Take me there; take me with you.
Earlier today, to celebrate an anniversary, I took Metro-North to New Haven, passing by the familiar landmarks that haunted my commute not too long ago. Noting with acute sadness and surprised longing the billboards, the storefronts, the hills and ponds that alternately blazed and crept past outside my window. It felt like a homecoming more than any return to the New York apartment, and I think I can lay that particular sentiment at the foot of the people I was coming back to see.
They were intimately tied with this anniversary; in fact, they’d been instrumental in bringing it about and much of the ride, as much as I thought of my Property homework or the Didion book I’d started reading, was filled with thoughts of them.
In conversation later, I remarked that recent months, indeed much of the past year, had seen a retreat of sorts. As I felt strength returning, I judged myself healthy enough to begin this or that endeavor. But, coming back, it felt like my train was righting itself, and only then did I notice how far from the main rails I’d strayed.
Good things were happening in my life. Indeed, they continue. They, surprisingly enough, persist. And seeing them again, their smiles and their frowns and their laughs and hearing their voices-their familiar intonations and pauses, their lovely locution-brought home the notion that it was this fellowship, this particular congregation of penitents, that was almost single-handedly responsible for my present health, much as my recent turns of thought have been fraught with illness.
Towards the end of February, I had the opportunity to realize a dream, during the course of whose realization I’d forgotten I’d nourished. Last semester, I joined the European Law Moot Court, an achievement in and of itself as part of the tryout consisted of pleading a case in French. Ever since I’d first begun studying the language, I’d nurtured hopes and dreams of performing a professional duty in that language. That, to me, was the mark of proficiency. And I’d done it. In my mind, the tryout went horribly and I flubbed vocabulary and mixed up descriptives and assigned the wrong gender to nouns, but apparently, my French had been strong enough to guarantee me a spot on the team.
Much of the fall semester was concerned with the written portion of our bifurcated competition process. If we, as a team, could write a strong enough brief, then we would advance to the oral semi-finals in cities all over Europe. If we came first in that competition, we would see ourselves, at some point in the spring semester, in Luxembourg for the finals.
Soon after our return from winter break, we discovered that we had indeed advanced to the semis in Lund, Sweden, and that was where my most recent trip had happened.
It was a wonder. Sweden, as homogenous as it was, turned out to be a lovely place and the experience (for instance, remarking on how much the landscape outside our train ride from Copenhagen to Lund resembled the American Midwest) is one I’ve fought to keep at the forefront of my memory ever since our return.
The weeks leading up to it were a flurry of practices, memorizing our arguments (including the French portions) and internalizing our problem such that we could bring our uniquely American style of advocacy with us to the proceedings.
The first day of competition, stationed in the various halls of Lund University’s Faculty of Law, pitted us against European teams from across the continent, and one couldn’t help being reminded of how porous the borders were for Europe, how for each passing generation, the line dividing one parcel of nationally-endowed territory from the next had become increasingly meaningless. The Italian team had Spaniards on it. The team from Geneva sported a native French girl, a German, and a Swiss competitor. The team from Leiden University was a panoply of nationalities, including one erstwhile American, with whom we made fast friends.
The night before the first day of competition, there was a social get-together and despite our initial reluctance to mix with the others, we soon found ourselves beset upon by new friends and acquaintances, our exotic Americanism a natural draw for examination, perhaps.
I don’t recall being especially nervous, in preparation for that first day, though I undoubtedly was. My body had perhaps reacted to overcompensate with an abundance of lackadaisicalness. Indeed, that first morning (I was the first of our team to compete that day), I arrived at my room with three minutes to spare before pleadings commenced.
I was the defendant, so I got to hear the plaintiff plead his case and was struck (almost physically) with relief at how prepared I was to present. When it came to be my turn, I felt at ease in a way I’d rarely felt during practice. The bench, composed of about 5 judges of various nationality, was merely a new set of friends for me to make, and I experienced a sensation similar to what I’d felt on the football field in high school or when I sat down to write and the words came with particular fluidity. A psychiatrist once called it flow, and that is indeed what it felt like.
