200 Years vs. 200 Miles

What’s the difference between a European and an American?  HA!  It’s truer than you think.

The first time I stood inside an Amsterdam building and found out it was older than my country of origin, America, I had to pick my jaw up off the floor.

In the following years of further travel around Europe, I’m still as awed.  It never really sinks in.  Like recently, in March, when we walked through the above Marksburg Castle in Germany, built in 1174.  It’s over 800 years old…and even has an inside toilet.

But what really takes the cake for me was Rome a few years back, walking around the Forum, following, perhaps, the footsteps of Apostle Paul from 2000 years ago.  It has been called the most celebrated meeting place in the world, and in all history, according to Wiki.  I can imagine how I’d feel if I ever make it to Jerusalem!

I never get used to it.

As for Astrid, who has lived all but one year of her life in the Netherlands (that one year being America), age of these places is simply ho-hum for her.  She’s never known anything other than O.L.D.

However.  The first time we took a one-day trip from where we live here in middle Holland to Groningen in the northeast of the country, just 120 miles away, you would have thought we had driven to the other side of the world.  Seriously.  And it wasn’t just her.  When she told her co-workers where we had gone and come back, all in the span of one Saturday, they picked their jaws up off the floor.

She was never used to anything other than N.E.A.R. here in Europe, but that’s changing quickly.

If I told you it takes us one hour to drive from our back door to Antwerp, Belgium (50 miles), or 1.5 hours to Brussels (75 miles), in case we want to get a good pot of mussels, you’d laugh, right?  How about that it would take us 5 hours to drive from our city to Paris (250 miles) and could easily be done in a long weekend just about any time we wanted?  Yup, you’re picking your jaws up off the floor…while I’m convincing her how doable it is.

Speaking of America, Astrid came to visit me in Atlanta in 2009, 6 months before I moved to the Netherlands.  I wanted to take her to the family cottage in Michigan to meet some of my siblings.  Even by my standards it’s a long trip, 850 miles.  But I had done it almost every year for 25 years and knew the map like the back of my hand:  2 hours to Chattanooga, 2 hours to Nashville, 2.5 to Louisville, 2 to Indianapolis, another 2 to Fort Wayne, and then the “strome hetch” once crossing the line into Michigan.  All in one “swell foop” and usually during the night hours with at least 2 drivers.  In good weather we’d drive it in 12 hours, longer if we stopped at the cemetery to see Mom and Dad.

You could say I’m training Astrid.  She’s getting used to my “long-distance” antics.  In fact, we’re planning a 3-day birthday weekend to Luxembourg come July, 162 miles away, driving all around that wee country and spending a day in its capital, Luxembourg City, founded in the 900s.

She’s getting used to the distance, she says.  200 miles doesn’t make her gasp anymore.  But I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to any place older than dirt 200 years! 

All Geared Up

All geared up and ready to go!

As we speak, Astrid and I are packing for our annual trip westward over the Big Pond next week.  We’ll land first in Michigan for my favorite nephew’s wedding on The Farm, after which we’ll fly to Atlanta to be with my kids, grandson and friends the following 2 weeks.

Without belaboring the point, some of you know my conservative, fundamentalist, Christian, preacher-father family history.  However, in the same kind of way I usually do NOT like to use the gay/lesbian/homosexual words to describe myself, I do NOT like calling myself a Christian, even though I mostly am.  I just don’t like the negative definitions and interpretations that have nothing to do with either.  I’m a lesbian, but…not like that.  I’m a Christian, but…not like that.  And no, it’s not an oxymoron.

Which brings me to dancing at the wedding.  Astrid and I have a daily practice of dancing which is very important to us both.  However, knowing this could be a touchy situation for many in the family (for whom dancing is still relatively new), I wrote Peter to ask his honest druthers about our dancing at his wedding.  This isn’t about us but about him, I said.  Luckily, he generously replied that he and Andrea would be offended if we didn’t!  In fact, her sister will be bringing her girlfriend and plan to dance the night away.

Did I mention this will be the first time most of my extended family will finally meet Astrid (after our 5 years of knowing each other this month)?!  Astrid takes it all in stride.  She doesn’t care if they like and accept her or not.  She is who she is, she says.  Take it or leave it.

I wish I could be so…tame.

Which brings me to the absentee ballot I’ll fill out in Atlanta for the November election.  Who do you think will quicker facilitate Astrid moving back to America with me as my wife?!  As she prepares to retire in the next couple of years, her Euro and my dollar will both go much farther there.  I’d like to think we’ll have that choice once the time comes, even if we decide not to do it. 

I want the possibility.  The option.  Without having to ask.  For all of it…the dancing, the moving.  I don’t really ask for much, do I?  To be honest, I wish I wasn’t even having this conversation!  Do you get as sick and tired of it as I do?

What is it they say to never talk about in a public forum like this:  sex, religion and politics?!  Okay, then.  You didn’t hear any of this from me.

It’s time.  Time for a lot of things.  Time for change?  But for right now, we really are all geared up and ready to go, which is so much better than the alternative, all dressed up and nowhere to go, don’t you think?

