I’d catch a glimpse of a towering steeple peeking out from behind crowded nearby buildings and, like the north star to a 17th century sailor, use it to vaguely navigate my way though narrow alleyways and cobblestone streets.  I’d walk fast, conveying at least a public confidence in my direction, intently focused both on seeing whatever “sights” there were to see, all while not losing my way back to the venue I’d need to return to within an hour or two for sound check or set.  If I had guessed correctly, the narrow alley I’d chosen would eventually spill into a large cafe-lined square—the ubiquity of which lay at the center of not only most every European city but also my American envy—dominated by the majestic, magnificent church I had aimed at.  My fast feet would stop stuttered, squelching the last of my built-up forward momentum like a library sneeze, and I’d gaze up at the steeple with the sort of reverence and respect reserved for the tallest, most treacherous peak of a jagged mountain range.   But often my awe would immediately subside when I would disappointingly discover the expected resplendence obscured by tacky construction. With summer having ended a few weeks prior and the tourist season now its dimmest twilight, the great cathedrals of Europe were dawning their autumnal scaffolding.  Their fall colors an array of pipes and planks affixed like a scab on skin.  Admiring a great cathedral under construction was like watching a movie with the subtitles unnecessarily on, no matter how hard you try to focus, you end up distracted.  And it was hard not to be disappointed, to sigh, throw up my hands, and shake my head at my innocent, helpless, victim-hood.  I had come all this way, thousands of miles across an ocean I’d soon be flying back over, only to find men in hard hats instead of gargoyles, the metallic echo of hammers muting the organ’s vibrato.   But the expectation that any of these cathedrals would be, or even could be perfect, was simply unrealistic.  After all, the astounding marriage of minute detail and massive size that initially pulled me through strange cities towards those steeples was also what led them to be in a state of near constant repair.  The upkeep required to keep myriad five hundred year-old statues in perfect condition while exposed to the elements atop a two hundred foot tall steeple would be almost incomprehensible if it wasn’t so frequently and tangibly represented by scaffolding’s ladders and ledges.  Complex things need to be tended to if you want them to stay complex—there are whole laws in physics dedicated to this idea—and if you make that complex thing large enough, well, it makes sense that it would need constant attention.   So really, for me to walk up to a five century old cathedral and be disappointed to find it partially under construction is not only an unrealistic, but also rather selfish and somewhat solipsistic expectation.  It soon became clear to me that in the midst of all that construction and renovation, I was actually the one who needed the most work.  The truth is, I’m lucky enough to have seen those churches in any state.  To find, still standing, such a literally awesome achievement of man, regardless of its sordid roots, is a privilege I’m grateful to have experienced.   Large, complex things will undoubtedly always be in some state of construction, repair, or refinement.  It’s the inevitable, but worthwhile cost of complexity.  And to throw out the beauty of the whole thing because of its ongoing struggle with entropy would be to violate a cliche as old as the steeples themselves. I’m been thinking a lot in these past months about how much those old, massive, and complex cathedrals have in common with people, and how I need to be a lot better and forgiving other’s scaffolding.  

I’d catch a glimpse of a towering steeple peeking out from behind crowded nearby buildings and, like the north star to a 17th century sailor, use it to vaguely navigate my way though narrow alleyways and cobblestone streets.  I’d walk fast, conveying at least a public confidence in my direction, intently focused both on seeing whatever “sights” there were to see, all while not losing my way back to the venue I’d need to return to within an hour or two for sound check or set.  If I had guessed correctly, the narrow alley I’d chosen would eventually spill into a large cafe-lined square—the ubiquity of which lay at the center of not only most every European city but also my American envy—dominated by the majestic, magnificent church I had aimed at.  My fast feet would stop stuttered, squelching the last of my built-up forward momentum like a library sneeze, and I’d gaze up at the steeple with the sort of reverence and respect reserved for the tallest, most treacherous peak of a jagged mountain range.  

But often my awe would immediately subside when I would disappointingly discover the expected resplendence obscured by tacky construction.

With summer having ended a few weeks prior and the tourist season now its dimmest twilight, the great cathedrals of Europe were dawning their autumnal scaffolding.  Their fall colors an array of pipes and planks affixed like a scab on skin.  Admiring a great cathedral under construction was like watching a movie with the subtitles unnecessarily on, no matter how hard you try to focus, you end up distracted.  And it was hard not to be disappointed, to sigh, throw up my hands, and shake my head at my innocent, helpless, victim-hood.  I had come all this way, thousands of miles across an ocean I’d soon be flying back over, only to find men in hard hats instead of gargoyles, the metallic echo of hammers muting the organ’s vibrato.  

But the expectation that any of these cathedrals would be, or even could be perfect, was simply unrealistic.  After all, the astounding marriage of minute detail and massive size that initially pulled me through strange cities towards those steeples was also what led them to be in a state of near constant repair.  The upkeep required to keep myriad five hundred year-old statues in perfect condition while exposed to the elements atop a two hundred foot tall steeple would be almost incomprehensible if it wasn’t so frequently and tangibly represented by scaffolding’s ladders and ledges.  Complex things need to be tended to if you want them to stay complex—there are whole laws in physics dedicated to this idea—and if you make that complex thing large enough, well, it makes sense that it would need constant attention.   So really, for me to walk up to a five century old cathedral and be disappointed to find it partially under construction is not only an unrealistic, but also rather selfish and somewhat solipsistic expectation.  It soon became clear to me that in the midst of all that construction and renovation, I was actually the one who needed the most work.  The truth is, I’m lucky enough to have seen those churches in any state.  To find, still standing, such a literally awesome achievement of man, regardless of its sordid roots, is a privilege I’m grateful to have experienced.  

Large, complex things will undoubtedly always be in some state of construction, repair, or refinement.  It’s the inevitable, but worthwhile cost of complexity.  And to throw out the beauty of the whole thing because of its ongoing struggle with entropy would be to violate a cliche as old as the steeples themselves.

I’m been thinking a lot in these past months about how much those old, massive, and complex cathedrals have in common with people, and how I need to be a lot better and forgiving other’s scaffolding.