Duivendrecht

yawn on yawn spread from face to face from window to window across the sidewalk it's all the same we're all the same people you know sounds like a fucking coca cola commercial

the thing is you know the thing is here in this quaint little town isn't the very word quaint so fucking quaint is it just me or ain't that the way it really is it really is so the thing is here in duivendrecht sitting here right on the edge of amsterdam

the thing is here in duivendrecht it's fucking back to the future it's the nineteen fifties with internet and mobile telephones with a little eurotechnodiscorepetez-moitechnopoptrance thing going on here in duivendrecht it's back to the future with a bit of wild wild west kind of twist lots of interesting contraptions gadgets but they work by hamster-wheel power ah so clever these dutch aren't they just fucking cute

the radio stations here are either eurotrashtechno or seventies eric clapton pablo cruise eighties men from down under are ee em maybe it's just the ones we listen to in the car and admittedly we've only used the car when we've gone down to neijmegen and breda down in southern and eastern holland which tends to be the middle of nowhere

which is odd since there are sixteen million people in an area which is twice the size of delaware you would think that the middle of nowhere would be a rather relevant location but you gotta just love the fact that there are rednecks and mullets once you get into the buttfuck egypts of any country and

holland did not disappoint

rednecks with big bellies and shark fin mullet haircuts do indeed live in holland they were not present in duivendrecht though

duivendrecht is the suburbs duivendrecth is quaint

i guess once that it was an old village like so many of the suburbs in the good old you ess of aa silicon valley used to be all orange groves disneyworld and orlando used to be all orange groves hell in keeping with the standards which they've attained over the years my hometown of valdosta georgia used to be a swamp

back to the fifties we were living in this house in duivendrecht it was cool in this simplistic way we traded houses with this family that usually lives in this house they were in our house in san francisco there are five of them there are five of us seemed to work out dutch houses are different i mean this was pretty cool every other time i'd ever come to europe i'd stayed in hotels and never really noticed how people actually lived restaurant food is never really the same thing that people eat every day now is it

duivendrecht seemed pretty small i don't know how big it is seemd big enough to have it's own newspaper but it's an afternoon paper but the whole town seemed pretty new relatively new maybe twenty maybe thirty years old quaint a grocery store pharmacy produce stand bakery bank post office around this little brick plaza not one of those ancient plazas with a statue in the middle but a post-industrial quaint little brick plaza built in that block german style or what i think of as that block german style

it was a three minute bike ride from our house seven minute walk

used to be an old village big old church at the end of one road an old farmhouse remained neighbors said that two old sisters lived there they had two sheep in a yard by the canal one other really old house

the first thing we noticed the first thing we noticed hell i don't know what we noticed first everything was so familiar and yet we didn't know a fucking thing everyone speaks english if you address them directly but if you happen to be sitting at the next table you can't really eavesdrop on conversations what kind of fun is that i totally dig what uncle billy is doing these days i want to know more about what young bobby did to piss off his mother so much and how on earth did jennifer get knocked up

the first thing we noticed no shit sherlock we ain't in kansas anymore not that we ever made it to kansas as a family i think that stella might have gone through there on one of her jaunts across country i drove through there twice had a very interesting evening in russell kansas once flew into kansas city before i ever realized that it ain't in kansas kansas ain't got much i mean there's some good bee-ball but i guess that is canceled out by senator bob let me tell you about how to cure a limp dick dole but we ain't in kansas anymore not at all baby and i dig that

the neighbors complained about the weather no summer this year too cloudy i'm looking up i'm feeling the cool breeze and i'm loving it feels a lot like san francisco when the breeze comes through oh kay yeah it's a little more humid but the clouds are simply slathered onto the light blue canvas they go forever to infinity and beyond

the neighbors filled us in on the local biases the dutch are known for being cheap and the belgians are stupid but rich and the luxembourgers are something or other and no one likes the germans i mean one by himself may be oh kay but don't let them gather into groups i love it we're all idiots on this planet big loveable idiots why can't we just do the rodney king thing

the house itself it was a house rooms beds kitchen stereo television bathroom but things were smaller not significantly smaller not even noticeably smaller but smaller in a more subtle way in a way where you only noticed it after considering it the chairs the chairs and sofa in the living room seemed like about ninety per cent the size of ours when you looked at the room everything was in proportion so it was familiar

but when you sat back into the chair it was just a little bit smaller like one and only daughter she is just a bit smaller and while i didn't love it like i love her like i love one and only daughter i did dig it in just that subtle way that should be considered

we ate a dutch breakfast in the morning we stayed with the family for two nights before they went to san francisco they showed us their version of the dutch breakfast old cheese on dark bread strong coffee the kids had young cheese on sweet bread i'm hooked i got fat but they were all skinny what the fuck is that all about