Indeed, when the first question in French came (I was obliged to answer in kind), I did not hesitate to respond with an answer my subconscious (melding, of course, with the practice answers and the hours and hours and hours of rehearsed response I’d managed in the weeks beforehand) had helpfully provided.
My teammate, who argued for the plaintiff’s side in the afternoon, had a similarly breezy round, but we were not without surprise when we found we had advanced to the second day of competition.
There was another social that first night, but we left early in order to diligently prepare for the next day’s work.
We’d switched rooms, and though my audience the second time around was tougher, I felt I’d performed to the best of my abilities. Nothing felt particularly forced. Indeed, it all swam as if guided by a predetermined course.
That said, when we heard we’d advanced to the last round of the semifinals, we were almost delirious in our fatigued joy. It meant more work, but it also meant a chance at glory. And for our coach, who had been denied a run at the oral rounds last year, it was quiet vindication.
That last round was later that afternoon and our preparation was feverish after it had been decided that I would plead the defendant’s side for that final round. My teammate who had argued for the plaintiff would be my second chair.
The last round took place in a cathedral that had been repurposed for our competition and in the pews behind us sat all our former competitors and those teams that had been knocked out over the past few days. They shook our hands and wished us well in the minutes before the round and expressed both awe at our presentations the previous day and confidence in our ability to take it home, as it were.
I’d developed the habit on the fly of rising slowly and button my suit jacket before I was to speak. The first day, I did it, I realized it was so that I could steady my hands, give them something to do, but it had precisely that effect of slowing me down, massaging the nerves so that when I spoke, I would be a composed bundle of well-packaged words, rather than a present that had been poorly-wrapped and leaked its contents on a displeased recipient.
I breezed through the French portion of my practiced speech (indeed, the bench in its entirety had heard the whole thing by now) and the questions came and went and I stood before it all, unaffected, ever willing to help, to guide the bench towards a correct understanding of affairs (correct as my side of the case understood it). And under it all was the flow, like a river about my ankles, nudging me along, the current guiding my strokes until I had answered the final question, rebutted my opponent’s final point and sealed the presentation with a neat, emphatic bow, proceeding then to thank them for their time and retake my seat.
The two Commission Representatives argued the European Commission’s side of the case, and the judges retired, and the room let out its collective breath, rushing to both our bench and our opponent’s with effusive congratulations and hands offered for shaking and requests for photos.
The whole aftermath was a bit of a blur, and I rushed to our opponents to thank each of them personally for what had been, in the eyes of many participants, a pitched battle, every aspect of the case from presentation to depth of case law knowledge a duel of contrasting styles.
The judges returned, we took our places, and they proceeded to regale us with a humorous presentation mocking the various presentational missteps they’d seen over the past few days. Then, they announced the winners, and the opposing table erupted in cathartic, almost chaotic joy at hearing their university’s name called.
While, on our side, was quiet, satisfied relief. The journey was over and personally I would not have had it any other way. We were all ready to be done with the case, and we had not ended on a note of retreat but on a note of triumph. Many of our former competitors remarked later with no small amount of shock that they had expected us to advance to Luxembourg. But, quietly smiling, I reassured them that the result had been just and that it had been a very good, very close round. This was, all said, a result I was more than happy with.
There was a lavish dinner and a party afterwards where our team was the object of much amusing, excited attention. And the next morning, with perhaps between three and four hours of sleep in me, I traveled with my plaintiff’s counsel to Copenhagen where we boarded our flight for Newark. Our team’s Commission Rep and our coach remained in Europe to take advantage of the opportunity of university-sponsored travel, and we did not begrudge them.
I slept on the flight, re-watched Looper, and read some of Doctor Faustus, and upon landing in Newark, I alerted my mother of my return and we made our way back home (of sorts), me to Morningside Heights, her to Astoria, our memory of the past few days a bit like ice water about our heads with occasional chunks of sharp ice-memory dislodging and knocking about our skulls.
I’m not sure what I did for the rest of that night, I might have seen a friend with whom I smoked hookah regularly. Or I might have sought to catch up on homework for some of my missed classes, I don’t remember.
But I remember the particular bond that is cemented when two people travel together, the things said and unsaid that are shared. And as I sit in New Haven's Union Station, preparing to travel back, to make another return of sorts, I know I will be carrying those people with me. In all the unoccupied seats around me, they’ll sit and laugh or whisper a joke or observation or commiseration in my ear. And only I will hear them.