Wish us peace.  Wish us shalom.  Life is short (tick tock).  Life is good.  We keep believing all things!

Finding Money

De Tijd Vliegt = Time Flies
Monnickendam, Netherlands

Whether it's a windmill, a lighthouse, a weathervane, a water tower...or as in this case, a gable stone on the front of a brick building...whenever I find one, I feel like I've just found money!

Just like I still feel whenever I find a penny on the sidewalk!  [And yes, I still embarrass my kids when I bend down to pick one up.]

Years ago when then-husband and I were in ministry to college students in Southern California, they gave us a metal detector just for fun.  Actually, I think it was for Bill's birthday.  They knew we loved taking our 2 kids to the beach every possible weekend, summer or winter, to fly kites and body-surf the waves.

Picture it now:  first Bill, then me, then the kids, one by one, all searching for treasures hidden in the sand.  We knew you could find rings and watches and whatever...and coins, of course.  Each of us had our own fantasy of hitting the jackpot.  But who would hit it first!

What is it about that EUREKA hope of finding a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.  Now that St. Paddy's Day has come and gone, many will have had their visions of finding treasures untold totally dashed...never really believing their gold was right there in front of them all along.

And sometimes it's not just money.  It's better than money!

Of all the things I "collect" with my camera here in the Netherlands, gevelstenen (gable stones) rank right up there at the top.  Lucky for me, they can be found in the city centers of almost every Dutch village or city, just waiting to be found.  I look up all the time on those photo hunts, holding my breath...expectant with childlike bliss to find whatever trinket is there just for the taking.

Now here's where the fun takes off.  There are Dutch databases for windmills (1173+) and lighthouses (40) and water towers (175)...AND FOR GABLE STONES (a gazillion)...to help you find where they are. 

As for gable stones, there are so many all over the Netherlands, you have to click on a city in the database to find out exactly how many and on what street.  In Amsterdam, for instance, there are over 800.  When I lived there half of every month for two years, I "collected" over 500 of them.  Talk about a jackpot!  Here in Gorinchem where I live now, there are only 36.  But all are treasures, as good for me as money!

In Monnickendam, which we visited a couple weeks ago, there are 60+ gable stones.  In the 2 hours we were there, I "collected" 33 of them.  The one above is my favorite and is the one where I immediately thought of us women here at V&V.  Once home, I went to the database and found it is a young whipper-snapper from 2003...compared to one I found from 1611, for instance.

"Finding money" means different things to different people, of course.  It certainly says a lot about us what we even call "money" or treasure.  But I can tell you this, when I find it, whatever it is, time stands still...even if it's trying to tell me otherwise.  And even if I can't take it with me!

A Stitch in Time

A stitch in time saves nine.

Most of us women, I'm guessing, know exactly what this means.  Well, the women of our age that is.  My grown daughter doesn't.  She may know the meaning but not the experience.  It was always too easy for Mom to give in and just do it for her.

If you mend it now, it'll save a bigger rip and more sewing later, right?!

Back in the 60s when Bill and I decided we would get married, the question of the engagement ring came up.  Without any ado, I told him I did NOT want a diamond ring (sorry Eliza).  All I ever wanted on my left finger was a wide, gold wedding band.  IF there was to be an engagement gift, I'd much prefer a sewing machine.  More practical.  Diamonds meant nothing to me and would be a waste of money, I declared.

Now a sewing machine.  That's different!  Even with rust on it, look how beautiful it is (no, silly, that's not mine!).  So, since Bill and I were on the same page, I received a Singer sewing machine for my wedding engagement.  I never used it to make clothes for me or my kids...but for Bill himself.  Remember when polyester was the new sliced bread?  I took a men's-wear sewing class and made all his dress slacks and sports jackets.  He loved them and made me proud.

Switch gears now to my spontaneous trip to America this Wednesday for a week with my kids and extended family.  I was NOT planning to be at the Michigan family cottage for our annual reunion this year because it didn't seem the right time to introduce Astrid, my new Dutch wife, to the family.  Most were still smarting over the 2008 break-up with my past partner, so I made the executive decison:  we don't have to do this now.  Give them time.

Then suddenly, three weeks ago, I found out my 2 kids and grandson would be driving up from Atlanta, just like we always did.  They hadn't planned on it till their schedules unexpectedly changed, and when I found out, I wanted to be with them to help with the driving and expense.  Actually, I just wanted to BE with them.  In the process, I would also be with my family...but without Astrid.

A stitch in time saves nine?

To be honest, I never dreamed of this possiblilty, to mend the initial rip and perhaps help keep it from getting bigger by going to my family alone without Astrid.  There's a part of me that says if you don't want her than you don't get me.  But I know this isn't about her.  It's about me and about how my family perceives me.  It's about mending whatever I can now to make her introduction better later.  A stitch in time.

So, please wish me godspeed as I venture off once again.  It takes a village, you know.  And my rusty seamtress skills could use a bit of fine-tuning!