There is this one song by a Dutch band called ‘Het Goede Doel’ dealing with friendship. It is a song that is very cliché and covers the so typical things that happen with friendship. I momentarily do not get my head about the concept friendship. Perhaps too much technology got in the way and makes this concept rather a very hallow feeling.
Last weekend I even walked around like a zombie and blame myself for kind of messing up things when it comes down to hanging around the friendship frontier. It seems I hardly hang around there anymore. I just don’t find the time… not good and now please believe me, I don’t do it on purpose. IT JUST HAPPENED AND STILL HAPPENS AND WILL KEEP ON HAPPENING! You might wonder why I get so worked up about it and why I just don’t let it go…well sorry, this I just can not sugar coat with the lovely Frozen song. Sorry, I need to get it out of my system. So here we go…
Working in the educational hotspot is a very challenging and takes up a lot of energy. I love it and I still give that place more time than what I am expected by my time table. It is very hard to resist when you aim for perfection or always will find something that can be improved. Now, there is nobody who tells me to come earlier on my free morning or stay longer but I have noticed if I do not put enough time into my job that I then feel rather ‘empty’ and feel not as satisfied. There are other factors involved as well but it does basically come down to the fact that Stallie does not mind to spend more time at work than her contract states. But then there are the side effects due to my personal work ethics.
As a result I am rather tired at the end of the work week. Plus that I recently seem to need more time to reload my batteries. I have now more ‘boring’ weekend than very adventurous&exciting ones. Not that I would not love to hang out with my family and friends but I just seem to not handle my time that well to fit in everything that I have to do and wish to do. The to-do-list I most of the time seem to be able to handle. The wish-list on the other hand only seems to grow longer and longer. So many things I really would love to do and just do not seem to get done. Just because I first need to do the groceries, ride my A from A to B and then from B to C, get lunch ready, do some cleaning, check my mails, do the laundry and ironing, do some bank transfers, mow the lawn with a lawn mower that almost is about the break down, face the weekend traffic (yes, I live in area where traffic can ruin my mood even on a weekend!), stop by the post office to pick up those packages that do not fit in our mailbox, come up with some awesome new lesson plans and creating differentiated worksheets, I can go on and on…. This is my life over the weekends and that is what I call a normal one… by the end of such a weekend I am tired…believe it or believe it not…
If I manage to fit in seeing some friends then this is a very nice extra. Stallie takes friendship very serious and I have got my own expectations about it. The last 5 years lots of things have changed and I seem have less an less time for my friends. Many have moved away even further and their life seems so much more exciting from my point of view. They post lovely things on Facebook and seem to fit in those things that I fail at. Plus they seem to succeed at what I do not succeed at. Now do no start me about jealousy and all other negative feelings. It is not about that…it is about something totally different and it is more complex.
Now some of these humans are very structured and very organized people. They seem to be able to be awesome at time management and they can plan months ahead. These are the friends that I have got lots of respect for. Their agenda is well planned and they can tell you ahead of time when they will be available or when it is no go. So they can already tell me in January that seeing them over the summer might not work out due to an already filled up to brim agenda. WOW! Well, what can I say good job! It does not seem to work with me that way and believe me I have tried but it did not work out. At contrary...
A few days ago someone told me that I should then try to make more time for my friends. I could not deny that this person was not right to state this. The issue is that my ordinary life more and more seems to take up more time. The moment that I plan something out of the ordinary I seem jinxed. Or my mailbox is filled up with urgent work mails that need to be taken care before the weekend is, my lawn mower is falling apart while I am not even half way tackling our green pastures, the line at the bakery is getting every morning longer and longer (not to mention how annoyed I get that most of the ‘locals’ still not seem to be able to tackle Dutch words such ‘chocoladebroodje, 'boerenbrood', 'stokbrood', 'rond', 'lang' and 'de cijfers van 1 tot 20'), the lovely people at the local Foodlion whose cart is always in the way of mine and who seem to stalk me from the entrance to the cash till, A his home work that also demands some attention of me and he also has a weekend social/sport/youth club/art school agenda (momentarily I am learning a lot about the river the Demer for Geography and the fascinating history of the Mughals also keeps my brain fit) , the chilly and rather rainy weather that I try to survive with an umbrella that never seems strong enough, people who think that parking on the sidewalk (so tempting to plaster myself to their front window to proof my point but I resist) is the best spot while you walk home with two filled up grocery bags and then still give you the ‘evil eye’ when they get into their car and you happen to walk by, P whose private consultations will always go over time unless he needs to be somewhere else than home, the laundry basket that never seems to be empty and resembles an ‘never ending story’, traffic jams that are so much out of proportions (believe me that even if you would ask me over on a Saturday and Sunday that chances are very likely that I will stand still for about half an hour to and from your house) etc…
Yes, I have canceled lately ‘fun’ things due the above and I do not feel okay about but all these things are momentarily ‘my ordinary life’. And there is this other thing that a bit annoys me. The thing is that when I do manage to see my friends that I wish to spend time with them alone and that seems not that obvious. We all grew older, have now families and some of these modern and 21st century families are not that straight forward either. Some of them have got their own complex planning and priorities and guess what it seems that when I have got time that many of those people do have other things at hand. No grudges towards anyone out there.
