Switzerland Day 3: Best.Day.Ever.

My wife Janis and I recently celebrated our 40thanniversary with a 12-day hiking trip to the Swiss Alps (dipping our hiking sticks briefly into France as well). Our hearts are still flush with the afterglow of the wonders we saw. Here’s the next installment of our adventures.

In my life, I can easily recall days that I would gladly relive again. Best-day-evers that I would want — if I had the choice — to live on forever. The third day of our Switzerland adventure was just such a day, the odd thing being it was set aside just as a travel day, to get us from one set of mountains to another. But you be the judge. This day had all the elements that all our best days have.

Food

The magic of it was set in motion by the evening before, as Janis and I celebrated the miracle at Stoos Ridge by dining outdoors at an Italian restaurant we came across in Old Town Lucerne. It almost goes without saying that to be a best-day-ever, it must include amazing food. We’re told that soon after we arrive in eternity, we’ll celebrate the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. “But there’ll be no prime rib on that table,” someone said to me once, suggesting (with biblical support) that there’ll be no meat-eating on the new earth. To which I said, “Then there’ll be bushes of prime rib planted by rivers of au jus, with wildflowers of horseradish growing in the grass.” For food and joy go together.

Though we couldn’t read the menu, and could barely understand the waitress, we learned that pizza is a universal language, and ravioli a close second, so we managed suitably well. The only drama to the meal was hoping I hadn’t accidentally ordered a glass of $100 chardonnay rather than the cheap knock-off that was right below it on the menu (which would have been doubly tragic, since my wine palate is very pedestrian). But Janis comforted me by saying my finger-pointing and grunting was clear, so I relaxed and she turned out to be right.

Delight

Being in no hurry to return to the hotel, we sauntered slowly back along the Ruess River, enchanted by the lights flickering off the water while the moon played hide-and-seek behind some mood clouds. We slowly passed across the renowned KapellBrücke, literally Chapel Bridge, a wooden covered-bridge whose bones date back to the 14 thcentury. Built originally as part of the city’s defense fortifications (whose iconic water tower served as both prison and torture chamber), the addition of 158 triangular paintings to its roof gables in the early 17 thcentury ensured it would become a global treasure.

The bridge survived an 18 th-century flood, a 19 th-century planned demolition that caused an outcry as far away as London, and a devastating fire in 1993 that damaged or destroyed 86 of the original paintings, along with most of the bridge, which was faithfully recreated in an astonishing eight months, while the world looked on and cheered.

Though it was sad to bring that evening to a close, we slowly walked back to the hotel along Lake Lucerne in a lovers’ silence. Earlier in the evening we had passed a group of old codgers playing bocce alongside that path ( I could retire here, was my first thought), while a small Swiss folk group performed traditional music nearby which even included…wait for it!… an alphorn player. ( Why don’t more worship bands have one of these? was my second thought.) Simple delight filled our hearts that night, putting it in the company of our finest days on earth.

Discovery

Early the next morning we bid farewell to fair Lucerne. It would be so easy to stay here, but there was so much more to see, which Is one reason we travel, is it not? — the joy of discovery. As the IR15 train carried us out of town toward our next stop of Lausanne, I remembered my Dr. Suess: Don’t cry because it’s over; smile because it happened (except for our naked babies on the bathroom wall — there would be no smiling about that).

The challenge of a vacation like this was deciding what not to do. Why not Bern? you could ask. Or Geneva. Or Lugano. Or St. Moritz. Because there’s far too much to take in here, as Elton John sang to us in The Lion King. Less is more for most vacations. So Lausanne it was. Just because. Besides, we needed a entry point to launch us into Chamonix, France the next day, where the Alps awaited to wrap us in its craggy arms.

The train ride was a smooth 2½ hour carpet ride across the Swiss countryside, with a stop in the nation’s capital of Bern, so yes, we did see Bern. Very nice. Lovely place. Must return. “There’s more to do than can ever be done.” (Incidentally, for those keeping score at home, including our rides up and down Mount Rigi, then Stoos Ridge, and now the train ride to Lausanne, we were down to $1,129 till we broke even on our $1,800 investment in two first-class Swiss Travel Passes. Just three days in I was feeling better about our purchase.)

What was fascinating about the ride as we got closer to Lausanne was to suddenly hear French mingled with the announcements of upcoming stops and stations. Then I realized we were hearing two entire sets of announcements for each stop. Come to find out, the four variations of language the Swiss spoke weren’t just regional dialects, but distinct languages altogether.

