back

Lets get back 3 weeks. My vacation started. Lets get back to what I wrote down then in my diary.

June 12 - Holiday. To forget everything. To take distance from my job, distance from E., from what happened Friday at work (I wrote about it). This week I need to think forward how I'll do my holiday. How far is the Brocken?

June 16 - Firstly I didn't do anything this week. I only read, didn't cycle. To be short I'm in a crisis. I'm ready to leave to the Brocken, but I'm scared. It was to much for me. I couldn't cope with it (It sounds familiar). Anything could go wrong. I wasn't as well prepared as in other years. It's only 500 kilometer in Germany but the way to it looks more and more like an ocean to cross and the mountain seems more and more like an Everest to climb.

Gamble

After Chronic City I'm reading Fyodor Dostoyevsky's The
gambler. A book written about 143 years ago. I enjoy it right from page 1.

I don't know what this book will tell me. I'm sure however it has some learning points.
For example playing your own game in life or the game on account of others. Guess that gambling in the 1840's might be the same as being on the stock market in these days.
If you know how the game is played you might be better off playing it on own account. That's a guess I make. There might be something changing plans. And of course a plan is a plan.

My plan was to be off work this week but I went to work yesterday. Only a short holiday of 2 weeks. My plan was to go and return to the Harz in Germany on my bicycle (goal: climb the 1100 meter high mountain Brocken).

Relaxed

Today I was in the grocery store. It was a kind of busy, an hour before closing time.
But I felt so relaxed.
When I've collected all I needed and waited at the pay desk I had a bird view of everything happening around me. So there were 2 pay desks opened with a queue. I joined the queue and another desk opened. I waited and didn't bother what the rest of the queue was doing. On my desk an old lady paid her bill and a family had their weekend groceries. A woman in front of me had a lot of stuff in her basket. She chose the new opened desk and other people did too. I didn't because I watched the people in front of me. Knowing that the row isn't really faster because of a heavy load of groceries. It felt good watching the load getting smaller.

Maybe because of the cycling tour I had the feeling.
At 10:30 AM I departed for a 101 kilometer tour. I came back almost 5 hours later. At 16:00 PM I entered the store. In a relaxed state of mind.

Does this mean that I should cycle 100 k to have this experience? I'll talk about that some place else.

life

I've seen no mountains. I've seen no abroad. I've seen beautiful places and cycled great roads. I've been in places like Paris in Texas. I've seen our old house for sale where my family and I lived in for 5 years.

The miss sunshine and the dry wind made it a monster tour. 386 kilometers in 2 days that's all. There were to many cobble stones and I counted them all. I tell ya that make minds aching. That's not what a vacation is supposed to be of course.
I break off this holiday if I can in order to use the days left for benefit of my well being ;)
August 5 I have a first consultation so u know where my time is spent. Before I'll make some kilometers on my bicycle.

For me this house was safety for a time. Nevertheless the gods were not always good gods.

life is a house, from time to time you got to open its doors and windows

Chronic city

This I can't cope with, all those lights on the cover. It attracts like a 50,000 $ chaldron.


Lately I said to be reading a book which finally catched me.
Well Chronic city of Jonathan Lethem really does. I had an emotional moment reading the letter of Chase's fiance. And I'm only half way.
Astronauts, cosmosnauts and a Chinese minefield, it's beyond believe.

To me the book opens what is closed. I see connections with my own life.
I see Perkus Tooth and Chase Insteadman as parts of myself and of course the flat characters in the book of the environment I am in. Oona makes some sharp remarks.

Reading the blog of Sarah and her friends I have a view on the city as a chronic one.
I know that most movies in the book are not existing but mixed with the names of Marlon Brando and Leonard Cohen it gives the book creditability. All the non-existing is a vehicle and a message to the world to think and act.

The world needs great thinkers, philosophers, not mediagenic analysts explaining problems to a large public. People without the knowledge to whom we surrender nowadays. We have the Bread and circuses like the Olympic Games, the Tour de France, World Football Championship (we lost the final against Spain) and so on nowadays to fool ourselves everything is going smoothly. In fact, we have a problem Houston.

In Chronic city it is said that a lion is escaped. It destroyed a synagogue and stores in the lower east side of Manhattan. (Amsterdam-New York, Manhattan 400 years)
The lion is hidden under the ground and comes out at night. (mean streets, Alicia?)
The book accuses Civil Service, the Goverment. It accuses the rich and famous and the beauty and the beast so to say.

