location: berlin
now playing: radiohead – kid a
okay.
i don’t even know where to start.
i should probably start with yesterday, my last full day in amsterdam.
i stayed up the entire night the night before because i’d taken a marathon nap in the afternoon and was wide awake. Ventured out for the first time at night. Everything was closed in my neighborhood except for the coffeehouses and it was drizzling, so after 30 minutes of exploring the area, I sit in a coffeehouse and order an amazing mocha drink, reading Man and His Symbols.
I spent the rest of the night in my hotel pod, listening to music and thinking.
Until you find the meaning you seek, you shake every hand.
I was starting to find myself a bit indolent and wondering if this trip was more a rebellious quirk than an existential quest. i was feeling a bit frustrated. figured i would get up whenever, but to my surprise, still dutifully got up at 8am.
i was determined to see sights today. saw the anne frank haus which was interesting, but it didn’t have further emotional impact on me than the book. the house has been cleansed of the energy. there were signs printed with diary excerpts everywhere, but nothing captured the soul of her story. i was hoping to catch a glimpse of a soul, something that vibrated with powerful emotions and inspiration. she was a fellow gemini who by being who she was, gave the world something very important.
went to the rijks museum whose most famous piece is rembrandt’s night watch. i couldn’t focus because this wasn’t what i was looking for.
wandered back home. stopped into a coffee shop that’s supposed to be famous. i told the guy i wanted to try some hash but i was leaving tomorrow and couldn’t take anything with me. he offered to sell me half a gram to try and showed me how to use it. I put it away and took it home but didn’t touch it. was told later that that’s very unusual that they break up a gram. i said, i was nice when i asked. i also seem to be exerting my will pretty gracefully.
on the way back, passed that shop that i’d gone into twice my first day here. the guy was outside pulling a display in. i told him i decided to buy something he’d recommended. (i didn’t really need it…it was an impulse event). he told me he was closing but he’d let me come in. inside there was a girl on the floor surrounded by friends, and a moment later, the paramedics came. what happened, i asked him. she smoked for the first time and freaked out, he said. i let her come in here to try to calm down because she was laying on the street, but she thinks she’s dying. it was dramatic and he was pulled away when the police came so someone else rang me up. he came back and asked me if today was my last day in amsterdam. tomorrow, i said. i asked him if he knew any fun, safe clubs or bars in walking distance. he recommended some but they were kind of far. i’m afraid to walk too far at night, i confessed with a laugh. aren’t you here with your friends? he asked. i was in germany and this is just a side trip, i said, not really answering the question. the paramedics wanted to talk to him so he walked away. the girl finished ringing me up and told me a club suggestion. she said bye and i thanked her and walked towards the door.
wait, he said and hurried over. if you want, i can take you somewhere tonight, and be like..your guide. i get off at 3:30.
what time do people usually go out, i asked, suddenly shy.
around 10 or so, he said.
i was thinking about going to see boom!chicago first, but we can meet up in that area after.
i’ve always wanted to see that show, he said.
so…you’re saying you want to go too…
yeah, he said.
i freak out inside. I have problems.
i can give you my number, he said. i don’t know how to use the phone here, i confessed. he laughed. we arranged for me to meet him at the store at 3:30 to have coffee then go to the show. my name is david, by the way, he said, extending his hand. i heard his name and was surprised. something crinkled in the back of my mind, the spark of something i should know. but it was gone as quickly as it came.
i do some writing in the meantime.
i met up with him and we go to a coffeehouse and talk over a couple of beers. he had a soothing english accent and had grown up in england. he said today was probably one of the weirdest and worst days of work since he started there. He told me the saga of the girl–basically a coffeehouse had kicked her out for freaking out from smoking, so she was in the street. he let them bring her in so she wasn’t in the street, but she thought she was dying, and the boyfriend was freaking out too and kept digging in her mouth because he was afraid she would swallow her tongue. she ended up throwing up everywhere. then when the police and paramedics came, they laughed and said, she’s just stoned; there’s nothing we can do. they were going to take her to the hospital and sit her in a chair to sober up, but she would be charged 700 euros. the girl obviously didn’t have money like that so he talked them out of taking her, then asked the place next door if she could lay down in the owner’s living quarter to sober up while he could get the shop cleaned up and reopened. it sounds like you had quite a bit on your shoulders today, i said.
i asked him if this kind of thing was common because i kind of assumed it would be (i imagine that amsterdam is europe’s vegas complete with sloppy escapism) but he said it’s never happened. then he said he hoped the night would be a good night to balance out his day. when he mentioned that he felt like he was at a point in his life where he felt stuck in a rut but felt he needed to make big life changes, i knew it would be a good night. i’ve noticed that people at this exact place in their lives tend to be the ones i interact with.
he told me that he didn’t believe in magic, that he was afraid to because when he was a kid, he had these dreams of minor events that would come true the next day, and they had frightened him. i told him that magic, as in things that seem coincidental or like there’s an explanation beyond linear time/space, is real and if he is willing to see it, the universe will show him that it’s woven into our lives. the universe wants you to believe it’s out there, i told him.
