Charizma & Peanut Butter Wolf

It has been so long since I've written, I'm almost embarrassed. For the past couple of weeks I have been on the move every 3 days or so, and writing time has been at a minimum. It's extremely difficult to be inspired in a hotel room. They make me feel so unsettled. I found a condom wrapper on the floor of my Amsterdam accommodation, and I couldn't even bring myself to pick it up and put it in the garbage. I just stared at the word "Durex" with my nostrils flared and said a silent prayer that housekeeping would find it the next day. It was such a cruel reminder that a stranger had slept in the same bed... and that something else had (most likely) happened there too.

I prefer to do my writing in the apartments I've booked for my longer stints in certain cities. They've all been chosen for their natural light and cozy qualities; they make me want to say "I am living my best life!" out loud in the mirror and then wink sassily at myself. I had a super expensive thought the other day: when I get home I need to move. I need white walls, I need cacti and a Fiddle Leaf Fig tree, I need lots windows. I need a writing ROOM. You know what I need first? How 'bout a job. Writing has also taken a backseat for the past 14 days because I had a travel partner! Unloading all of my thoughts and emotions into this Squarespace page seemed much less necessary because I was unloading them all onto a real person in real time instead.

My travel buddy's name is Alli.

Alli emailed me while I was still in London and asked if she could join me for 2 weeks. She was supposed to travel through Thailand with a girlfriend, but plans changed and now she had a few weeks of PTO scheduled and nothing to do with them. Of course I agreed! Drinking cocktails at 4pm alone is called a disease, drinking them with a friend is called Happy Hour. We settled on 3 days in Paris, followed by Brussels, Bruges, Amsterdam, and Berlin. Armed with Eurail passes, we traveled by train exclusively. Only a few things of note happened on our travel days: I nearly fell backwards out of a train and into 'the gap' while boarding due to the weight of my pack; on one ride the bathroom door slid open revealing an elderly woman on her back, with her pants around her ankles, screaming for help; and perhaps the most traumatizing, we were served some kind of rectangular, marigold-colored fish mousse for lunch on our way out of France. (Alli had one small bite... I embarrassingly had several). Alli will be a part of the next couple stories, so I wanted to make sure that everyone has a clear understanding of who she is as a person.

. . .

I have known Alli since I was 5 and she was 3. Even as a toddler Alli was a force. I don't mean to say she was a chatty kid who took up all the air in the room, I mean it more in the way that she didn't accept defeat (like if defeat meant eating her vegetables, she was NOT going to accept that). After watching a group of us play, my mother used to say that Alli had "management potential." You could just tell that one day she would be running shit. Lo and behold, she is. Alli has an eye for design that can't be taught... or learned (believe me, I've TRIED). If I could turn Alli over, give her a shake, and sprinkle her aesthetic sensibilities everywhere like fairy dust, I WOULD. Her taste is flawless and I wish everyone could share it. The world would be a much prettier place.

Berlin was our last city together. On our first full day of exploring, we were in search of a brunch worth instagramming. We were wandering around our neighborhood and walked by a music store. There in the front window for a cool 45,95 € was an album I'd been introduced to by an ex-boyfriend: Circa 1990-1993 by Charizma & Peanut Butter Wolf. Let me run that back for you. CHARIZMA... and... PEANUT - BUTTER - WOLF. Are those not the best two names you've ever heard? I can't tell you the title of a single song on that album, and it's not like I've ever heard these guys on the radio (even if I did, I wouldn't be able to identify them), but I have NEVER forgotten their names. Has there ever been a better-named duo?! (No. The answer is NO, there has not.) As soon as I get my shit together and buy that hypothetical house with the writing room, I will also be treating myself to a duo of kittens whose names will undoubtedly be Mr. Charizma and Mr. P.B. Wolf.

Alli and I continued down the streets of Prenzlauer Berg and talked about C. & P.B.W. "I would be DELIGHTED to be called EITHER of those things," I said. Alli agreed. Peanut Butter Wolf sounds a little fierce, but also sweet... and kind of slow moving. Charizma is charisma; engaging, compelling, charming. I'd be totally proud to have either pseudonym. But after 2 weeks together, it is abundantly clear to me now which of us would be P.B. Wolf and which of us would be Charizma.

. . .

Let me be clear - Alli and I are both engaging ladies. That said, I can be engaging in a way that gets me into trouble sometimes. An example from our time at the Antwerp train station comes to mind. Making reservations for European train travel is a mixed bag. It is either not necessary, not even remotely possible, or so critical you end up waiting hours for a seat. I am sure there is some way of figuring out which of these scenarios it will be before arriving at the train station, but I DON'T KNOW WHAT THAT IS YET.

In order to get from Bruges to Amsterdam, we had to make a stop in Antwerp. Upon our arrival, we headed to the international ticketing office to book our seats for the final leg of the day's travel. Initially Alli and I dealt with a cranky bald man who somewhat resembled Vladimir Putin. He declined to help us because he was "kind of closed." I'm sure the actual issue was that he was 'kind of a d***.' He sent us to another window at the end of the counter with a young man behind the desk. We never said it out loud, but I think Alli and I had a mutual understanding that dealing with a male peer was going to be exponentially easier for us. We approached the counter, flashed all our teeth, and asked for two seats on the next train to Amsterdam. We wanted a direct route, we wanted seats together, and we wanted 1st class.

