20. There Is a Quiet Place—But It Ain't Here

She ate no meat to-day, nor none shall eat;
Last night she slept not, nor to-night she shall not.
——The Taming of the Shrew, IV.i

On Thursday morning we returned from Starbucks a little late for our 10:30 a.m. worship service. It didn't matter, though, because Q. wasn't even up yet. Eventually he dragged himself out to the courtyard and sat on a bench, blinking. Whatever the poor guy had been up to the night before, it hadn't involved sleep. I had some sympathy for his fatigue—we were staying up later and later after gigs, and all of us were looking and feeling worn out. I find it next to impossible to sleep in when I'm traveling—I always seem to wake up between 6 and 7 a.m., so if I want more sleep I have to go to bed earlier. Q. seemed too tired to even go through the motions of singing with us, but I think he did manage to distribute a few prayer requests from his Web site.

Today's Pearl of Wisdom: Ken, Barbie, and E., who usually joined us for these worship services, were absent, so I asked Q. where they were. "Oh," he said, "they're out running errands." Later, when the trio returned, I asked them how their day had been. That's when I learned that Q. had lied to us. They'd been watching an Olympic event (I forget what, maybe kayaking).

You'll recall, gentle reader, that long before we reached Athens, Q. and E. had promised that we'd attend an Olympic event together. I assumed they'd be obtaining tickets for said event, since they hadn't asked us for money for them. And once we got there, Q. repeatedly boasted, "People [what people he didn't specify] are giving me free tickets all the time, so you can go see something if you want to." Cory, the South African leader of our Russian team, apparently did have a ticket source, so his team attended quite a few events. But as far as I can tell, Q., despite his boasting, managed to score only three free tickets during his entire stay. He might even have gotten them from Cory. Since it wouldn't be fair to give tickets to some band members and not others, he gave them instead to Ken, Barbie, and E. Only he forgot to tell them to keep mum.

Catching Q. in a lie did nothing to lower my opinion of him, which had already hit bottom. I didn't even bother to call him on it. I don't remember much about the rest of the day. There was one day, and this might have been it, when Q. actually left us to our own devices for 2–3 hours, saying, "See, I give you guys time off."

That night's gig was in Vathis Square, a seedy little spot north of Omonoia frequented by pimps, prostitutes, drunks, and junkies. It would be difficult to imagine a public space in Athens filled with people in more dire need of the Gospel. I must admit that my own participation in spreading said Gospel amounted to little more than playing in the band—and with U4ic—and with Proin, Philemon's band. Heck, I played with every band except Qedem, who didn't need me now that they had their distortion pedal. When I wasn't playing I was, for the most part, backstage keeping an eye on our gear, because once again it was sitting out in the open and I didn't trust anyone else to watch it for me. I may have handed out a Bible or two, but I didn't do much more than that.

The French kids arrived at the square hoping to give one last performance before leaving to board their plane home. Unfortunately, we were late getting set up, and their time ran out while they were waiting. There wasn't much to do but hug a few tearful kids and wish them bon courage, bon voyage, and above all, bon fromage.

By this point, pretty much everyone in the band was operating in "survival mode"—meaning that psychologically, we'd adopted a defensive posture toward Q. and anything associated with him. This meant keeping our distance whenever possible, both physically and emotionally; trying to keep all interactions with him—even positive ones—as brief and uneventful as possible; and doing only what it took to get by. Some other band members still found a way to proselytize, even in survival mode, but I didn't. I had too many reservations about Q. and his methods. It hurts to say it, but I wasn't convinced that Christianity as practiced by Q. was something that ought to be spread around—so I was reluctant to help him spread it. There were, however, plenty of folks from Greeks for Christ and Elias' organization, Passage to Life, working the crowd while he preached.

As for Sarah, she split her time that evening between watching the baby and being propositioned by a pimp. But in the end, as we like to say in the business, nothing was stolen, nothing was broken, and nobody got hurt.

So you can see, perhaps, why I wasn't in such a buoyant mood at 12:30 a.m. when we got back to Athens Christian Center. I was determined to go to bed as soon as possible, but that proved difficult.

First we came upon Ken and Barbie, who were lying uncomfortably on the floor in the hallway, having been locked out of the room they were sharing with Q. and E. We offered to let them stretch out on the extra air mattresses in our room, but they declined.

About our room: Fortunately our separation had lasted only one night, and Sarah and I were now staying in another "conjugal room," which, although technically private, wasn't very quiet. Its window opened onto the same courtyard as the window in the shower room, so we could hear anyone taking a shower. Also, not everyone seemed inclined to go to bed. Loud talking persisted out in the hallway for an hour, with no evident attempt by Q. or anyone else to get people to quiet down.

This pattern of behavior had been established over the course of previous evenings, and I doubt it crossed anyone's mind that they were keeping people awake. On other nights I'd been just as guilty as anyone else of staying up too late, but I no longer wanted to participate.

I'm what pop psychologists call a "slow boiler"; instead of dealing with situations as soon as they turn negative, I tend to hold my feelings in until I can no longer contain them. I'd been boiling for a week now, and I lay on my air mattress, getting angrier and more frustrated every minute. Just then, E. and Barbie decided to take a shower. As if that weren't loud enough, they also started to carry on a conversation, shouting to each other over the sound of the running water.

After a few minutes of this, Sarah suggested that we pray together. So we tried, but the noise was even more of an impediment to prayer than it was to sleep. Mid-prayer I decided I'd had enough. I got up, burst into the hallway, and started yelling at the top of my lungs for people to be quiet. The nearest person to the door was Hannah, and I gave her quite a start.

Of course that was the wrong thing to do. My behavior wasn't any more appropriate than that of the people I was yelling at, and Sarah told me so as soon as I got back into the room. Meanwhile, my yelling had gotten the attention of E., who cut her shower short and stormed down the hallway toward the room she was sharing with Q., all the while yelling about how awful I was (in a voice even louder than the one she'd been using in the shower).

Before long Q. burst in, without knocking, and admonished me. Everyone had gathered in the courtyard, he said, and now he, Q., had to go out and explain to them that I wasn't a jerk. He also denied making any contribution to the noise problem, even though (1) for the first half hour after I went to bed, his had been one of the voices in the hall; (2) part of leadership means taking responsibility when you let things get out of control. Nonetheless, I remained calm, apologized, and after a few minutes, followed him out to the courtyard. I repeated my apology to everyone there, after which they gathered around me and prayed some more. This prayer was led by Ken, who put his hand on me and implored God to give me "supernatural sleep" so that I'd be miraculously refreshed in the morning. I was genuinely affected by everyone's concern, but by the time I got back to the conjugal room I was already analyzing Ken's prayer.

"These people treat prayer like magic beans," I told Sarah. "They don't provide enough leadership or discipline to allow us time to sleep, and when that becomes a problem they want God to snap his fingers and fix it." It reminded me of the way they planned concert bookings.

With the hallway quiet at last, we got some sleep, which was not supernatural as far as I could tell. Yet when I rose Friday morning I learned that my outburst, rude as it was, had borne results. First, Q. and E. had instituted quiet hours: all of a sudden it was verboten to talk in the hall before 10 a.m. Of course this meant the early-to-bed/early-to-rise crowd, like me, were expected not to disturb the late sleepers, like Q.—instead of the other way around. No problem, since I was spending every morning at Starbucks. And at least Q. had done something.

The second result: E. finally coughed up the plane itinerary for me and Sarah, and when she did she repeated the invitation for us to leave the group—which was sounding more and more like what we really ought to do. We decided to devote the day to finding out whether it was feasible.

But that's a tale for another entry.