And that will be enough. For this weary traveler, at least.
They were intimately tied with this anniversary; in fact, they’d been instrumental in bringing it about and much of the ride, as much as I thought of my Property homework or the Didion book I’d started reading, was filled with thoughts of them.
In conversation later, I remarked that recent months, indeed much of the past year, had seen a retreat of sorts. As I felt strength returning, I judged myself healthy enough to begin this or that endeavor. But, coming back, it felt like my train was righting itself, and only then did I notice how far from the main rails I’d strayed.
Good things were happening in my life. Indeed, they continue. They, surprisingly enough, persist. And seeing them again, their smiles and their frowns and their laughs and hearing their voices-their familiar intonations and pauses, their lovely locution-brought home the notion that it was this fellowship, this particular congregation of penitents, that was almost single-handedly responsible for my present health, much as my recent turns of thought have been fraught with illness.
Towards the end of February, I had the opportunity to realize a dream, during the course of whose realization I’d forgotten I’d nourished. Last semester, I joined the European Law Moot Court, an achievement in and of itself as part of the tryout consisted of pleading a case in French. Ever since I’d first begun studying the language, I’d nurtured hopes and dreams of performing a professional duty in that language. That, to me, was the mark of proficiency. And I’d done it. In my mind, the tryout went horribly and I flubbed vocabulary and mixed up descriptives and assigned the wrong gender to nouns, but apparently, my French had been strong enough to guarantee me a spot on the team.
Much of the fall semester was concerned with the written portion of our bifurcated competition process. If we, as a team, could write a strong enough brief, then we would advance to the oral semi-finals in cities all over Europe. If we came first in that competition, we would see ourselves, at some point in the spring semester, in Luxembourg for the finals.
Soon after our return from winter break, we discovered that we had indeed advanced to the semis in Lund, Sweden, and that was where my most recent trip had happened.
It was a wonder. Sweden, as homogenous as it was, turned out to be a lovely place and the experience (for instance, remarking on how much the landscape outside our train ride from Copenhagen to Lund resembled the American Midwest) is one I’ve fought to keep at the forefront of my memory ever since our return.
The weeks leading up to it were a flurry of practices, memorizing our arguments (including the French portions) and internalizing our problem such that we could bring our uniquely American style of advocacy with us to the proceedings.
The first day of competition, stationed in the various halls of Lund University’s Faculty of Law, pitted us against European teams from across the continent, and one couldn’t help being reminded of how porous the borders were for Europe, how for each passing generation, the line dividing one parcel of nationally-endowed territory from the next had become increasingly meaningless. The Italian team had Spaniards on it. The team from Geneva sported a native French girl, a German, and a Swiss competitor. The team from Leiden University was a panoply of nationalities, including one erstwhile American, with whom we made fast friends.
The night before the first day of competition, there was a social get-together and despite our initial reluctance to mix with the others, we soon found ourselves beset upon by new friends and acquaintances, our exotic Americanism a natural draw for examination, perhaps.
I don’t recall being especially nervous, in preparation for that first day, though I undoubtedly was. My body had perhaps reacted to overcompensate with an abundance of lackadaisicalness. Indeed, that first morning (I was the first of our team to compete that day), I arrived at my room with three minutes to spare before pleadings commenced.
I was the defendant, so I got to hear the plaintiff plead his case and was struck (almost physically) with relief at how prepared I was to present. When it came to be my turn, I felt at ease in a way I’d rarely felt during practice. The bench, composed of about 5 judges of various nationality, was merely a new set of friends for me to make, and I experienced a sensation similar to what I’d felt on the football field in high school or when I sat down to write and the words came with particular fluidity. A psychiatrist once called it flow, and that is indeed what it felt like.
Indeed, when the first question in French came (I was obliged to answer in kind), I did not hesitate to respond with an answer my subconscious (melding, of course, with the practice answers and the hours and hours and hours of rehearsed response I’d managed in the weeks beforehand) had helpfully provided.
