No rest for the wicked

Why am I writing this on a Sunday evening you might wonder.  I have been rather busy these last weekends and during the week I am working.  It has been the most wonderful summer.  Sunny and warm.  Almost every evening, I could still sit in the garden when I got home from work.  Some weekends, we took care of some of our grandchildren, while their parents were working in their future home.  We had a plastic inflatable pool in the garden and they loved that.  Those of you who read my previous scriblings know that houses play a big role in my life at the moment.  My parental home is now officially another family's property and concern. The deed was signed last Thursday.  We spent some Saturdays clearing out the house.  It took 3 of us 2 full days to clear out the garage alone (that has a cellar).  Not as bad as the attic but almost.  Saying goodbye to the house was not that emotional for me.  My childhood home is actually the house we lived in with my grandmother and was actually her house, untill we moved to the house my parents had build when I was ten.  My childhood to me, are the years we lived in the small dead end street.  There were less cars back then but because it was a cul-de-sac, almost none came into our street.  Many children of about my age were living there so we played outside on the street most of the time.  It was even safe enough for roller skating; The old ladies would sit outside on chairs on the pavement in front of their houses when the weather was good.  They would be watching us, chatting and knitting.  We would sometimes go visit them and play card games.  I spent a lot of time with my grandmother and I have fond memories of her.  She was in her late sixties when I was born, so I had an old grandmother.  I guess I spent so much time with her because I am the eldest and it was normal for me to be with her when my younger brother was born and later my sister. But I remember I really liked being with her. She sometimes cooked for the 2 of us and I would have dinner with her and not with the rest of the family.  My grandmother died when I was 12 at the age of 80.  I remember the funeral and clearly remember it made me sad to realise I would never see her again.  I can only hope to be in my grandchildren's hearts as she still is in mine. I do have good memories of te house we just sold, but somehow I don't consider those childhood memories.  The next step now is our youngest son moving house tomorow.  I have taken off some time from work to help out a bit with the decorating;  All this physical activity does have an added value.  I am getting fitter and I am actually losing weight without strict diet.  On the days that I was not working in one of the houses, I spent some time with the grandchildren. Yesterday we spent the afternoon with 2 of them.  I enjoy that immensely and they are so energetic that I don't have problems to sleep well at night.  A busy time is coming on at work too and the rehearsals with the theatre group for the play in January have started 2 weeks ago, aswell as my Italian course.  No rest for the wicked as the saying goes.

Sunset in Paradise

A pure white sandy beach, the blue ocean, the sun, a sea breeze, it's nice and warm and tranquil, I am reading and somebody (our neibours on the beach !) just brought me a strawbury daiquiri with crushed ice, just like that.  What else could I want ?  There are a number of things I could think of, but it's near perfection to me, for a while anyway.  And those glorious sunsets ! Every evening any number of hotel guests would be on the beach trying to catch it on camera.  We did have a great holiday in Aruba.  The 10 hour flight was well worth it.  I actually could have stayed there for another fortnight, soaking up the sun, reading, eating drinking (!), swimming and enjoying the relaxing atmosphere.  Now that summer seems to be seriously delayed on our otherwise very nice seaside, I realise even more how lucky I am to have been able to be in the sun for 2 weeks on a wonderful holiday.  The hotel was super and everybody seemed to be enjoying themselves, even the Arubans who were working.  Most of the other guests were from the U.S., some were South-American and so we kept forgetting that a large number of the staff also spoke dutch.  Aruba, although it has its own government,  is still a part of the Dutch kingdom and dutch is still taught at school.  So very often when we were talking amongst ourselves they would immediately say "maar jullie spreken nederlands !' (you speak dutch) and I guess they liked speaking dutch for a change. They even knew some programs from our flemish TV channels.
So I thoroughly enjoyed it.  I read 5 and 1/2 books, and apparently, people do notice what others do on the beach, unlike myself because when I'm reading I am like immersed in another world except for the times I'ld be asleep or swimming or watching one of the pelicans diving for food, a remerkable sight.  The friends we were travelling with, met a couple from Philadelphia (well actually 'near' to as they lived at about a 2 hour drive from Philadelphia) and when they joined us for dinner one evening, they said : 'Oh, you're the ones that are reading the whole time.'.  It is funny how relative distance is : they said they lived near Philadelphia (2hrs away) and they asked us if we lived near to each other.  Our friends said no, but I said : 'We don't call it near but to you it would be, it's 'only' 1 1/2 hrs drive .'
So summer is on hold here.  It rained all night last night and now it's grey and cold for the time of year.  I am writing this now on my lunch break because it's too cold to be out.  I would much rather be outside right now, with my book, I am on my own at work all day, kind of boring but it has its advantages.  But still, a bit of a chat now and again is a welcome intermezzo most of the time.
Meanwhile a lot has happened even in the month since we got back from our holiday.  Our parental home is as good as sold, so we will have to empty it out now in the next 2 or 3 months.  A bit of pressure is always good.  Our sons are both moving house after the summer.  Not into the same house obviously ! The eldest and his wife have bought a house but a lot of construction needs to be done before they can move in.  I have been looking after their 3 children 2 Saturdays in a row, while they were clearing it out.  The previous owner and the tennant had left so much junk in the house and garden that it has taken them 3 weekends already of moving the stuff out to be thrown away and still the house isn't empty yet.  Last weekend I didn't have to babysit the children, so I went over to help them.   I am even more determined now to start clearing our attic of any stuff I don't have a use for anymore.  Not that it looks anything like my son's house but still, I will do it.  Our youngest son and his girlfriend are also going to move to another house after the summer, probably October, meaning that for the next 4 to 5 months I will not have a lot of time to read, but that's not too bad.  It will keep me busy as always.  This saturday it's Ophelia's 3rd birthday and according to the weather forecasts, dare we believe it, the weather will improve from then on.  Keeping my finges crossed as our joint birthday present, a trampoline, does require a day without rain and we would like to have a small family BBQ, can you believe for the 1st time this year. 

