Tag: compassion

No Accident At All

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A friend recently told me they thought we were crazy moving to such a rural place. Won’t they get bored? they said, when discussing it with other friends. But in typical Jeff and Kelli fashion we have blown that notion out of the water. The doubters doubt no more. And I can’t, for the life of me, believe they ever did. Long ago I had another friend tell me I was the only person he knew who could find a way to stay busy, while naked in the middle of a corn field. As disturbing as the images from that visual might be, he wasn’t wrong. I have things to do. And so does Jeff. But sometimes, the unexpected begins before we’ve even had our first coffee.

Take today, for example. We were in Melide running errands. I had decided that bringing Fergus was a better idea than putting him in his dog run. It’s a sunny day here. But a very cold morning as we strolled through town. Jeff made a haircut appointment with Alfonso at the barbershop on Rua San Pedro for tomorrow morning. Then, we walked down to the Hyper Melide and picked up a few necessities. On the way we saw two cars with their flashers on and the drivers on the hood writing on papers in the middle of the traffic circle.

‘Accident or just catching up?’ asked Jeff, sarcastically. We have seen this before and it was 50/50 that they were just having a good chin wag in the middle of traffic. This should have been an indication for us of what was to come.

Fergus stopped, repeatedly, sniffing much of the lower half of the town, so we were delayed heading back the ten blocks to our car parked behind the church and the ayuntamiento (town hall). My suggestion that we stop for a coffee was met with resistance from Jeff. He shivered and wanted to get home to get warm.

Jeff was twenty yards ahead of me, practically race walking to the car as I went through Fergus’ training on the lead, and he was already to the parking lot when Fergus and I came around from side of the building that was blocking our view. Jeff stood at the back of the car with the hatch open. I knew when Fergus saw it he would take off running and jump in. He loves to go for a ride. Just then, a car was pulling out from beside us and made a very weird shallow three point turn. He wouldn’t make it clearing our car to leave the lot. I held on to Fergus and stood back. Jeff did too. The guy stopped, and backed up, again. Then, instead of turning his wheel hard he stepped on the gas as his head went down, as if he were asleep. Jeff shouted but the guy didn’t ‘wake up’ until his car hit ours. Yes, we were rear ended while parked in a parking lot, and we watched it happen!

The guy’s car was still running and his head was bobbing. Jeff shouted at him to shut off the car, which he did not do. But he opened the door and stumbled out. He could not stand up. I turned Fergus around and started running. A woman was walking towards me on the street and I asked her where the police station was. She pointed and we took off in that direction. The station door was blocked by non-police men smoking. I swear, this seems to be the default setting in the winter everywhere you go. I had to weave my way through them, and the smoke, with the dog to the desk, where I amazed myself, explaining in español that a drunk driver hit our car. Well, I had to mime the drunk bit. It’s not a word I commonly use. They asked where it was and I pointed and told them. Then, I walked out with the police following me and Fergus on foot.

We arrived back at the parking lot. Jeff was trying to get the guy to give him his information and insurance. And Jeff was pissed off! I asked Jeff what was going on but he just shook his head. The guy couldn’t stand and couldn’t really speak. Neither of us have patience for a drunk driver. And a drunk driver at 10am? Even less.

Soon we were like an episode of Cops!!. I could almost hear the theme song. Bad boys, Bad boys, what you gonna do? What you gonna do when they come for you…? We stood off to the side as more cops arrived in what we call squad cars in America. Here? They are just little Fords or KIAs. We had the PolicĂ­a Local and the Guardia Civil as back up, and were there long enough that people we know with business in town began to arrive at the aparcamiento (parking lot), including our contractor, Diego, who we needed to meet with anyway – so we did it standing up in the gravel lot. Two birds with one stone.

The young local police officers were very nice and kind. They understood the situation and interviewed the other driver. And then it turned into something altogether different.

Jeff had noticed the car when we parked. The man had been sitting in it the entire time. And, the driver, it turns out, was not drunk. As he explained to the police, he had sat in his car and taken a bottle of pills in an attempted suicide. This accident with us, and my running to the police station to get help, had actually saved his life. And, likely the lives of anyone he might have hit if he had been able to leave the parking lot. Pedestrians are everywhere. He would have killed people at a zebra crossing before he died from the pills behind the wheel. An ambulance was called to take him to the hospital to pump his stomach.

If we were in the US the driver would have been handcuffed immediately. A firearm might easily have been involved. But here, the police just spoke to the man. Let him sit down. They showed compassion for him and his state of mind.

This was a refresher for me on what to do in an accident in Spain. I’ve only had one other here, when I hit that pack of javalies on the A6 outside Lugo on a rainy October night during Covid. Today, the police helped us with everything and our insurance agent in town is already filing the claim with the guy’s insurance company. So the back end of our car will be repaired. It will cost us nothing. In the end, it’s just stuff. Cars are just things. We are not hurt. When we were driving home from the insurance agent I thought about the man. So desperate, so despondent, that he would take a bottle of pills alone in his car behind the church in Melide. What must have happened to precipitate that? The loss of a loved one? I looked at the claim form with his name on it. It listed his birth date. He looked 70 but he is three years younger than me. A hard life. We all have struggles in our lives. Things that take us down to the very bottom, where we are drowning and can’t see a way out. The possibility of a brighter future where this will pass is lost to us. I know that place. So while this car accident is inconvenient for us, this man needs help and compassion. He needs our understanding and our prayers. I send up a prayer for Juan, the man from the parking lot. That he gets the help and support he needs. Then, I think, that perhaps this accident was no accident, at all.

