Week 2: The Wall

Breathing lightly, I arrive. I stoop down to tie my shoe and collect myself, the vapors of my breath crystallizing in that crisp, cold air I can't seem to hide from in northern Italy.The sun has been hiding behind clouds all day long, waiting patiently behind a curtain of cloud cover. With my shoes tied, I stand back up and walk into the nearby campus gymnasium. My steps echo hollowly against the hardwood floors and empty stands. I am the only one here in this cavernous room, yet I am not alone. There, in the corner, stands the wall. 12 feet high, wooden, and slick, it is the reason why I have come back here.

My breathing slows. Though I am now indoors, my skin suddenly crawls. The goosebumps are not unwarranted, as I know that the reason for my sudden, slight chill arises not from the weather, but from the knowledge that the wall before me has already presented its challenge to me. I have scaled this wall several times, but it was not without help - a lot of help. Now, after the fact, on this chilly afternoon, I stand alone before it. The wall has shown me many things; like a true seer, it has not so much shown my future, but it has brought truths to the surface that had previously been suppressed. Some of these things are seemingly obvious, while others are not so plainly seen.

Standing nose to nose with the wall, I put my hand on its surface. It is cool to the touch - not how I remembered it last time. Then again, I wasn't paying attention to that last time I was here. Last time I was here, I knew only one thing: 'the wall is a tyrant'. Last time, I conquered the wall.
[updated on 2/2/11]
The events of week 2 have come and gone, and I am finally getting around to telling you about them.

First, there was the Da Vinci challenge. For the greater part of Saturday, January 22nd, I spent the day with 35 or so of my newly met peers. All I knew beforehand was that this day of challenges would be physically demanding, so I put on my running gear and headed out the door. Once everyone had gathered, a Slovenian man in his mid 30s, clad in a fluorescent "Ljubljana Kurling Klub" outfit, approached. "Follow me", he said, and we did.

He took us to the gym on campus. He introduced himself (his name was Urush, I believe) and his helpers, whose names escape my memory. We then made a large circle across the gymnasium. Stretches, head to toe, were in order. It was certainly a wake-up call for me - I knew I was as inflexible, but this was bad. Thankfully, that was over soon, and we were split up into 3 smaller groups of about 13 each.

Next were the team-building exercises. Trust circles, trust falls, the human knot - you name it, we probably did it. At one point, I sat unceremoniously quickly, hitting my tailbone on the ground with a resounding thump! This would be my only injury for the day, but it would be soon forgotten as we returned from lunch.

What came next were the team challenges, which involve the factor of time. Our group dynamic had been picking up steam all morning - our competitive spirits were at the forefront of our minds. There would be three challenges - one was the spider's web - a web of ropes strung around a wooden lattice. Our objective was to get our entire group through the holes made by the web, with only one person going through each hole made by the ropes. We couldn't let any part of our bodies touch the ropes or we would have to go around and do it again. Did we break the time record for moving everyone through? Yes, we did. Bring on the next challenge.

The next challenge was the bridge over lava. Everyone stands on a small wooden platform. A short, wooden board is anchored by the largest person in the group (that was me at the time), while a long, wooden board is thrown over to the other platform. The goal is to get everyone across the two boards to the other platform without anyone or any props touching the floor of the gym. Did my group break another record? Yeah. You can see where this is going.

The last challenge, the one I have been waiting to tell you about, was, in fact, the wall. Our group of 4 guys and 9 girls were told that all we had to do was scrabble over the top of the wall (onto a raised platform behind it) without using any props except a rope for the last person. So, we climbed over it. I was pushed up first, then another guy was pushed up. From there, girls were pushed up from below and thrown over onto the platform. It was the most comical thing I've seen in a long time. When the last guy was finally over, we checked Urush for the time: 59 seconds. Wow, I thought. That's fast.

I know that I am capable of conquering many obstacles that lie in my path. Those obstacles may include exercises coupled with a low-ropes course, or finding my way across a foreign land. It might only mean that I'm trying to find a pair of socks that have escaped my attention. Whatever the case may be, I know that I am not without the means to succeed.

There it is again. The wall. Why am I revisiting it? My feet are tired from treading hours and hours over rock, wood, and pavement (especially in Venice). My rear is still sore, a week later, from sitting too quickly. My calves, my back, my head, my...

My, my, my.

How I have become so self-absorbed? This whole semester, so far, has been all about me - my personal growth, my reflections, my problems, my own...everything. Did I really conquer that wall? No. We did. WE, the group, conquered the wall. Under no circumstance (except loss of gravity) would I be able to get over that 12 foot monlolith without the backing of my peers.

There is a lot of semester left to go, and I am not going to get through it if I don't get over my own prejudices and assumptions about the people I go to class with day in and day out.

The sun is going down. The shadows on the bleachers of the gym grow long and weary. I, too, need to catch up on sleep. The wall I see before me and the walls I have ahead of me are not always going to be easy to scale, but with a little bit of help, I can get by and be content.

[ More reflections from my trip to Venice and my experience in LIFE in the Week 3 posting!]