The Swiss-German left me flustered and clueless. But once I began hearing Swiss-French, I perked up. I took four years of French in high school and college, but then left it far behind, for decades. Any remnant of it could only be stored in a stack of old cranial floppy disks stuffed in a janitor’s closet way back in my brain. Yet suddenly my ears were tingling with words I knew. How was that possible? ( “We’re fearfully and wonderfully made,” Janis replied, when I asked her. I love my wife. She can be so succinct.)

We arrived at the Lausanne main station late morning — and blinking stepped into the sun — of what was rapidly turning into a superb summer day.

People and Places

Lausanne has history. And hills. Serious hills. According to Rick Steve’s and his Switzerland guidebook, the Romans built this city on the shores of Lake Geneva, and then when Rome fell, they fled several miles straight up the mountainside where they resettled in what became “old town” Lausanne, where the barbarians apparently left them alone. We could see why.

Leaving the train station, we walked across the street in search of a late breakfast, straight up a cobblestone road, that had our calves and hearts straining at a serious fat-burning rate. We settled on the first bagel shop we came to, and while we caught our breath (sweat dripping from us in pools at our feet), we overheard a twenty-something woman from London behind the counter, grumbling heatedly about her vile hatred for Lausanne, and how she couldn’t wait to kick its dust off her feet.

“Where would you wanna go instead?” we asked, glad to hear a little English. “Back to London?”

Janis and I make a habit of talking to as many as possible when we travel, not because we’re Americans — though Europeans say that about Americans, that we’re always smiling and jabbering. It’s more I think because people are interesting, and everyone has a story to tell, and I’m a storyteller; and also because we’re Christians and you just never know how God might use a conversation to do his God-thing; and…okay, I concede the point, also partially because we’re Americans.

She shook her head. “No, I want to go to New Zealand.” We told her about our daughter Hannah who went to New Zealand for a year to help find herself. “God helped her figure some things out while she was there,” we said, offering a small nibble of faith-talk but she didn’t bite. She smiled and handed us our bagels, we wished her well, she turned to the next customer and we walked out, feeling a little sad for her (and for the sweat-swamp we left behind on the floor).

It probably wasn’t Lausanne she hated (though if she had to walk up those hills everyday…) It wasn’t Lake Geneva that spat on her, but maybe it was a self-absorbed mother. It wasn’t the Alpine mountains in France across the lake that stood in her way and made her feel small, but maybe it was an abusive boyfriend that she once thought loved her, but then learned it was only one part of her that he loved.

People or place — which are more important for our happiness? That’s a question Janis and I go back and forth on. Place matters. She loves New England, but twenty Connecticut winters soured me on it, and became for me a symbol of dreams I found dying. I adored the people in the California desert towns where I occasionally preached, but my soul would have withered living in all that barrenness.

But what are places without people? I take short prayer and writing retreats to the mountains and they’re glorious. But you can only stare at a mountain so long. It’s beholding the face of my family afterwards, or sharing the memory with friends over a cheap chardonnay, that makes it all worthwhile. Bonhoeffer said, “Let him who cannot be alone beware of community; let him who is not in community beware of being alone.” I think he would say that best-day-evers usually have both in full measure.

All Our Best Days Have This — But I’m Not Sure What To Call ‘It’

Nothing about Switzerland is cheap, especially the lodging, but being a once-in-a-lifetime vacation, we sucked it up and splurged with hotels where we could, especially in Lausanne, where for my lady, it would be nothing but the best. For one full day, Janis and I would live like a king and queen, courtesy of the Royal Savoy.

The lap of luxury was ours to sit in: our room — stately and immaculate, our balcony overlooking a garden, the bed with its dream-maker softness, the bathroom with soaps so fragrant you could wash your face for hours, a coffee-maker, yes a coffee-maker! that you knew was of the highest quality because it took a half-hour to figure out how to use it, not to mention an indoor-outdoor pool worthy of a Roman emperor, with walk-in jacuzzi bays for personalized water massages while standing, and courtesy bathrobes and slippers to use afterwards, while you sipped on a mimosa, before you went for your workout in the fully equipped fitness center, and all to give you an appetite before you went to lunch or dinner at the Sky Lounge rooftop restaurant with the city spread out before you, and snowcapped mountains in France beckoning from across Lake Geneva.

As I sat on the balcony later that day and sipped my well-earned afternoon coffee, I had a feeling of well-being that I know everyone has experienced, though I struggle to describe exactly what it is.

Jesus told a parable about a wealthy farmer who harvested a vast bumper crop one season, so large that his only thought was to tear down his barns then replace them with bigger ones. After the last bushel was safely stored into the last barn, the farmer was filled with it, and he responded by saying to himself, “Soul you have ample goods stored up for many years. Relax, eat, drink, and be merry!”

