Prague 1991
From Paris to Prague: A Journey Through Love and Career Balance
“This place is horrible! I’m not going to stay here,” she says. “How can you allow them to treat us this way?”
Bill Weimer and I left IBM about the same time and started a small company to consult in education, training, and international project management.
Bill and I developed a warm and collegial relationship while sharing an interest in good books, education, politics, and cultures.
He had spent three years in Brussels as his last assignment at IBM, and he seems to know every good restaurant there and in Paris.
Through Bill's European contacts, we landed an assignment to teach a seminar on international project management at the Czech Technical University in Prague, Czechoslovakia, one of the oldest and well-known technical universities in Europe.
We arrived in Prague just over a year after Russian troops left the country in July 1991. I had no idea what to expect.
Surprisingly, we required no special visa to enter, and the immigration people at the airport greeted us with big smiles as if we were long-lost friends.
Sally, after learning about our project, decided to join me on the trip.
We spent two nights in Paris on the way to Prague in an upscale hotel she chose.
It was not the Ritz, but the room was decorated in a modern European style and had an elegant bathroom. In Prague, the host university had arranged our accommodations in one of their facilities I assumed was a student dormitory.
Our taxi delivered us to the door of a classic building that could have been the original facility at the university’s founding in 1707.
The ground floor had ten-foot-high arched windows, and two additional floors had rectangular windows topped by a facsimile of the architect’s eyebrows.
Here is the story:
We pick a door and step inside.
A man in a dark suit is seated at a small desk.
He looks up at us and heads toward us with a big smile.
“You must be Dr. Tate. Welcome to our university,” he says with almost no accent.
“Yes, and this is my wife,” I reply.
“I’ll show you your room,” he says. “Let me help you with your bags.”
We go up a flight of stairs and down a hall with endless doors.
We stop at one.
The man inserts a key and welcomes us inside.
We step in to see two cots covered with brown wool blankets, a sink like my mother's in the laundry room, a window without drapes or shades, a tile floor without a rug, one overhead light, and a small door to a bathroom.
The man shows us how to turn on the light and then offers to show us the bathroom.
I was relieved to see a normal toilet and small sink, not one of those French stand-up facilities with an open hole.
A stand-up shower with no curtain stood in the corner.
He hands me the key, saying, “Have a nice stay here in Prague.”
I place our bags on one of the cots, turn to Sally, and say, “Do you see a place to hang our clothes?”
“This place is horrible! I’m not going to stay here,” she says. “How can you allow them to treat us this way?”
“They’ve been under communist rule for years. I’m just thankful they have a place to put us up,” I reply.
“This is a hell hole; I’m not going to stay here.”
“I’m not going to insult our hosts by complaining about the facilities,” I say.
“There you go again, unwilling to support my needs.
It’s only for three nights. We can survive this,” I say.
“Well, you might, but I won’t,” she says, stepping out the door. “I’m looking for a telephone.”
I find a hook, unpack my bag, and hang up my suit, hoping the wrinkles will fall out during the night.
After fifteen or twenty minutes, Sally is back.
“I’m leaving in the morning on an early plane,” she says.
“Where are you going?” I ask.
“Back to New York. Where else?”
“Our workshop starts at nine in the morning and I have to get a good night’s sleep. Hope you have a good trip home,” I say.
The next morning, I left for our workshop in a nearby building, knowing they would have coffee and snacks waiting for us.
In the midst of the room discussion, I had forgotten to look up Bill Weimer to confirm my arrival. Nevertheless, he greets me with a big smile when I step into the seminar room.
“The guy at the desk told me you two had arrived,” Bill says.
“Yes, two arrived, one left,” I say with a sly grin.
“What do you mean? “he asks.”
Sally couldn’t take the room, so she washeading back to the States. After experiencing an upscale hotel in Paris, she couldn’t deal with real life in Prague,” I reply.
“Oh. So sorry.”
“It’s OK. We’ll actually have more freedom now,” I reply, affirming how relieved I feel.
Bill and I can spend whatever time it takes conducting our seminar, hanging out with the participants, exploring the historic city, staying out late, getting to know people — all without me having to worry about pleasing Sally, attending to her tastes, enduring her critiques, adjusting to her schedules.
And — I can sleep soundly each night, knowing our seminar is going well.
Sally’s behavior reminded me of a similar situation in Nashville when I took Mom and Aunt Ruth there for a special vacation.
Aunt Ruth, Dad’s sister, has been one of my closest confidants ever since childhood, in many ways, closer than my own mother.
She spent much of her life around Washington, DC, and she always gave me the benefits of her life experiences.
During one of our discussions, she said, “I’ve always wanted to go to Nashville.”
Soon after, I scheduled a trip with Ruth and my mother to visit the Grand Ole Opry and other sights in Nashville.
Fearing Sally might try to interfere, I told her, “This is a really special trip for Ruth, Mom, and me, so I’ve planned the agenda accordingly. You can join us if you want, but this trip is for them, for their interest.” Sally decided not to go.
On the morning after our first night in Nashville, Sally called me at the hotel, saying she wanted to join us that night.
She went to the Grand Ole Opry with us, looking unhappy throughout the performance.
“What’s wrong with her?” Ruth asked. “She looks so unhappy.”
The next day, we were on a tour bus, and an unknown man across the aisle asked Sally if she was OK.
She glared at him and said, “Leave me alone!”
That afternoon, she went to the airport and flew home.
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