Springtime

Springtime, should be sunny and fresh and green and hopeful.  That is how I expect spring to be anyway.  This year really is no spring at all. On monday morning, there was ice on my car again and it's almost May.  As I am writing, I am trying not to pay too much attention to the weather forcast on TV.   We had a couple of nice,  sunny and invigorating spring days so far.  last Thursday was really wonderful, sunny and around 20 ° C, but Friday morning it was foggy, chilly (8 °C) and raining. This weekend was sunny, but still too cold for the time of year. I am really looking forward to our holiday in less than a month.  We are going to Aruba.  That will be the most exotic holiday we ever took, but hopefully the first one of a series I am intending to take.  Meanwhile I am still trying desperately to get rid of some kilos.  I refuse to buy bigger size clothes.  That is an advantage financially.  Every down side, has an up side ! But I am very determined I will succeed, so I am sure somehow I will lose weight.  Well somehow means obviously I have to cut down on sugar and fat and eat more vegetables an fruit.  But hey, it is spring or is it ?  My parental house is still not empty and we haven't been able to sell it yet.  You probably think not much has happened apart from the holiday bur that is not entirely true.  Untill the end of March I had 2 rehearsals every week with our theatre company, and I am still following an italian course. I have been doing that for 5 years now, and this year we went on a weekend trip to Milan together.  We were a bit unfortunate in that the weather was more wintery than spring like - it actually snowed  while we were there!  The 'primavera' as the cycling race Milan San Remo is called, that was cycled on the Sunday we went to visit Bergamo, had to be interupted due to the snow and cold.  But otherwise I thoroughly enjoyed the sights, the atmosphere, the food (yes, it is no wonder that I have trouble losing weight), the people there and the company, and the art.  I am defenitely going back someday.  Yesterday I got some work done in the garden.  I bought lots of plants and filled many a terracotta pot so even though spring  is a bit late, I am hopeful and ready for it.  The previous weekend I managed some spring time cleaning around the house.  That should be the start of another project that has taken form in my mind.  I keep adding projects to my to-do list, I know, but I do have more energy than I have had at the beginning of the year, although with my hobbies, the family and work, I should not complain about a lack of energy.  The project I have added is renovating the rooms that have been standing emty for a while now(we have become 'empty-nesters').  The rooms are really in need of redecorating and when that is done, we can finally offer nice lodgings to friends or family visiting with us. So, that is what I have been up to, next time, I will have been on holiday.  I am still hoping to get some sun before, otherwise I will need some heavy sunscreen, at least, that is the ecpectation.

Looking back and ahead

I wasn't aware 2 months had past since my last scribblings. As you can guess, I have been very busy.  First I spent so much time contacting my former colleagues from North Sea Ferries and put up old pictures on the facebook event page I set up.  This started out others going through their photographs and even looking up stuff on the internet and I really enjoyed seeing new facebook friendships grow and everybody connecting again and I really felt good about this.  Many of you probably saw some of the going ons on fb.  After my last post here I kept going.  At first I was a bit worried that it would not be a succesful reunion because  it took some people a long time to confirm their attendance,  But 2 weeks before the event some 70 had confirmed, some couldn't make it on the day, so we were 63, and 46 of us actual ex NSF.  On the day of the reunion, I was very nervous.  But there was no need for that.  My sons and their friends did a splendid job serving the food and drinks and it was such fun to see everybody in a great mood at renewing friendships and catching up on what everyone had been up tosince 2003 and how their children were doing and if they had grandchildren.  It was great and there was not nearly enough time to talk to all of them.  They all brought so much Potluck, I still have some chips and nuts left, even after I gave away half of it and used some myself on my birthday and at Christmas.  One of my dutch friends, and it was great that so many of them drove all that way to join us, had prepared a wonderful power point presentation with lots of pictures and videos from 'the good old days'.  It is amazing that even after such a long stretch of time, you immediately feel at ease again with old friends.  Afterwards I realised how I had missed this familiarity, and it is maybe a bit sad but on the other hand : it was great back then and I have all these funny and happy and some sad shared memories.  After the reunion I did still spend time posting pictures and mailing pictures to the ones that are not on fb.  A lot of time spent on my computer but rewarding.  After that, I was looking forward to the arrival of our American friends.  They arrived on the 20th December and I collected them from the airport. It was great to see them again.  On my birthday, 21st December, the supposed Maya end of the world, I took them and son Niels and friends that helped out at the North Sea Feast with POtluck out for dinner to thank them for helping me out.  We had a wonderful evening with them.  I had some offtime from work and Christmas dinner to prepare.  I did a lot of cooking, and eating I might add, over the past 2 weeks, but enjoyed having all the family here even though we had to move some furniture around and 3 champagne glasses were sacrificed. On New Year's eve we went to my brother and had a great dinner and evening there.  Wednesday our American friends had to go back home.  And now well : I am teary eyed and snotty nosed, not from crying but from a cold I seem to have caught.  The New year comes with new challenges, losing some kilo's I seem to have gathered over the last month or so (that is not really a new challenge), selling our parental house (that may not prove to be the biggest challenge - emptying it of all it's contents will prove far more difficult I'm sure) and last but not least : planning a holiday that is a bit out of the ordinary, but I guess nobody woul call that a challenge but rather a wonderful propect.