We’re inside of a week before our planned departure for Europe, and we’re still not sure where we’re landing. That suits Carol and me just fine. We’ve had only one trip together where we had to be in a specific place at a specific time, and I could feel my shoulders scraping against the constraints of time and space, as well as those same considerations impacting every calculation of itinerary we undertook. It was no biggie for sure, but that presence of constraint added a palpable layer or dimension to that trip.

So plan B is to fly to Portugal and spend a month drinking Madeira and kicking around the country that helped bring genocide and slavery to the New World.

   About three years ago, Carol and I were provided a pair of global Eurail passes for an article I’d written for the online magazine the company publishes. Right at the time we planned to use the passes, Covid hit. It would be until now that the window to use those passes would open again. The last communication with Eurail was to let them know two weeks before our planned departure date, and they would issue the passes. We did that last week, but their instruction was given more than a year and a half ago, and I’m cautiously pessimistic that the statute of limitations has run out on the validity of these passes.

   So plan B is to fly to Portugal and spend a month drinking Madeira and kicking around the country that helped bring genocide and slavery to the New World. Call it our answer to the study of Critical Race Theory. We’re told everything in Portugal – especially Lisbon – is uphill in all directions, so I’m thinking the Madeira is going to start well before five o’ clock local time.

   If Eurail comes through with the passes (plan A), we’ll fly to Paris instead of Lisbon and ride the rails for a month. With Carol I’ve modified my principle that the train is the destination, and where I get off is merely the place where I sort out some wash, locate the wood fired pizza place and generally wander aimlessly for a day or so until it’s time to board the next train, preferably to wherever a four to six hour ride will take me without having to change trains along the way. Carol enjoys European train travel as much as I do, but has “adapted” my concept of destination from that of a first class carriage to a somewhat structured tour of a town’s environs, and where Happy Hour will not begin before five o’clock anywhere.

   So those are the potential carrots and sticks of either option. Portugal offers short days, sore legs and Madeira as early as two in the afternoon (you should have seen the look on Carol’s face as she read this) or an enriching multi-country tour of Europe, complete with cathedrals, castles, museums and Happy Hours spent pouring over train schedules and booking.com hotel options. I can’t honestly say which plan I prefer.

   And it goes without saying that the phrase “I prefer” is one best tentatively embraced with a kind of quiet acquiescence to a much higher power.