Afgelopen zondagochtend rijd ik mijn bijna wekelijks rondje op de fiets door Almere, waarbij ik deze ochtend langs een van de grootste gemalen ter wereld, De Blocq van Kuffeler, fiets. Het is het oudste gebouw van de stad waar ik nu woon, in oktober 1967 begon het met het droogleggen van Zuidelijk Flevoland,welke ervoor heeft gezorgd dat de polder in zeven maanden werd drooggelegd. Hierdoor kan ik deze zondagochtend in het zonnetje rondfietsen op de oude, drooggelegde zeebodem in plaats van dat ik ronddobber aan het wateroppervlak.

Het is deze zondagochtend heel vriendelijk weer. De temperatuur verraadt dat het de eerste dag van December is, maar verder is het heerlijk vertoeven. De maand geeft me, in tegenstelling tot de temperaturen buiten, een warm gevoel. Het zal wel te maken hebben met het gevoel van saamhorigheid dat ik zal ervaren met de komende december-momenten als; Sinterklaas, Kerstmis en Oud en Nieuw. Let’s go December!

Deze periode rijdt het openbaar (treinverkeer) weer eens anders dan normaal. Dit komt door de werkzaamheden op Schiphol. Het grootste luchthaven van Nederland is aan vernieuwing toe en ik denk dat de aansluiting van de diverse treinen ook hiertoe horen. Daarom rijden de treinen iets anders dan normaal. Dit betekent dat ik in de ochtend een paar minuten later op mijn eindstation aankom, waardoor ik niet een verbinding mis en een vijftal minuten op de metro moet wachten. Het is niet anders en het duurt maar tot einde volgende week.

Maar van de week had ik een bijzondere variatie; tijdens mijn rit in de vroege ochtend was er een storing waardoor we minutenlang stilstonden in het donkere landschap tussen Weesp en Diemen. Uiteindelijk werd er aan de reizigers omgeroepen dat door een wisselstoring op de rails de mogelijk om door te rijden nihil was. De trein ging weer terug naar het laatst aangedane station, werd er ons geomroept. Ik had inmiddels al een collega geappt dat ik deze dag ging thuiswerken. Uiteindelijk kwam in na een reis van anderhalf uur weer terug op de plek van mijn vertrek. Net op tijd om de werkdag te beginnen.

‘Wanneer heb je voor het laatst iets voor het eerst gedaan?’ Dit was altijd een gevleugelde uitspraak van een kennis van vroeger. Ze was een vrouw van mijn leeftijd die in dezelfde wijk als ik in Den Helder was opgegroeid, maar die ik pas later leerde kennen via het internet toen ik al in Almere woonde. Ik moest laatst weer even aan haar denken. Helaas kan ik het haar niet vertellen. Zo’n tien jaar geleden heeft ze zelf voor het laatst iets voor het eerst gedaan, en dat was onomkeerbaar; ze overleed aan hartfalen.

In mijn gedachten leeft ze nog voort. Zo dacht ik even aan haar toen ik laatst bij de plaatselijke supermarkt voor het eerst beef jerky had gekocht. En thuis had geproefd. Dit was voor mij de laatste keer dat ik iets voor het eerst heb gedaan (het eten van gedroogd vlees). Dit omdat ik gewoon nieuwsgierig was onder het mom van het verbreden van de cullinaire horizon. Het is niet dat ik er spijt van heb, maar ik vond het eten van dit gedroogd vlees geen succes. Ik had nu echt het idee dat ik aan een dood dier zat te knabbelen. Wanneer al het vlees smaakte zoals beef jerky, dan was ik jarenlang geleden al vegetarier geweest.

I find it extraordinary in more ways than one, that I have been writing pieces of text on this weblog for the past twenty years. It is not, like twenty years ago, that I share my blogs, or the pieces of text, daily and almost fanatic, but every now and then I have the urge to share something online. It’s not that I want to air my opinion anymore. Since a few years I don’t think that’s of any importance. Imagine ‘shouting’ something and someone will respond to create a stupid discussion. Opinions are like opinions; everyone has one.

Why I haven’t stopped writing blogs in recent years is partly because I enjoy reading back on things from the past. Nowadays it’s the case that when we welcome a new, mostly young colleague at work I can look back to see what I did, or what kept me busy, on my colleague’s birthday. No need to mention I am getting old (well, at least twenty years older, since this weblog started).

Since a few weeks, I have been taking a mug of coffee with me on my way to work. My attention was caught on a thermos cup that was on sale on an online shop. It was a nice item and I reminded myself that at work I always leave my coffee cold. With such a thermos cup like this item, it wouldn’t cool down as quickly as I was used to. And I was right. Even a few hours after pouring, my coffee in the thermos cup is still hot.

Now I also take a mug of coffee with me from home in the morning for travelling. A coffee to go. Not that I sit and sip it on the train or metro, but when I walk the last few hundred meters to work, I take an occasional sip of my coffee, and believe me, with these cold winter temperatures the last few days, this is not an excessive treat.

With the early morning hours still dark (say night) since a week ago when I go to Amsterdam on weekdays, Christmas jitters are slowly starting to bubble to the surface. Thus, I have been cautiously listening to Christmas songs for the past few days. There are, to my knowledge, no Halloween songs, and I have been skipping St Nicholas songs for years, because I no longer celebrate St Nicholas. That leaves only the Jingle Bells, White Christmas and other songs.

I still try to listen to other music, though. My Eurovision Song Contest playlist is still playing from time to time, but after ten months Bing C. and Mariah C. are more often heard through my airpods. I’m not going to deny, nor resist it. The lead up to Christmas has begun. Not that I have ever resisted it in the previous years.