the conversation was really good. after a few hours, he was leaning in very close and looking at me quietly and smiling, creating lulls in the conversation which made me increasingly shy. we headed over to boom!chicago for dinner and a sketch/improv show. when we left the theater, there were all these soccer fans congregated in the square outside with police in riot gear. the aig fans fight, he said. it can get dangerous. so we ducked into a pub and had coffee while we waited out the rain and the potential riots. the bar closed at 1am but there was a club around the corner so we went there to check it out. then we left and talked until it was well into the morning.
i think it’s true. a different person in me comes out around 2-3 am in the morning. i always felt like, 2am is for work to be done on me, 3am is work to be done for the universe. but i’m always dropping knowledge around that time or making discoveries around that time of night, but as morning breaks, i turn into an impish jokester again.
we started talking about some deep shit. about life, hopes and dreams and secrets. he told me about his stepfather and i told him about the cycle of pain and how children wear their father’s insecurities and failures, which they may or may not pass on to their children. but how even if you decide not to perpetuate the cycle and not project that energy, you also can’t carry it inside. we ha
ve to refuse to give any power to that voice until it’s only a part of your history, but not a part of you.
he told me that in 7 years of working at that shop, he’s never run after someone and asked to meet up later. he said that he’s never met anyone like me, and he knew for a fact how he felt about me. i didn’t question what those feelings were and he let the subject drop.
we talked until i had to check out of my hotel, then went and got coffee. i appreciated that he had a very witty sense of humor and from some angles, gave off a big brother energy of someone strong and dependable, and from some other angles, when he smiled, he seemed like a sweet kid. he was trying to think of a plan to get me to stay, even though my hotel was booked in berlin. i took one of his cigarettes from the new pack he’d bought last night but hadn’t smoked from, flipped it upside down and put it back in.
lucky cigarette, he said. i haven’t done that in years.
you’re going to smoke all of these cigarettes until you get to this one. then after you smoke this one, you’ll have forgotten about me, wondering if our meeting was just a dream, i said.
i don’t believe that, he said.
it happens, i said. then you’re going to quit smoking.
after a couple of coffees, we realized we’d been up all night and were screwed in terms of staying hallucination-free. i had 3 hours before my train and it was raining, so we went to his place to wait it out and nap. i woke up to find my head on his chest, lulled by the steady beat of his heart, and his arms around me to keep me warm. i was caught between a waking and dreaming world where everything seems familiar even though i had no idea where i was. i let my eyes follow the lines of his angular shoulder under the blue threads of his sweater, my eyes having been drawn to his shoulders all night, and then suddenly… deja vu. i shot up and stared at him. have you ever seen me in your dreams?, i ask, very seriously. i’m gonna dream about you every night, he said. no seriously. did i seem familiar to you? i don’t remember my dreams, he said. i put my head down again, thinking away the thought.
it was a bitter, freezing rain coming down making the walk to the train station miserable. he was very quiet, as he had begged me all morning to find some way to stay at least another day. suddenly, he stopped and squared me by the shoulders. his eyes were intense. i need you to know this. i want you to stay. you can say it’s about your journey, but it’s also about whether you want to stay another day and spend more time with me. but the reason i’m not being more forceful about keeping you here is because it’s your choice and you needing to do what you feel is right. last night was one of the best nights of my life and no one can ever take that away from me. but if you leave today, know that my doors will always be open to you, whether you want to come back today, next week, next month or next year. i know how i feel about you and i am sure of my feelings. i’ve never felt this way before or said this to anyone. i need you to understand this. this is important, julia. do you understand?
i nodded, the moment stripped so emotionally bare there was nothing you could do but take it very, very seriously.
but i also remember the one word that resoundedly landed in my head.
Crap.
he walked me to the station and made sure i got on the train, then said goodbye. it was the longest hug i’ve ever had with a one-night spiritual stand, a hug with teeth that gnawed on the hidden zipper within my chest. yes, i was scared to be here, scared to leave. the knowledge that this could be the close of our window, a surreal blip in reality where we had plunged into darkness together and found a familiar light within each other, hung over us. when i got settled in on the train, i was surprised and frustrated to have tears stinging my eyes. i knew he was sitting on the bench outside the train, because when i’d passed by the window, he’d been sitting there, long legs sprawled out, looking so sad. the train sat unmoving on the tracks for a good 5 minutes. i could have easily gotten off and changed the course of events.
but the point of the story is, i didn’t.
even though i knew the moment i sleep and wake again, it will be a reset of my reality where the surface gleams and everything underneath could very easily be the colors and shapes of a dream.
3 meetings, two of them unintentional because i’d gotten lost. one night. two sane, intelligent people communicating their deepest thoughts. and yes, i showed him the real me. how is it, that these people can fall so hard and be sure they want to be with me with such intensity and sincerity, and yet i still feel so hollow? because i promised myself i would never let anyone ever catch me again?
what is the meaning of these things? what is the meaning?
i feel like a ghost, radiating the light of a broad, spiritual source, but in essence, just a tiny, forlorn paper lantern who doesn’t know what she is outside of her function, blowing uselessly in the wind when the day breaks.
the message is real. everything i’ve said and communicated has always been out of a deep love and it’s always been real.
even if there’s a chance i may not be.