I read that Naijma stated that she is trying to get a visa for Germany to study (message of July 10 2010). She paved the path for her sister Hadia. Isn't it great?

Deep thought

Years ago when I studied I said in a discussion among fellow students that there is no god. We are the gods.
To be short, finding the love of somebody is finding the real god.

Maybe one has learn to know the gods they're with. It takes time. It's an exchange of thoughts and values.
The value is like a generalised principle of behaviour to which the members of a group feel a strong commitment and which provides a standard for judging specific acts and goals.

For some people finding god is a life time work. Other people easily jump from one to the other. Their god is exchangeable. They just divorce.
But if you know someone more and more, everyone can be god
However it's hard to find the real one.
I already had my own god, my protector and guardian angel. I thought I knew.
As my god died a long time ago I lost confidence.

Most of the time god is a man of peace but sometimes Satan comes as a man of peace too. (Free after Bob Dylan). They don't exclude each other. It's a paradox.
That's why good and bad are so close.
Meaning that Satan can be god it's understandable that people divorce.

People fall in love with the wrong god maybe because they live on the edge. The thin line between good and bad might get even thinnner.
For two gods on top of the pyramid might be not enough space. Lack of possibilities for self actualization might cause interferences between them. This interference gives problems in their love. One will end as the bad god.

The top of Maslow hierarchy of needs, self actualization, is not easy to reach that. It's finding a balance between your inner self and the environment.

It's a funny act when god asks how to love him if you don't know him.
True, I don't know god.
Also true, I like to know this god.
Yes, I can say I believe.
And yes, god knows me a little bit because I'm sure he reads my blog.

vacation and the man who knew too much

At 13.45 I quit work. Doomed and depressed because of 1 ride to work. I encountered some problems and finally I was almost at work (I hate that building at the moment) when I annoyed someone. I parked my bike near the side entrance when that person saw me apparently.

I walked inside together with a colleague also going in. The person missed the open door. I didn't open it for him. But he showed his pass and opened the door. Then he started being very hostile. He asked if I was a temporary worker and who my boss was. The man and the woman with whom I went in seemed to know each other. In the elevator I told that the 3rd was my department and the team leader wasn't available. So we went to my office and than he started telling with an agitated voice his story to all the colleagues who were in at 8.30 am. I felt no bottom beneath my feet. But that man went to far when he told what he saw from a far distance earlier. He drew his conclusions. And I did too which I told him. What the heck. Some colleagues were disturbed by the action of that man. If this man wants to go to the director than it's fine with me. He simply forgets a few levels and the director will not understand what his problem has to do with her.

What a weak man who wants to go high up in the organization to solve something which happened on the streets.

But my concentration had gone. I asked a colleague if he knew what department the person works. Yes he did. It's not a very social department. The-department-of-no- more-benefits I guess.
When I wanted to leave I talked with another colleague. She told me not to let it ruin my vacation. It's a minor incident, just to be forgotten.

This week the name of one Screbrenica veteran I know was on the news. He was with Dutchbat in Srebrenica in 1995. 8,000 men were murdered there. It is said that he will be personally prosecuted because he knew things. I was puzzled and sent a short text message to his cell phone. He didn't know anything more than I did. Back in Holland he will be informed.

At the hair cutter's the barber told that with this weather (every day hot temps) people are easily agitated. I agreed haven't told the story.
I must say that I've never been at the hair cutter with temp above 34 degrees, but I never felt so comfortable. No agitation at all, just relaxation and a smile on my face. People should know.

Spain

The opponent in the final on Sunday July 11 will be Spain.
I like that because it plays the game delightfully almost gloriously.
Holland has to play 2 times better than they did to win that final. Luckily it's only one match and the players can play an extraordinary balanced game with their energized bracelets.

This afternoon I screwed the derailleur of my racing bike. I was lucky enough not to fall. A photo

I went home and took another bike to make a trip to Soest and Lage Vuursche. In the woods I had some real brainwaves when I sang the versions of songs I know.
At 10 pm I was home. I'm ready for a vacation till the end of the month.

I feel good, I hope you feel tohoo.

Thinking of Spain, I think of Puigcerdà. It was the first town in Spain I visited. Spain was the first country I entered walking.
And Puigerdà makes me think of Llivia, a Spanish enclave in France. And that brings me to a small museum in Llivia with all kinds of butterflies. I think Boudewijn Büch has never been there only because it's not on an island in the sea.