There is also the fact that I do not live close by to some of the individuals I consider my friends. I have up till not mastered the art of making new friends in this corner of the country. Some of my friends live now in other parts of the world. There are even those I only see once in every decade. There quite a few I hardly see anymore and I feel so bad and sad about it momentarily. Even Trump gets in the way. Yes, I do not plan to visit my second home for the moment because the idea that a border patrol officer will demand access to my social media and will read my blog and then consider me a national security safety threat freaks me out. Believe me I now not even dare to post certain things on Facebook and Twitter because of this.
Still, it does mean that when I wish to see some of my friends I need to make major travel arrangements and these also cost money. Not that I mind but to be honest some of my friends have moved to very exotic spots in the world that come with a very nice price tag. I am willingly to save money to get there. It is worth every single coin. The memories I create with them over there are priceless. No, Skype and FaceTime just do not make up for this. I want a real conversation. Not just a five minute chat while in the background your toddler is about to turn the kitchen in a war zone and you really only have got five minutes. Sorry to break that news to you.. and do not take it personal. Your child’s safety is more important than having to hear how I am holding up in my life. We will hopefully find then an other more safe moment soon to catch up. Not sure when that will be but I then will not pressure you to tell me exactly when you plan to call me back.
And you know why? Because I can not give you any guarantees that I will find very soon the right moment to call you back either. The moment I put down my phone life goes on… I don’t bear any grudges towards anyone of you when it comes down to last minute cancelled dinners or meeting up (kids get sick and then there is that teacher that suddenly thinks that Monday is the best moment to have a science or math test) or when you have to reshedule due to other more urgent and perhaps even more or less fun things. That is fair and this is fine…that is how life works… or at least that is the impression I have got.
Plus sometimes I do not feel welcome.. I don’t… and do not take this personal...please…it just happens that my radar then picks up vibes that seem to creep into my brain and make it shift into a certain paradox that I can not seem to shake off. I then over analyze every single text message or telephone conversation we ever had or shared and then I take off…crash and burn as a result…. that is how I work and I then wait very patiently for you to extend your invitation to visit or to make me feel welcome… for some of you it then seems the end of the friendship… what is fair enough..but be aware that it hurts and will cause me pain and even sleepless nights for a while… You know me well enough to know what I do function like…don’t pretend you don’t…
Oh yes, I know I do cancel sometimes arrangements but that is mostly linked to that the planning of my beloved men is suddenly and unannounced, colliding with my personal arrangements. In a way I even expect that my planning will not work out and that something will get in the way. When P is late then I suddenly feel a bit more obliged to do mow the lawn (on Sunday you are not allowed to do this anyway) so I better then get the mower out the garage. Next I try to untangle the very long cable that goes along with it. I can tell you that the battle that then goes on in our garage depicts in a way what I feel like… you would crack up but I am about to crack into million pieces. To settle the score and calm down after this whole garden adventure I need chocolate and a good cup of George Clooney coffee or a gigantic glass of Italian lemonade.
Still, I feel lonely lately… it happens a lot around this time of the year… May Day is always this time that the past seems to catch up with me… then I dive into a dark pool where there is not much to see besides all the things that I wished for but never will be… sorry, I still miss him and that will never change…just saying…it will never pass but it is not easy and I will never be able to totally let go. I have tried but it seems that there is this scar that will never totally fade.
The last few months have not been easy in many ways and it seems that many are rather a bit disappointed in me. I have said sorry and I mean this from my bottom of my heart it but I just can not offer you the guarantee that things will change in the near future… some of you have also kind of made choices and decisions that now kind of influence your planning. Sorry if this not seems enough and that you had different expectations about our friendship but then in my life I try to live with the word unconditional when it comes down to friendship…
PS: Once again sorry for this rant and I promise that it won’t happen that much out here but the thing is that I wish to make a point about how I work when it comes down to friendship…because with some of you I do not manage to meet up in person anymore or even have a long and private heart to heart over the phone.. The thing is that this week even Sean Spicer did hide out in the bushes when he was afraid to face his ‘friends’ of the press to break certain news. And today in the national newspapers there is this article that many teachers constantly flirt with burn out and have a very hard time to balance family and work life… what can I say??? The Aperol Spritz is chilling and the weekend is here… Big hug.. you lovely readers…you lovely friends.. I miss many of you.. believe me that many have given me so much I cherish...hold very dear...very grateful... but it does not exclude now and then feeling lonely and dissapointed....so must you feel like now and then as well...
