years in Altensteig, learning new skills, teaching and leading courses, working on projects for all kinds of clients and making friends from all over the world. The director of Media Village and his family were instrumental in helping me get out of my depression. He always had wise, timely things to tell me when I most needed to hear them. I knew I could always come and talk with him when I needed to. I will always remember his help and will always be grateful to him for it.
I also made some close friends with the family I was living with there. They were Swiss, but had lived in Altensteig for a while. They became like my parents away from home. They took me in and made me feel like I was part of their family. They also always seemed to have timely things to say and I will also always be grateful to them. Their two youngest daughters were close to my age and were always fun to hang around with. They became close friends, and I’m still in communication with them to this day.
During my time there, I travelled all over and saw many amazing places. I’ve been to London twice, once by plane, the other through the Chunnel. I’ve been to France several times. My favorite cathedral is the Strasbourg cathedral. You can see it for miles before you reach Strasbourg. The old astronomical clock inside it is amazing. I even attended an Easter service there with some friends.
I’ve been to Venice, my favorite city in the world. It practically oozes romance at every corner. I was only there for a couple days, but the sights and sounds have stuck with me since. I went with the Swiss family and another friend I had made years earlier in Hawaii. We got there late, so he and I had to find a place to stay since there were no boats to the youth hostel at that hour. We eventually found a place near a church. It wasn’t a hotel, but was in the attic of this old building. It was setup for young backpackers who couldn’t afford much. I don’t think it was legal, but it was cheap and we were glad to have a bed. We met back up with the Swiss family the next morning and meandered through the city. We went on a gondola ride through the canals, with music echoing through the alleyways. We saw the amazing cathedral of St. John’s with gold everywhere you looked. Even though the sites were awesome, there were two events that were the highlights of the trip for me. The first was the very loud, very long yelling match I had with the old, Italian woman who ran the place we were staying at. This was the kind of yelling match you see Italians in all over the place. It looks like they’re about to start throwing punches, but then they walk off smiling to go drink coffee. Our yelling match was like this. She had given our room out to someone else because of a misunderstanding between us. We began arguing over it, both our voices getting louder and louder. In the end, we worked it out and she smiled and patted me on the back. In her very broken English, she told me I was a “good young man”. The second highlight was near the end of the trip, we decided we’d go off the beaten path and just meander through the alleyways. We eventually ended up in a small plaza where we were obviously the only tourists. There were little kids playing soccer with a dog chasing the ball as well. Old men playing chess. Old women sewing and talking. There was music floating down from someone’s window. And the evening light had that tone and color that accentuates every detail and almost makes it seem surreal. We stopped, bought some amazing gelato (ice cream) and sat down to enjoy the scene. It was so perfect, I hated to leave it.
I’ve been to Budapest and ridden the very small, very old subway trains. We rented some two-seater bikes and rode around in a beautiful park. People were all over the place, reading, playing games and enjoying the perfect weather. Despite that, you could still feel some of the old remnants of communism here and there.
I’ve been to Denmark twice, the second time for the marriage of two good friends from the Philippines and Denmark. Their wedding was the best one I’ve ever been to. The ceremony itself was like any other, but the reception afterward was great. Everyone there gave a speech about how they knew the bride and groom and how they had touched their lives. Each one affirmed the new couple and promised to help them whenever they needed it. There was lots of laughing, singing, dancing. There was even a tradition where the men had to keep the bride away from the groom in one dance. The reception lasted long into the night, well after the bride and groom had left. Sadly, not even two years later, the groom was killed in a car accident. I cried for hours after I heard about it.
A few years after I lived with them, my Swiss family moved back to Switzerland, to a small town called Einigen. They owned some land there just above the lake, surrounded by the Alps. They had two amazing buildings on it. One was an ancient chatel, and the other an amazing mansion built by a banker back in the late 1800s. I stayed in the old chatel for Christmas in ‘96. The ceilings were so low, I had to duck so I wouldn’t hit my head on the beams. Only an hours drive into the mountains is a ski resort with some majestic views. In the winter, we went sledding near an old church in the area. In the spring, when the winter snows are melting, there is a gigantic waterfall there a short hike through some woods. It’s so big it creates strong winds and sends mist hundreds of yards into the woods. My Swiss family still lives in Einigen and I have an open invitation to stay there whenever I want to. I would love to go there sometime soon.
I’ve lost count of all the places and things I’ve seen and done in Germany. I’ve been to Hamburg, Münich, Ülm, Stuttgart, Frankfurt. I’ve strolled through the endless stalls on cold winter nights during the Kristkindlmarkts. I’ve climbed to the top of the Ülm cathedral. I’ve camped out at mountain lakes in Bavaria. I’ve seen Neuschwanstein twice. I’ve driven over 140 mph on the autobahn in a tiny, 1.7 liter Opel diesel station wagon. And I was still getting passed! I’ve seen castles all over the place, but one of my favorites was the one in Nagold. It had a beautiful view and a bunch of us would bring and eat lunch there every now and then. And yes, I’ve even been to a nude beach.