Last week, I covered more kilometres in three days while driving a car than I did in the past three years. It is no secret that I hate driving a car. I derive no pleasure from it and the socalled free feeling, I do only have when I am in the passenger seat. Or in the back seat. For that, I don’t care. Shifting gears, accelerating, braking and keeping an eye on other traffic, makes me cramp up.

Admittedly, after yet another drive, it wasn’t that bad. Compared to the first ride last Tuesday from Utrecht, but I still did not enjoy it. Nor do I think that the euphoria of driving a car will ever happen. Some people don’t like water, or are horrified by insects. I don’t like getting behind the wheel to drive. Soit.

What I personally regret is that because of this personal crappy feeling, I almost forgot the reason why I got to spend a few days behind the wheel. Namely, my the eye of my main man was troubled, having undergone cataract surgery a year and a half ago. After a short visit to the ophthalmologist, it turned out that his lens was getting loose and he needed an urgent surgery on his eye. No argument here. I will take my seat behind the wheel.

The operation is done and it was successful (there was a small moment of panic when the eye pressure was too high, but after an extra check-up (extra car ride) it turned back to the normal pressure). The eye now has to heal and in a week and a half there will be a final check-up (last car ride). I’m already looking forward to the moment when everything was as the way it was.

I’m not a birdwatcher. I know the difference between sparrows, blackbirds, gulls, starlings and parrots, but my knowledge of birds doesn’t really go much further. Maybe I can point out some more (the hummingbird or a woodpecker), but I can’t tell you the difference between the various bird families. Nor explain it. There are plenty of birdwatchers and hobbyists who can inform you.

At work in Amsterdam, I often walk during my lunch. You get out and you’re on the move. But recently, the gulls that sit here above my employer’s car park have young gulls in their nests. I always thought that all birds lay eggs in the month of May, but it just goes to show that my bird knowledge is limited in that respect as well. The breeding period of gull is from May to August (I googled it).

Besides the fact that gulls are protected animals in the Netherlands, they are also very protective of their own chicks. This results in aggressiveness towards the people walking by. And me in particular. It has happened a couple of times that a gull flew in a dive towards me, above my head. After a few days I found out that when I keep looking at the ground, the seagull keep flying in the air. Just keep my fingers crossed and let us hope that these gull chicks grow up pretty fast.

The run I just ran is hugely disappointing. My knees are hurting and my legs are tired. It looks like my condition is deteriorating. No matter which direction I ran, I had a strong headwind. So I am glad that despite the tired legs, I can cool down quietly. When I want to close the running lap in my running app, I am startled by a huge unfamiliar sound. It takes a while before I realise what that sound is, but when I awake, it turns out to be my alarm clock.

Lovely. Monday morning and I wake up exhausted. A good start to the new week, and of course I write that sarcastically. Things can only get better now. I think. But the Universe knows otherwise. Later, when I travel to work by train, the driver forgets to stop at the station where I’m supposed to get on the metro. With a diversion and delay of almost half an hour, I arrive at work. Sometimes you just have to love your life.

Every now and then I like to take a bath. My body surrounded by the warm, fragrant bathwater does not transport me to other places as others might appreciate. I am simply lying and relaxing in my bathroom at home in a bathtub that is getting tighter as I get older. This has nothing to do with me getting older, but rather with my expanding body. One of the downsides of getting older; your body loses to gravity and it sags.

As I sip from a ‘glass of pleasure’, which I hold elegantly with my water-wrinkled fingers, I think, smiling, that getting older, or the sagging of my body, will no longer be a problem. I put the ‘glass of pleasure’ back on the edge of the bath and remember that I have been part of humanity on this planet, orbiting the sun, for more than 50 years. Whining about my old age is a waste of time. Not that I am ready to continue with a limp and sagging life. I am just going for a run again on Saturday. This way I will , hopefully, be able to keep going on for a while.

Today it’s my youngest sisters birthday. She a golden girl by now, simply because she’s 6 years older than me. Therefore she will always be older than me. The same goes for my eldest sister, who passed away five years ago. She will always be older than me, even if I get to live long enough to reach the age of sixty eight. One year older than my eldest sister, when she passed away. Life is short, life can be sad, because life isn’t always funny. Just be sure you enjoy it.

Isn’t it funny that every now and then, through a little trigger, a forgotten memory bubbles to the surface? In my case, they’re often the not meaningful memories, but more the ‘oh-yeah!-moments’. This is probably also why these moments disappeared so quickly from my mind.

This week, I was streaming the album Introducing The Hardline According to Sananda Maitreya. An album from the 1980s with a slightly different title then, as Terence Trent D’Arby changed his name to Sananda Maitreya years ago. Contrary to the rave reviews about the album at the time, I was not a big fan. I was allowed to borrow it from a colleague at the time, Jolanda. I listened to the album once and also immediately recorded it on a cassette tape. I don’t think I listened that much to the album after that. Until recent days, after thirty-seven years. I do appreciate the album a little more.

It was while listening to the album, from work, on the way home that one memory from long ago suddenly bubbled up. The memory is an accusation by my colleague Jolanda, at the time (± 35 years ago), that I had borrowed her album and when I returned it to her, she said it was full of fingerprints and stains on the vinyl. Even then, I don’t remember smudging the album with greasy fingers. It was something I couldn’t reply to. I could deny it, but I’m sure Jolanda was convinced of my greasy actions. And with that I leave the memory as I dealt with it back in the 1980s; I’m going to forget about it.