Anyway he would have loved it. Not only the museum but also being far away from the real world. The monastery on top of the hill looking over Llivia lying downhill up in the Pyrenees will make your mind free, gives you new incentives in finding yourself.

The butterfly effect makes me happy. I didn't bother having no dinner tonight. Only two 2 days old sandwiches. The sour stomach are the butterflies..

Maslow pyramid and all about the lady

Watching the semi final yesterday I switched to another program in the break.

Some people talked about the Maslow hierarchy of needs (Maslow pyramid). It seemed to be a program for people in their thirties, the begin of the X-generation.

They have everything but don't feel themselves happy. Something is missing. They are in the top of the pyramid.
It can be dangerous there. Know that it's lonely at the top. And if your young it can be very lonely. Not because you don't have friends, that need is satisfied in one of the lower parts of the pyramid.
People are in search of themselves, the authenticity of their life. Is it worth to live it like they do.

A colleague of me said she has problems with self-actualization, that it's difficult to live on that edge.
Living on the top is like living on the edge of something you can fall off I understand.

She thinks of quiting her job and start all over again. Starting from ground zero, to reinvent herself.
My opinion, to be specific, take a year to travel around the world, buy a world ticket and see all you wanna see. Problem is that according to the Maslow theory you face the same problem after that year unless you use the new experiences.

I think that's not the only way. If you visualize a pyramid and on top of it you mirror the pyramid then you get at the top a wider range of opportunities.
What those opportunities are depends on yourself because you decide what direction you go. Take it or leave it.

It's like the Council I'm in at the moment. It widens my view, I learn something and enjoy the view on the rooftop. ;) Sometimes I can't stand heights.

It's like the universe. Go through a black hole and a different reality appears on the other side. With complete new possibilities.

Worldchampionship

We kicked Brazil (2-1) and Uruguay (2-3). Stay focused... one step each.. after the semifinal....yes... the final of all Finals...after 1974 and 1978 Germany as our Nerven Gegner, better than Spain... Have sweet dreams Germany! Nederland has title aspirations.

Jetzt geht's los

If you don't know this is all about football

cycling

After 8 days I cycled again. My bruised rib heeled like my doctor said. Suddenly this morning I felt better than earlier this morning. So I took my bicycle to ride a 53 k.
However, it doesn't feel like 10 days ago. That's a pity.

Fortunately the book I read catched me finally and I take some time to read Chronic city written by Jonathan Lethem.

summer

July 1 2010, 3 Weeks after the elections. Politically nothing has changed. A VVD-deputy informed the parties and came to the conclusion that the party that lost significantly blocked a right wing coalition which would be a monstrous coalition.
I saw when I woke up on June 10, the day after the elections,that hopefully a cabinet of 4 parties without CDA would emerge. Purple plus as we call it.
Problem is that VVD doesn't like the idea to rule the country with the left wing. It's to left for their voters.
I think that left has to make concessions to get our proud Nation through the crisis. VVD can make demands in some way or another.

Last Thursday I got the results of a neuro-psygologic test I had at the end of May. The crow-incident was mentioned between the lines. The result is understandable. But the motivation of the result is unclear for me.
It will be send to my family doctor because he didn´t know anything about it when I asked about it when I saw him because of my bruised rib

4 Days ago I spoke E. and told her about the conclusions of the test. Well, she said, you ruin your own chances and only you are responsible for that. Only you.
It´s the logic of the social academic professionals, the soft economy of social workers, psychologist, etcetera.
It´s the same what Fennie says. It´s true that one has to work on himself after being confronted with himself.
Of course I should have done it 20 years ago. I did and in some way it helped. Now I have to take the next step.

Okay, it was a really confidential conversation. I bent over to her and she laughed seeing my shoes. (Zebra shoes she said once) I took her into confidence and she let it happen me telling some fresh conclusions of the test.
Among other things I told her that under stress I can lose control ending in the experience of derealization and concentration problems.
I told E. I was being under pressure by her -if you tell part of it you better tell it all-. That's why I said what I said.....

But isn't it so that I provoked her question (who?) why we should go to vote together by answering that I am in love. On who, she asked. On you, I hesitated. I don´t, she said.

But 3 days ago we had a good conversation and I could sit on the seat of her colleague right in front of her.