Talking vs. Communicating

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Communication and understanding are the key to a happy life. I know this from the harsh reality of experience, as I’ve not always been the best at either of these. I guess time grants you wisdom and perspective – if you decide to pay attention.

In thinking of our preparation for moving to Spain, we joined several Facebook groups for Expats already living in our chosen city, and some specifically for Americans moving to or already living in Spain. It’s been eye opening and in many cases invaluable. But sometimes, it’s been ugly.

Hearing how some of my fellow countrymen speak about people in their chosen country of residence hurts. The harsh reality when they’ve discovered that the culture in Spain isn’t American. Surprise! They do things differently there and the people who run the country won’t bow down to ‘The American Way’. In reading their posts, I sometimes wonder why they don’t just go back to Kansas, or North Carolina or Virginia if they find it so hard to deal with.

It also made me examine myself. When I was still working, I did business with people from other countries, notably France, and decided it was a good time for an ‘Intercultural Communications’ class. It wasn’t because I couldn’t talk with the people in La Ciotat, France – where the other company resided. They spoke English. It was because we couldn’t communicate effectively, and I couldn’t figure out why.

We would have a daily call at the beginning of our day and then end of their work day. We would ask for things and they would always agree to do them. But then, they started missing dates on projects and their people were clearly stressed and working ungodly hours to meet our demands. I couldn’t figure out what was going on. So I flew to France.

Meeting with them face to face, I learned that in France – The Customer is Always Right – even if I was wrong, they would never tell me ‘NO’. In developing software, this is the killer. In the US, I would make demands of my engineers and they would tell me ‘You’re crazy if you think we can do that in that amount of time.’ I would ask them to help me be more realistic and they go away and think about it and come back and we would negotiate. My job was to push, their job was to push back. We both understood our roles.

The French team just said ‘Yes’ to every idea I had. But soon, I realized I had to give them permission to tell me I was ‘Full of it’. It made them uncomfortable at first, but we started working well together. And on that trip, I got to hear my team on the phone, from the perspective of the team in France. I was able to see their faces as my people in Seattle spoke, and how it landed 7,000 miles away. It wasn’t pretty and I went back home and we changed our approach.

So taking the ‘Intercultural Communications’ class was eye opening too. I learned that different cultures have different power hierarchies and power distances, and dynamics that are not ever discussed but are ingrained since birth. It’s the subtle things that govern how people interact. And it’s the agreed upon method of communication that everyone, except outsiders, understands.

So, when considering moving to another country, it’s imperative that we learn how to communicate effectively. Its not just being able to order a cafe con leche in a cafe in the right language. Or asking for directions. It’s the subtext and context that’s most important. And it’s cultural sensitivity and empathy.

We are the way we are in the US, because of our Puritanical roots and our cultural belief in manifest destiny and some sort of divine right. We’re taught that in school and by all the cultural cues we receive subliminally. But in Spain, the people are also a collection of their history and experiences. A history that stretches much longer than our Anglo-Christian view of the world. The Spanish people of today are a result of those experiences, just like us.

Jeff and I’ve had a lot of discussions about how, at times, we just won’t get it.  And we will trip and fall. But the most important things is, we need to approach it without judgement. And we need to stop, take a deep breath, and try to understand it from their perspective. With intercultural communications, there is no ‘right way’. There is just empathy and willingness to understand. Its the only way to get along in this life, even in our own country. And we’re committed to it.

The New World

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It’s funny. My whole life I’ve been taught that the US is the great experiment. My country is where the term ‘Melting Pot’ was first coined. Mass immigration in the late 19th and early 20th century from the rest of the world – namely from Europe and Central Asia filled the US with new blood, new ideas, new traditions. And the cultures that were landed on our shores are what made us who we are today. Here in Spain, I feel the same way.

I walk down these streets and I see people from all over the world. I hear languages and smell food cooking that is distinctly not Spanish. The people here seem to embrace or certainly tolerate those from other countries. I’m not saying there is not skepticism. Certainly, me being from the US has caused some people to pause. I see them look at me like ‘Why are you moving here?’ and sometimes it requires me to provide additional documents. Some assume it’s because of our current political situation in the US, and they tell me so. But overall, the people I’ve met that are both Spanish, and from other countries, have been welcoming and hospitable. They just want to get to know me. And I find I want to get to know them.

The Schengen agreement in the EU means that there are people in Valencia from all over Europe. The PA I hired is Latvian. She speaks many languages but her Spanish has been invaluable in helping me navigate. I’ve looked at apartments that are owned by Iranians and others who are not from here. All of this is the international soup that makes me feel like we could make this home. We won’t be the odd man out, because so many are from other places around the world.

It is interesting, though. I’ve traveled all over the world. But I was always going to go back to the US – that was home. So even if I was in a country for an extended period of time, I knew that the US is where I would return, eventually. But it will be different now. We will be the ones coming to a new place – to build our lives. Living with people whose language we are terrible at speaking. Trying to navigate a system we don’t really understand.

It makes me stop and think back. Have I always been patient with others who have come to my own country from the outside? Have I had expectations that they ‘Should just know’ how our system and culture works? That they should be able to communicate effectively and jump into the flow at the same pace as the rest of us who were born into it?

Coming here has held up a mirror for me, and given me a different perspective on how we treat outsiders in the US. Maybe we could be more patient. Maybe we could allow those who seek a different life amongst us, to reshape us and make us better, more compassionate people. Maybe the New World isn’t a place, but a state of being. The State of Kindness.