After ten days in Croatia exploring with my best friend, and before that hanging out in Ireland with Jackson, I was alone for the first time in weeks (ever, in a foreign country). I had been excited for this part of the trip, too. Similar to how I had been excited for the next day in Ireland even when the day I was living was pretty darn great. And kind of like I’d looked forward to Croatia even while driving around Ireland with my fiancé…
I suppose it’ll always be difficult for me to “just be” and enjoy the in-between no matter how much I encourage others to. I’m always excited about the next thing.
So there I am, in Croatia, all by myself and a little bit excited to be. After Madie left I milled around a bit before walking (loaded down with luggage) to find a coffee shop so I could work until it was time to head off to my final stay.
It was about to storm. I heard thunder rolling in the distance and it threatened to force me inside.
I would get a ride to my next stop, a fifteen minute drive to the outskirts of Dubrovnik and didn’t want to stand curbside in a downpour. The rain came just as I requested a car.
It was a winding road that led to the little village of Zaton. I get car sick.
I took deep breaths. The road narrowed significantly when we arrived at the village and my driver made a questioning noise. I looked around anxiously, then down at my phone. It was still raining heavily and my destination was a bit farther down the narrow strip of concrete.
“I can- I can walk,” I said.
My driver looked around. He hesitated. Then he creeped forward between two walls that threatened to scrape the paint off the sides of the car. I held my breath.
Once through, the road didn’t exactly widen back up. My driver stopped. “The road, it ends. I don’t know…” he fumbled to explain to me, but I could see it.
The path before us appeared to be a wide sidewalk, not a road.
“I’ll be fine! I’ll walk from here,” I told him.
Rain pounded on the roof. I zipped my rain jacket all the way up. My driver looked at me doubtfully. “Are you sure?” he asked.
It didn’t really matter if I was sure. There was only one “road” on Google Maps leading to my destination and apparently we were on it. But my driver couldn’t go forward, and I couldn’t just hangout in his car.
“It’ll be fine! Thank you!” I jumped out of the car and splashed through the ankle-deep puddles.
Let’s play a game, I thought to myself, recalling the words Jackson had said so many times while we were in Ireland. Roads were so narrow we often questioned if they were roads or driveways. Road or driveway? The waterfall coming down around me didn’t help me to determine which narrow path around me now was the “road” I was supposed to follow and which were simply entrances leading to peoples’ homes.
I did the best I could and took a break under an awning to re-check my map. So far so good.
I bolted the rest of the way until I saw what I assumed was my destination: the inn at the very end of the road. Under the canopy I stopped and looked around. I walked into the lobby and found no one, just a quiet room.
I sat my stuff down and shrugged out of my shell. My phone rang. It was my dad.
“Hey Daddy,” I said, smiling big because it was so good to hear his voice. The sound of my voice alerted the owner, who I assume was in the back room, that I had arrived and she came out with a question written all over her face.
“Daddy, can I call back?”
There was a leak in the room I booked, so they gave me the apartment. I settled in on the couch to call my dad back but we didn’t talk long because my stomach was begging for food.
The rain had settled down, if only a little, and I made my way back down the road to the little restaurant that opened its doors to a patio on the water. A few people were seated, but no one had food so I wondered if it was a drinks-only kind of thing at this odd time in the afternoon: about three o’clock.
I still hadn’t got a hang of the restaurant culture in Croatia: I never knew whether to seat myself or wait to be seated.
I made my way towards the back and asked the man wearing a white shirt and polishing wine glasses, “Hi, um, are you open to serve food right now?”
He squinted at me. He would be the second person this entire trip if he didn’t speak English. My Croatian was rough. “What?” he asked.
“Are you open? Are you serving food?” I asked again. I felt pathetic for not being able to better communicate.
He glanced toward the front of the restaurant, then back at me. “Does it look like we’re open?”
I blinked. “Well- yes, you look open- But are you serving food?” My cheeks had to be flaming red.
“We are open, we are serving food!” he exclaimed, still looking at me with a bit of amusement.
“Okay. Okay.” I didn’t know what to say. Can you tell me where to sit, then?! – is what I thought. “Can I sit… anywhere?”
He made a motion to come around the counter then and directed me to a table. And this is what I don’t understand about the dining rules in Croatia: sometimes they’d say seat yourself and sometimes they’d want to seat you. But if I had waited to be seated, I would’ve stood near the front awhile as my stomach threatened to devour itself. But I asked, to make sure I could indeed eat there, and I felt stupid for asking.
The man said to me then, “Just you, alone?”
“Yes,” I said. Suddenly my eyes stung and it was difficult to swallow. “Just me.” I had to blink away the tears.
That evening I actually made friends with the waiter and ate the best meal I’d had in a month. I admired the building and the rain settled down. The next two days were relaxing. I walked the trail down from the inn, read on the patio of my apartment, took a couple baths, swam once more in the beautiful blue water, and walked back to that restaurant and ordered the same meal over again.
But I didn’t forget about that feeling: the feeling of being alone.
I thought about it when I couldn’t sleep those two nights. I thought about it on the drive to the airport, and again in Chicago when I slept on the ground at O’hare. And I thought about it again when I saw Jackson, after nearly two weeks apart.
I held him extra tight and extra long.
A week later, I curled up on the couch with Kona while Jackson was away. I rewatched “P.S. I love you” because I wanted to see what I might recognize from Ireland, and because it’s a dang great movie.
Towards the end, Holly’s mom delivers her the final letter from her deceased husband (if you haven’t seen this movie, go watch it – now!) but before she walks away to let Holly read it she reminds her that though maybe she is alone, and we’re all alone, then we’re together in that at least.
I cried.
We’re all walking our own paths, alone, but also together. We’re walking in the in-between, always alone, but sharing in that reality together.