Isn’t there a longing we all feel at times to find a place in life where we can just rest, free from anxiety and fear, suffering and hardship, futility and fruitlessness — a place where we are free to simply bask in joy? In some fashion, this is what the rich farmer was experiencing. He thought he had found that place.

Sitting there on the balcony, savoring my coffee, splashing my face in warm sunshine, hearing birds singing in neither Swiss-German or Swiss-French, knowing my beautiful wife was resting several feet behind me in the room, I brushed up against it, that same joy the rich farmer had. Only I knew a secret that he didn’t, and so my joy was deeper and more real than his. But also tinged with sadness.

What I knew that he didn’t was that this moment was only a moment. It would not last because it could not last. That longing, that ache we have for a world without pain is not a longing that this world can ever satisfy. It’s actually a longing for the Other world, for the Real world, compared to which this world at its best is only a shadow or a glimpse.

The very night the rich farmer thought that his life was secure was the night he lost his life. And God rebuked him for his foolishness, of living only for this life.

How To Find True Contentment

There is a reason we want our best-days-ever to go on and on forever, and it’s not just because they feel good. They’re giving us glimpses of the Other Place. If this is true, then the secret to experiencing genuine contentment in life comes down to two things. First, savor those moments when they come, for they are glimpses of joy to come. Savor them down to the last drop.

The way Janis and I savored our first Swiss fondue pot later that night. We lapped up with bread and potato every bit of that heavenly cheese-wine confection down to the drizzly-dregs that clung to the bottom. For it’s about the food, a glimpse of that heavenly Marriage Supper to come.

The way we savored ambling along the beautiful Ochy Harbor hand-in-hand after lunch at a French artisan bakery where a fresh croissant au jambon called out to me (and without blinking an eye, I knew at once that jambon was ham; how did I know!? Sweet mystery of life!) On the walk we marveled at a bird with a deformed foot hopping near to us like a fowl Artful Dodger. “Poor thing,” I said. “At least it can fly,” said Jan. How I love my succinct wife! For it’s about finding delight, especially in ordinary things.

The way we savored one of Lausanne’s crown jewels, the Olympic Museum (free for Swiss Travel Pass holders; we’re down to $1,099 till break-even). Lausanne has been the headquarters of the International Olympic Committee since the revival of the modern Olympic movement more than a century ago. Give a gold medal to the museum, for it’s top-notch, family-friendly, and we easily spent three hours in and around the museum and its grounds. For it’s about discovery.

The way we savored conversation with Will and Alexandra from England, he a TV producer (of a show called Happy Valley) and she a travel journalist, whom we “randomly” sat by at the Café du Grütli where we enjoyed that fondue, outdoors on a cobblestone street in Old Town Lausanne. Then later, Willi, the 65ish-year-old jocular owner of the restaurant, who came and sat down by us, and regaled us for a half hour with banter about philosophy, politics, travel, theology, and of course fondue. For it’s about the people and places we encounter.

The way Janis and I savored returning to the hotel after dinner and enjoyed a late-night dessert and coffee at the Sky Lounge, looking out at Lake Geneva and the twinkling little stars of small French villages out there somewhere across the water, which we would likely never visit, for there is far too much to take in here. And the way the next morning we swam in the warm, refreshing waters of that indescribable pool and its standing jacuzzis. If it’s true that he who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the Lord, then for those to whom it is given, it’s about savoring the favor.

Savor them all. Drink it all in. Each drop. Taste and see that the Lord is good. And then, the second thing we must do to enjoy true contentment is this. Brace yourself because it will hurt.

We give them all back to God with thanks and worship. Don’t cling to them too closely. Let them pass through your fingers, into the hands of God, who is the one who gave you that moment, that glimpse, to begin with. St. Augustine writes of the bitter grief that nearly destroyed him earlier in life at the unexpected death of one of his best friends. Later as a Christian he realized that everything in this life has a beginning, middle, and end, even the very sentences we speak with. That being the case, Augustine concluded, to find lasting peace, we must place our trust in something that lasts. Of which only one thing qualifies.

Each of the glimpses of goodness we are given when life is at its best is pointing us towards something. Towards Someone. If we can summon the wisdom and the will to look in that direction, and then move in that direction, towards that faint rim of glory we see rising on the edge of eternity, then and only then will the longings we feel on our best-days-ever find their fulfillment.

Bear Clifton is a pastor, writer and screenwriter. His latest book, “Communion With Christ” is now available through Amazon. His blogs and scripts can be enjoyed at his ministry website: trainyourselfministry.c

om and his writing website: blclifton.com. Bear is also the author of “Ben-Hur: The Odyssey”, and “A Sparrow Could Fall”, all available through Amazon.

Originally published at https://www.trainyourselfministry.com.