Even though I’ve done a lot of things there, some of my best memories are of a place only a few minutes drive from Altensteig. Down a small road in the Black Forest, there’s an old castle tower that stands about 8 stories high. It had been renovated who knows when and had a long, spiralling staircase on the inside. We mostly went there at night, so you’d either have a flashlight or feel your way up the stairs. Walking up to the tower at night was always cool, because you couldn’t see it until you came around this one turn in the road. Every time I saw it, it made me think of some scene from Tolkien’s books. You half expected Orcs or something to come pouring out of it. Once we reached the top of the tower, there were places to lay down and stare at the stars. We would be up there for hours, drinking beer, talking and laughing, watching the stars and counting satellites. One night, we counted 14 satellites!
In ‘99, I headed down to Melbourne, Australia for the last course I needed for my degree. I had already been there the year before to teach in a Web development course, but that was only for a couple weeks. The second time was for three months. Melbourne is a great city. It’s huge, but it feels laid back compared to other big cities like Dallas or Atlanta. At the Art Centre I saw a theater/dance troupe there that was amazing. They had everyone on their feet at the end. I travelled down to Prince Phillip Island and saw the little penguins by the thousands waddle up onto the beach to their nests. I got to drive a standard on the wrong side of the car, on the wrong side of the road. That was exciting! I saw kangaroos and koalas and all the other interesting wildlife. I travelled down to Geelong and watched the surfers ride the waves.
In 2000, my closest cousin got married in Austin. While I was back and visiting with everyone, I realized how much of my family’s lives I had missed out on. My sisters, who were little girls when I left, were now women with all the curves that attract guys! My mother and father had all kinds of interesting stories to tell. My cousins were all growing up. At that time, a desire to get back with my family kicked in and I was no longer happy travelling all over by myself. I love travelling, but I hate travelling alone. So in December 2000, I left Germany and moved back to the US.
In February 2001, I went to Brazil for a month to work with a group of interns from the design course I had led in Germany. I stayed with some Brazilian friends I had made in Germany. He and I are like long-lost brothers. We have the same sense of humor. The same interest in technology and entertainment. We just clicked. His parents had a home out at a nice place outside of Belo Horizonte. It was simply beautiful out there. We would go out to the little lake there and swim and stand under the waterfall. It felt like a giant masseuse. I saw tiny monkeys the size of small squirrels come down out of the trees and eat fruit at a little stand made just for them. We watched the Carnival on TV. They were showing a whole lot more than would be allowed on US TV, but no one seemed to care. After a while, you just got used to it and enjoyed the dancing, music and colors. And of course, we played soccer. I love the Brazilian people, culture and language. I was there for just one month, but by the end I was able to freak out my friends by understanding the gist of their conversations.
Reading over this post, I’m amazed at how many things I’ve seen and places I’ve been, especially considering I didn’t have a paying job during that time. I volunteered my time at Media Village, but somehow things always seemed to be taken care of. I didn’t stay at the nice hotels or rent fancy cars wherever I went, but in the end I think that’s what made the trips so memorable. They were different. More real, I guess.
The last few years have been boring and quiet in comparison, although I’ve become closer to my parents. My Web development job was a hot/cold roller-coaster ride for three years until recently. Sometimes I would go for a few months with only a trickle of money coming in. Other months I’d bring in a few thousand. It was horrible, and not enough for me to move out on my own. It’s a lot better now, and hopefully will remain steady like this for a long while so I can finally move back out on my own.
I’ve already written before about my desire to meet people my age and get married, so I won’t go into that again.
All in all, my 20s had some towering highs and some deep lows, but they were exciting and memorable. I only hope my 30s are as exciting and rewarding, if not more so.
Hi Chris,
thanks so much for writing this post. I just hit 29 last week so I know where you’re coming from.
After reading it I wish I was just across town or something so I could buy you a drink, hang out, and talk about life outside the USA. I’ve never been to Europe, but I’ve hit Japan, Taiwan, and Hong Kong.
In my 29 years this is what I know. There are dragons. We can slay them. Strength & honor!
Hi Chris, it was good to read about your twenties… Quite a rollercoaster ride. One that in part I can identify with too. Our time in Altensteig was such as good experience. We were very blessed. The people, the place… The first two years of being back in the UK, I really wanted to return.
I’m now approaching my 30th soon too, and we have just celebrated the birth of a daughter Abigail. All the best for your 30s! May they be full of happiness, joy and peace. By the way, do you still produce tunes on your Garage Band? Let me know if you do… I may need a bit of music soon for a DVD I’m doing.
Take care, Paul
(Good to see your reply too Rodrigo!) – Isn’t it amazing how many of us still call by Chris’s website! Keep it going Chris!
hey paul. good to see you here too. don’t let chris know we come so often or he might start charging us a fee. better let he think we never care. 
and, yes, you’re right. the altensteig part of the story made quite an impression on many peoples lives. i don’t know about you guys, but i never felt like i am back home. there’s always something missing and that thing seems to be hidden somewhere in the heart of the black forest. or maybe with each one of us.
Great story Chris. I have fought terrible depression my whole life, and it’s always great hearing stories on the ways different people find to beat it. Hopefully things will continue to improve for you as life goes on.
Best wishes to you and your dad on your birthdays this week.