My teammate, who argued for the plaintiff’s side in the afternoon, had a similarly breezy round, but we were not without surprise when we found we had advanced to the second day of competition.
There was another social that first night, but we left early in order to diligently prepare for the next day’s work.
We’d switched rooms, and though my audience the second time around was tougher, I felt I’d performed to the best of my abilities. Nothing felt particularly forced. Indeed, it all swam as if guided by a predetermined course.
That said, when we heard we’d advanced to the last round of the semifinals, we were almost delirious in our fatigued joy. It meant more work, but it also meant a chance at glory. And for our coach, who had been denied a run at the oral rounds last year, it was quiet vindication.
That last round was later that afternoon and our preparation was feverish after it had been decided that I would plead the defendant’s side for that final round. My teammate who had argued for the plaintiff would be my second chair.
The last round took place in a cathedral that had been repurposed for our competition and in the pews behind us sat all our former competitors and those teams that had been knocked out over the past few days. They shook our hands and wished us well in the minutes before the round and expressed both awe at our presentations the previous day and confidence in our ability to take it home, as it were.
I’d developed the habit on the fly of rising slowly and button my suit jacket before I was to speak. The first day, I did it, I realized it was so that I could steady my hands, give them something to do, but it had precisely that effect of slowing me down, massaging the nerves so that when I spoke, I would be a composed bundle of well-packaged words, rather than a present that had been poorly-wrapped and leaked its contents on a displeased recipient.
I breezed through the French portion of my practiced speech (indeed, the bench in its entirety had heard the whole thing by now) and the questions came and went and I stood before it all, unaffected, ever willing to help, to guide the bench towards a correct understanding of affairs (correct as my side of the case understood it). And under it all was the flow, like a river about my ankles, nudging me along, the current guiding my strokes until I had answered the final question, rebutted my opponent’s final point and sealed the presentation with a neat, emphatic bow, proceeding then to thank them for their time and retake my seat.
The two Commission Representatives argued the European Commission’s side of the case, and the judges retired, and the room let out its collective breath, rushing to both our bench and our opponent’s with effusive congratulations and hands offered for shaking and requests for photos.
The whole aftermath was a bit of a blur, and I rushed to our opponents to thank each of them personally for what had been, in the eyes of many participants, a pitched battle, every aspect of the case from presentation to depth of case law knowledge a duel of contrasting styles.
The judges returned, we took our places, and they proceeded to regale us with a humorous presentation mocking the various presentational missteps they’d seen over the past few days. Then, they announced the winners, and the opposing table erupted in cathartic, almost chaotic joy at hearing their university’s name called.
While, on our side, was quiet, satisfied relief. The journey was over and personally I would not have had it any other way. We were all ready to be done with the case, and we had not ended on a note of retreat but on a note of triumph. Many of our former competitors remarked later with no small amount of shock that they had expected us to advance to Luxembourg. But, quietly smiling, I reassured them that the result had been just and that it had been a very good, very close round. This was, all said, a result I was more than happy with.
There was a lavish dinner and a party afterwards where our team was the object of much amusing, excited attention. And the next morning, with perhaps between three and four hours of sleep in me, I traveled with my plaintiff’s counsel to Copenhagen where we boarded our flight for Newark. Our team’s Commission Rep and our coach remained in Europe to take advantage of the opportunity of university-sponsored travel, and we did not begrudge them.
I slept on the flight, re-watched Looper, and read some of Doctor Faustus, and upon landing in Newark, I alerted my mother of my return and we made our way back home (of sorts), me to Morningside Heights, her to Astoria, our memory of the past few days a bit like ice water about our heads with occasional chunks of sharp ice-memory dislodging and knocking about our skulls.
I’m not sure what I did for the rest of that night, I might have seen a friend with whom I smoked hookah regularly. Or I might have sought to catch up on homework for some of my missed classes, I don’t remember.
But I remember the particular bond that is cemented when two people travel together, the things said and unsaid that are shared. And as I sit in New Haven's Union Station, preparing to travel back, to make another return of sorts, I know I will be carrying those people with me. In all the unoccupied seats around me, they’ll sit and laugh or whisper a joke or observation or commiseration in my ear. And only I will hear them.
And that will be enough. For this weary traveler, at least.