“Existing on damnation's edge
The priest had never known
To witness such a violent show
Of power overthrown”
“Hell Awaits” by Slayer (1985)
Connected to aviation, there’s something called “Non-Revving” - effectively flying for free.
Holidays and high season summer months, a “Non-Rever” must look for patterns (where people are going) and layers (what connections look like) of flight schedules to “know” odds will be better. Patterns and layers don’t lie. You can almost predict the future; you pick the option for success.
I had to go to Germany, but they’re hosting a European Football Championship now, and the patterns and layers for Germany were terrible. I picked Amsterdam. Open. Worked like a charm. I'd take the train to Germany from there.
Boarding in overly HOT Chicago, I noticed a mother and daughter struggling, and making a bit of a scene with their carry-on baggage. The daughter berated her mother at every turn. “Hurry up!” “Give me the bag!” “Come on, you are lagging!” “What are you doing???” The daughter (my age) I noticed her “JESUS” T-Shirt, a collection of words - all phrases I remember in Sunday school. Not sure what she was trying to do with the shirt. Does she want everyone to know she is a Christian? “How about treating your own mother with a bit more respect (‘honor they mother and father’)” I thought.
Mother and daughter were classic American: overweight, fingers a bit too puffy around the diamond wedding rings; struggling with too much baggage; overpreparation with yarn bags and head pillows and the entire panorama of Americana snacks made their seating arrangement quite cramped. And they were LOUD.
The daughter with the Jesus T was bossy and a bit mean and condescending not only her mom, but also to the flight attendants. The mother looked a bit sheepish, as if caught in Stockholm Syndrome. Mom’s shirt had big letters “Southern Girls” over the left breast next to her large Christian cross necklace.
They sat across the aisle from me, one seat up, in my direct line of sight. The daughter was super busy on her large mobile phone. The home screen of the phone was overly vivid “heavenly” picture of the Christian cross rising from an American flag.
She was texting (big font on the screen, very easy to read, almost impossible to ignore) to her husband (I guess) about meeting fellow Christians in Houston (or somewhere they connected) and how GOD IS SO GOOD for a variety of reasons like connecting them to other GOD-FEARING people and giving them safe passage on this plane and additional ramblings about the community that “will prevail in 2024.” She proceeded to look through images in her phone’s picture gallery. One of the pictures, very clear, was the White House with an AR-15 pointed at Joe Biden and the words “Let’s Go Brandon” on it. Another picture had an overly muscular Donald Trump 2024 and on and on.
I hate labels, but hers was easy: White Christian Nationalist Trump supporter. Let’s just call her MAGA Karen. Praise Be! She reminded me of my Aunt in Oregon. John 3:16, etc. etc. etc.
Then a shock! The mother spoke to the flight attendant in Dutch. Mom was Dutch! Imagine that: cultured, educated land of Rembrandt and Vermeer produced a woman who married an American (likely story I made this part up, as a stretch to put the puzzle together) in Texas and raised a daughter, now taken over by a nationalist cult.
No wonder mom was cowering and kowtowing to mean daughter: daughter was cult-figure enraptured, and mother was likely exasperated. Christianity is not (unlike how it used to be considered) a cult, but this daughters’ version of it likely is, with Trump as her GOD, next to Jesus, or something like that. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Trump Tower. Something…
How will the educated folks in cultured Netherlands deal with MAGA Karen? God, I wonder what they must think of Americans like MAGA Karen.
Segue to Netherlands, upon arrival, and another cult, this time the German Kaiser. Randomly, I decided to take the tour after reading about it briefly on my way to Amsterdam. Traveling to the tiny town or Doorn, in the middle of the Netherlands, I discovered the vast wealth of the Netherlands: massive estates lined the route to the dinky town.
Doorn is the resting place of one of the most influential people the world has ever known: the last Emperor of Germany, the exiled Kaiser Wilhelm II. His action, and inaction, spun the world up for the First World War, one leading to the next World War. People come from all over Germany in June to visit Huis Doorn on the anniversary of his death. “Even young people, which is weird” said my tour guide.
I learned more in a three hour visit than any book or documentary.
At the end of the tour, I asked the guide if the Kaiser had any regrets about his actions, after all, he was basically a house prisoner in this estate. “No, he had no regrets, because remember, he was a ruler whose power stemmed from God, as he believed. So, everything that went wrong was not his fault, but some ‘mortal’ who made poor decisions.”
I learned this house was also the home of Audrey Hepburn’s mother, before it was sold to the Kaiser. Audrey Hepburn, the movie star, had a childhood filled with depravation due to a war, a war which really started when Kaiser Wilhelm set the world on fire in 1914. Ironically, Audrey Hepburn’s mother admired the Nazis…in the beginning. She changed her mind, as one would, when her two sons – one taken by the Gestapo, and one went into hiding.
The patterns. The layers. Audrey Hepburn died young, some say, due to a cancer that likely stemmed from childhood malnutrition. Her depravation was due to a war, started by a man who lived in her mother’s house, after he’d lost a war he started.
The Kaiser’s estate, like the end of his life, is lonely. Very few people visit, according to my guide, except in early June (“when the fanatics come.” Said the guide to me…away from the others).
I walked around the mausoleum, sitting at the end of a field. In the entrance, a few faded flowers, likely from the “celebration” in early June. I looked in to see the faded flag of the German Empire draping the casket, the dark eagle in the center.
I walked in the sunshine back to the house, thinking about cults and power. If you give too much power to one person, you better be damned sure they are wise and benevolent. History is littered with the remains of cult members, pledging fealty to a man (always men) who could care less about cult members.
Napoleon and Mussolini and Hitler and Stalin and Mao and Putin and Kim Jong Un and so many others.
Their lessons – the patterns and layers - are very clear.
And completely forgotten.
A lady on a plane, swathed in religious fervor, devoted to a man wrapped in the American flag holding a bible he’s never read. An unlikely cult figure, Trump, worshipped by millions; a playbook followed.
We are bound to repeat. We have been warned.
Picture: Random. On the way back from Doorn, I stopped in Utrecht and walked the pedestrian zone. I came upon a beautiful bar. The doorman saw me looking in. I told him I would like to take a picture of the bar. He opened the door and loudly yelled to the bartenders “he wants to take a picture of you.” As I hadn’t even seen them before entering, I simply went along with it and took their picture, too.