He looked us up and down. It wasn't our strongest outfit day, and we had just witnessed that elderly woman sprawled out on the floor of the train bathroom. He had every right to be skeptical of us.

"Oh, really... First class?? You ladies certainly look like first class travelers!"

"It's the backpacks," I said.

He laughed pretty hard, and I thought "step into my web, ticket guy." This is where we start to have a problem. What web? Why is that a thought that I had? It makes no sense.

"Okay then!" He said. "Two tickets to Amsterdam. A ladies weekend in Amsterdam! I can get you on the 14:33 to good ol' Amsterdam!"

This guy must've said "Amsterdam" at least 6 times while making our reservation, so you can imagine my surprise when I looked at our tickets 30 minutes later and realized he had sold us tickets to Paris. Alli and I had been camped in the station Starbucks waiting for our train, and we still had 20 minutes before the actual Amsterdam train departed. Alli guarded our luggage, and I headed back to the ticketing office. The young man that had assisted us was helping someone else, but I refused to talk to a different ticketing agent. I stood to the side and waited. He caught my eye and winked. He handed the other patron his receipt and I stepped up to the counter.

"Hi..." I said in a sing-song way that took not one but two syllables. "I'm back."

"You are back. Realized you forgot to give me your number, did you?"

Oh, ew. C'mon, man. Don't do that.

"Ha, NO... I realized you sold us tickets to Paris. We want to go to Amsterdam. Remember? 'Ladies weekend in Amsterdam...'"

"And I booked Paris? Do you want to go to Paris instead?"

"Nope. We do NOT... we've already been."

"Ah. So you two must be pretty upset with me! Where's your friend? She couldn't even face me?"

"Totally. She's crying in Starbucks as we speak," I said dryly.

He laughed again.

"Well... f***..." He said.

This actually made me laugh. I felt bad that he felt bad. I smiled.

"Ah," he said. "THAT'S what must've happened."

"What's that now?"

"Your laugh must've taken me up to heaven. I was in the clouds and I was distracted."

Gross. GROSS.

"Yeah, that must've been it."

"I truly am sorry about that. That was my fault. Lucky for you, I'm still here or you'd have been out 30 € and on your way to Paris!"

No. No we would NOT have been. Believe you me.

"Okay," he said, "so I will exchange that free of charge, of course. I can get you on the 15:30, and HERE." He opened up the cash drawer and handed me 10 €. "Your next coffees are on me."

"That's very nice of you. Thank you."

"Okay! So here we go! Two tickets to Paris it is." He held out my receipt and I finally got a look at his hands.

"AMSTERDAM."

"Of course! Ha, you'll have to give me your number so I can make sure you make it there okay!"

"Totally. Question for ya - when you wear that ring on that finger on that hand, does it mean the same thing as it does in America?"

This guy was married. MARRIED.

"Well, YUP. Have a safe journey," he said.

"Thank you SO much for your help."

Now this guy was definitely a flirt, but do you see where I went wrong? I do. I wanted to make him laugh. I liked that a stranger thought I was funny. I wanted to be interesting. Alli and I talked a lot about the difference between being interested and interesting. We agreed that it's better to be the former rather than the latter. Being interested in others is something I place a lot of value on, but sometimes I have trouble putting it into practice. Alli is not that way at all. I noticed that whenever we were in a cab, at a bar, near other English speakers, Alli displayed such a genuine interest in whoever we were with. Whenever we got into a taxi, our driver would ask where we hailed from and we'd proudly say "San Francisco!" The majority of our cabbies had never been to San Francisco, but they were happy to tell us about all the other cities in America that they had visited. "I have never been to your city... but I have been to Los Angeles and Portland." My follow up question was always a yes-or-no number, a conversation ender.

"Oh, Portland! Did you like it?"

"Yes..."

"Cool."

Alli didn't do this. Alli asked thoughtful questions that kept things moving. "Wow! And what brought you to Portland?" THAT. That is how you continue a conversation. That is how you show you are interested in others. Alli is the Charizma. I am the Peanut Butter Wolf. We were at a bar one night and she flat out asked the bartender "are you from the Bay Area?" I nearly fell out of my chair. Here I was, sipping literal gin and juice, monologuing loudly about San Francisco hoping that he'd turn and say "now, hold the phone! I'm from that city too!" Alli simply asked.

. . .

I hope I've given you an idea of who Alli is as a person. She is interested in others, she does not accept defeat, she has a gift for interior design that I would pay stupid money for. She is always ready for a chai latte, a cocktail, or a good time, and she is literally there to catch me when I start to fall backwards out of a train. She's the Charizma to my Peanut Butter Wolf, and I'm so glad she was able to join me on this adventure.

This post is for you, Alvin. Love you very much, fambly.