i like the roots there d the dad there he grew up about thirty forty kilometers away his dad was in the resistance his family has always been in holland from eastern holland e the mom is also from eastern holland always had been back in the good old you ess of aa you're always from somewhere else even if your family had been in valdosta georgia for three four generations you were always from somewhere else some other state maybe sometimes but always going back to ireland england wales scotland most likely northern europe otherwise yeah yeah there is the africa thing but we try not to speak of it in public i like the roots there

every road has a bike path every family has bikes kids across the little plaza were learning to ride a bike one day we saw the little girl she was six she was pedaling around the next thing we know she was teaching her little brother to ride no one uses helmets the kids just sit on the little seats while the parents pedal

no harm no foul i guess

we walked we rode bikes we took the train i didn't miss driving

but there is the paradox that confronts me i mean the way it rains here i can't imagine that there is a problem with water maybe it is though or maybe it's just because it rains so much that they tire of water but i mean it's the glasses what's up with the size of the water glasses i'm fucking thirsty give me a big glass of water with ice and leave the pitcher this is my only complaint about holland everything else i love

i love and all that

Walking Blues

yeah yeah yeah we did the museum thing

note that oldest son is seventeen and he's stuck with family on summer vacation he is having a good time but he can't admit it i miss being seventeen sometimes oldest son nothing bothers oldest son so much he just slides he makes it look so easy and it's good note that one and only daughter is fifteen and she misses her very tight circle of friends she is the the surprising backbone of the family how did that happen note that youngest son is twelve and worships his sister and is the coolest meaning that sometimes he can be a royal pain in the ass but most of the time i simply adore him

if they never see another museum it will be too soon but it is kind of touching to see all three of them come together in agreement on something the harmony then comes from aw dad not another museum fading into we're not going to another museum

we tried to keep it low key you know hit them toward the end of the day limit the amount of time inside to well under two hours only do one in any given day we did the rijksmuseum the anne frank the van gogh museum the jewish museum the war musuem in neijmegen the tower of london in yeah well london a play in london that for them seemed liked going to a museum i tried to go to the big church in haarlem but they detoured into the shops until it closed stella had this idea while in the jewish museum that we'd go to temple over here on friday the look on their eyes the slow hiss of their souls deflating swept that concept into the trash pile before it even got a chance to form

i think that it would be cool to come back with stella by ourselves hang out in the coffee house hang out in the jolly joker for an afternoon and then go to temple

if the sun doesn't go down until after ten thirty at night does that mean that friday night services don't begin until then

we walked everywhere through amsterdam we'd just take the train into wherever we wanted to get off and then walk from there we knew all the train stops by the time we left this was my favorite part walking through the streets wandering wandering lost wandering wandering holding hands with stella or one and only daughter or youngest son and even sometimes on very cool moments with oldest son

oh kay oh kay just to digress just to take an aside on an obviously and blatantly childish attempt to make you smile that ain't that sweet sweet smile but i gotta tell you when you can walk through the street holding hands with your seventeen year old boychild i don't care what city you are in it's a pretty cool thing

dig

we walked everywhere the five of us here there shops food buildings parks talking to each other complaining sometimes joking talking shit mostly it wasn't just about daddy-o it wasn't just about stella it wasn't just about oldest lad about youngest lad about one and only daughter it was it just was

dig that too

i could be pretentious and get into the museums and culture and history because yeah yeah yeah there is that the big old fucking swan night watchman and and the manet monet thing and the crazy bastard with the sunflowers and tulips thing and i enoy it i can be in the one with it sometimes i just like seeing those works simply the reflections of the times oh yeah that is what they looked like that is what they were thinking then

i'm still trying to figure out what we're thinking now

we walked everywhere through amsterdam i was not allowed to discuss directions you see there is this thing about me being directionally challenged i can travel to some place twenty-five times in as many days and on the twenty-sixth day walking by there will appear totally new to me

dig that too

we walked everywhere everywhere everywhere i would say up and down the streets but that would be a lie it is so flat here that there really is no up and down only around only around and around we looked up though we looked at the clouds we looked at the tops of buildings i just love the buildings here i love the bricks here there are few bricks in san francisco earthquakes and all that don't you know i secretly wish that we had landed a house swap with someone right in town so we could have stayed in one of these classic old homes but i'm the prime minister of cheer in this family so i don't say it

i dig that too tattoo baby

we walked everywhere anywhere oldest son and stella became the navigator they were fucking lewis and clark stella looks over at me after a while and says she says shaking her head she says that she is going to have to talk with my man peter about our backpacking trips going to have peter attach a rope around my waist so i don't get lost she can't collect on the life insurance unless they find a body you know

