Go Anyway
Leigh and I just got back from Barcelona. Five days. First real international trip we have taken together. I am a full-time wheelchair user, and until recently, I put trips like this in the “Someday” column. Not because I did not want to go. Because I was not sure we could pull it off.
We pulled it off.
The trip was great. But what I really want to talk about is what it taught me — and I think it matters even if you have never left the country and have no plans to.
Barcelona sidewalks are beautiful … and genuinely terrible for wheelchairs. The tiles are gorgeous — and they tilt, and they rattle, and by the end of each day, my arms had opinions about it. The grab bars in bathrooms? A different philosophy entirely over there. The showers run lukewarm and at approximately the pressure of a polite suggestion.
None of that is the story.
The story is Jordi, our first guide, who was named after the patron saint of Barcelona and who talked about Sagrada Familia with the kind of love that makes you lean in closer. The story is Oscar, who speaks eight languages and recently got certified in Arabic just because he wanted to. The story is David, our driver on the mountain roads to Montserrat, whose driving kept Leigh from getting motion sick on curves that had no business existing and who kept glancing back to make sure I was OK. The story is Richard, who seemed to know every monk at the monastery personally.
These were not people doing jobs. They were people who had found something they were good at and decided to share it generously. There is a difference, and you feel it immediately.
One of the things that stays with me is how many people we met who spoke three, four, five languages. Oscar’s eight was the high-water mark, but it was not especially unusual. Our guides moved between English, Spanish, and Catalan without a pause, sliding into whichever one opened the door. Nobody there could quite understand why speaking more than one language would make someone suspicious. They looked genuinely puzzled when we tried to explain it.
We also did not see a single person experiencing homelessness in five days of wandering the city. Not one. I am not naive enough to think that means it does not exist there. But I noticed it, and I kept thinking about what we accept as normal at home and whether it has to be.
Here is what I keep thinking about: There are always reasons to not go. I was sick the whole week before. We knew the sidewalks would be rough. There is always something. We went anyway, and I so am glad we did.
Leigh handed me my phone somewhere along the way, and I sent pictures to my Little Brother. He fired back a wall of emojis. That was enough.
I came home with a bottle of cava from a winery overlooking the Mediterranean and a list of things I want to do differently. Finally learn Spanish. Say yes faster. Send the thank-you notes instead of thinking about them. Do the thing before someday runs out of runway.
Barcelona did not really change me. It just nudged me on some things I had been slow about. The world is big and mostly kind and filled with so many people worth meeting. You have to go find them, though. They mostly are not coming here.
Starting today, what is one thing you could do — even if the sidewalks tilt a little?
Sean Spence is a Columbia writer, podcaster, and poverty activist. Find him at growingolderandbetter.com
