And in other news, love chose grey pleats this week. Re-discovered during a recent house move, my grey pants are happy to be strutting and cycling around Amsterdam after months of seeing the inside of a dark cupboard in Amstelveen.
Much like those old new pleats, this blog has gone un-loved for too long. Hung out to dry in the wardrobe of my favourites list and folded deep in the drawers of my online history. Both the grey and pleated cycle to school, and a new old apartment (and a few other chance meetings
*) have added a verve of freshness to the blogging part of my brain.
I often think posts which re-tell events and time don't make the most readable blogs. But it's been so long that i feel we need a catch up. A catch-up dressed equally as love & fear and carrying a message on why we should all choose love, in every decision we make. Summers' story:
the love...Buying a heavily used 1990 Suzuki Samurai jeep from a shady but loveable Dutch used car dealer. Admiring the combination of a moustache and lemon yellow pleated trousers, i placed trust and put aside concerns about rust. The romantic ideology of a summer touring Europe in the name of adventure, intact. After posting a note on trusted travel site, Couchsurfing, i exchange a few months of e-mails and emoticons with a girl from Korea. In a small German train station i meet Yumi for the first time on June 23. Sharing a tent and 4/5 driving hours each day is a perfect way to get to know someone. Especially as the jeep was without stereo system. Jeep repairs are waited out in the comfort and familiarity of Amsterdam for 10 days. Un-knowingly, Yumi and I set about falling in love and attraction. We are American teenagers living the dream of a Euro roadtrip, we just don't know it. Love is realised in Venice, high on starry skies, vino rosso and modest drags of Dutch marijuana. We realise we're American teenagers and knowingly share love and Italy. After 3 weeks apart (Yumi in Italy on summer camp, me en-route solo from Nice to Northampton), we re-unite in my hometown. Little England. She meets the family, cooks a Korean dinner, ten-pin bowling with gran and meals with uncles & cousins. We live like a newlywed couple visiting the parents for a weekend. As summers end approaches, a return to work looms and one last roadtrip sees a return to Amsterdam. One last magical evening, this one in the glorious company of Keith & Edi. We light Thai fire lanterns high into a clear Amstelveen sky. We make wishes, they're secret. In the morning, i leave for work and kiss Yumi good-bye. For the past two months, we've shared the majority of 24/7's, when i return from work she's en-route to Korea. We'll soon meet again...
the fear...Repair bills to make my trusted chariot roadworthy equated to nearly double the cost of the jeep itself. Money is fake. Love is real. Several close friends decline my invitation to join my adventure. No hard feelings. Finances, work, partners etc can all get in the way sometimes. All this and i've not even departed yet. After some online activity i shared my adventure, 2-seater jeep and 2-man tent with a complete stranger. Further repairs see another substancial bill receipt shaking in my hands. This repair takes 10 days. Back on the road, we get lost often. No sat nav and Yumi takes to falling asleep at major junctions and directional decision points. No problem. I'm falling for someone who lives 9 hours away, not practical. Are the feelings returned? Is this real? Yumi stays in Italy to complete a pre-arranged summer camp. I'm alone. Confused when reflecting on the prior weeks and their emotions. Skeptical. I'm back home, alone. Yumi will visit and stay with family, will they like her? Will she like them? How do i feel? The jeep breaks down again. More shaking and receipts. Back in Amsterdam, summer is nearly closed for the season. By now, there is no fear.
"There is only love, everything else is our resistance to it"
-Terces Engelhart.
Hold a door open for someone, sing while you cycle, share, say yes, give a beggar a Euro or a Dollar or Pound or a smile (the most valuable of all currency), laugh with good friends, make new ones, dance, create, play, fuck for peace, high five everyone you see, hug a stanger and
Couchsurf. Be love where you live.
with love,
- Glenn x
The onset of daylight savings and dark winter nights mean this evenings sunset was buried under a blanket of cloud many hours ago. The only clue that the sun still exists is the reflective glow from the moon. Tis the season for grumbling about the weather in supermarket ques.
The dark and long winter nights are here.
24hours later and i've made the return flight. The train emerges from it's underground route leaving Schiphol. We travel side by side with a motorway. To my heavy eyes, brake lights form a hedonistic laser trip through the dark and drizzle. Back in the comfort of Amsterdam, the short walk home shares pavements which were short-sleeved and terraced only weeks ago. Now they're empty. Engulfed with shadows and moodlit by neon.
Some neon attracts me in for a beer and Champions League football. Sat at the bar in-between an overly-pampered cat and seven Gothic Swedish tourists, the football plays second fiddle to people watching and eavsdropping. People are more comfortable in the dark. In the brightly-lit hours of the day, people talk mainly of their outer-lives. Ideas, plans and what they are doing. But it's now dark, the place is lit only by candles and fairy-lights. It's like a visible definition of gezellig and people are talking about feelings inner-lives and the now. Talk is slower and pauses longer.