i do too dig that too

we walked everywhere oldest son and stella studied the map stella often just pointed and said this way without even consulting said map i followed blind stupid and happy we ate pancakes oh man i dig the pancakes sweet or savory not quite a crepe not quite what we would call a pancake back home in valdosta we've had pancakes no less than five times in restaurants and two or three times back at the house stella having figured out the process you can buy anything in a box these days

i liked mine with just sugar stella liked hers with cheese and mushrooms

we liked the indonesian food we liked the cheese we liked the pancakes i liked the coffee we liked we liked we liked each other for three weeks not bad not bad not too damn shabby

we walked everywhere stella did the camera thing that's what she does youngest son tries to be like her some he wants to take pictures like she does she tries to show him but he's got to play photojournalist and snap off five in a row click click click click click the snappy high tech digital ess elle are bobbing up and down stella having a heart attack that youngest son is going to drop said very expensive equipment we walked everywhere everywhere

we walked everywhere until lewis and clark did not even have to consult the map this town ain't that big we walked everywhere flea markets all over the city yeah there is the red light district the kids got a kick out of that yeah there were coffee shops everywhere and the sweet smell of ganja wafted into the streets we walked everywhere

i needed time to just be and we did it while walking everywhere

dig that and all that

Intrigue

ah yes i wish i do wish that i was smply claudius observing the play from afar from the wings or rather from within instead of being a player an actor in this stupid fucking performance yet to be determined if it's a comedy or a tragedy or simply a history

were that i claudius

but the question arises the question begs what bit part do i play into what role have i been cast i don't know enough shakespeare it's been to many joints since i last sat down with robert graves for me to continue this silly line of thought

been a while been a while i know lots of stories lots of tales lots of fucking pent up emotions anger despair joy happiness you know the regular lot the usual suspects if i hadn't waited so long i'd know just where to begin i'd know just where to start but i fucking already told you it's been a while

perhaps perhaps there is a beginning i suppose starts pretty much after the last one ended fucking amazing the way that works eh

right now right now though i guess i'm somewhere in the middle actually i'm sitting on a bench in the middle of hyde park in london just off the serpentine lake lovely it is it is as the natives might say it's a gas as marc bolan aa kay aa tea rex might say

we've been in europe the last couple of weeks we being he family me stella the three kids no dogs we'll be over here another couple of weeks we have a house in amsterdam doing the dutch thing doing the hollandaise thing

four days before i left for vacation i puled down a rather large deal worth several million through the end of next year not a bad deal if i do say so myself pretty cool fucking deal yeah worked late on this deal i was the next to last person to leave the office the guy i worked for being the only other one there it must have ben eight thirty maybe nine i handed him the deal we did the high five he asked me to come in early the next day

the next day being the first of july

now you gotta understand that we my company at the time we had just acquired another company one of about equal size of about the same number of people lets just say that there was to be a lot of overlap let's just say tht in the shuffling of the deck some cards were going to be tossed of necessity mind you

i came in early on the morning of the first of july again it was only me and this ichabod crane looking motherfucker that i worked for he's an executive vice president don't you know me only a lowly vice president in the company you get the picture i suppose rather blatant foreshadowing i guess not much of a mystery eh well if i must spell it out for you

old ichabod leaned over his desk and said he actually had a bit of a stupid grin on his face i will be optimistic and say it was a nervous grin he leaned over his desk and he said we're letting you go

first words out of my mouth were you gotta be fucking kidding me he nodded the second being you fucking got me out of bed at seven fucking thirty in the morning to tell me something you could have told me last night ichabod didn't say anything i'm fuming i'm steamed i'm fucking stunned to be honest with you he goes on to explain the severance package not a bad one lest you faithful be worried about me and mine not a bad one keeps me flush for a while through the end of the year

but i'm fucking pissed

i mean if i could only find that zen moment and get inside and focus i think this can be a very liberating thing a very cool moment for me i haven't even tried and about ten groups organizations people have reached out to me they want me to come spin them up do the magic show them the shine

but i'm still pissed

lessons learned lessons learned lessons learned there have to be lessons learned i know if i walk don't walk away having learned something then it's all for naught right i don't want my lesson to be don't trust the motherfuckers that ain't right that ain't the way it should be but jesus fucking christ i pulled in a multi fucking million dollar deal the night before something ain't right something ain't right but it's all part of the game i guess i wasn't the only one to go there were others a couple of other of us vee pees were whacked i spent nearly four years without much of even a breather

yeah i'm bitter yeah i'm pissed

ah yes i wish i do wish that i was smply claudius observing the play from afar from the wings or rather from within instead of being a player an actor in this stupid fucking performance yet to be determined if it's a comedy or a tragedy or simply a history i look over my shoulder and i whisper

et tu brutus

and all that