Love — Waalwijk, the Netherlands | January 2001
“Funny How I Blind Myself ”
“Don’t look at me like that,” she says.
“Like what?” I ask, abashed and defensive.
“You know, like that, you always look at me like that. Stop it!” I know what’s she’s thinking but it isn’t true. Like everyone else, she thinks I’m in love with her and thus sees that reflected in my eyes — my ‘sweet’ eyes have been causing me trouble since I was about 13.
It makes sense, of course, she’s a woman and I’m a man and we’re both heterosexual, so why wouldn’t I be? But the truth is that I’m not, at least not in the traditional sense of the idea ‘in love’. She’s my friend, my best friend. If anything, it’s a platonic love.
I remember meeting her like it was yesterday. It was on an ordinary weekday at the Saksen-Weimarkazerne in Arnhem, headquarters of the 11th Horse Artillery Battalion, and I was having a drink at the battalion’s watering hole above the barrack’s entrance gate when the stair door swung open and in came a soldier with in her wake a young blond female civilian.
Being one of the more flamboyant characters of the battalion, the soldier loudly introduced to all present in the room — troops, NCOs and officers — her sister, who was on some kind of study assignment in Arnhem. As this boisterous soldier was actually one of the regulars up there and as such part of my in-crowd, it didn’t take long before they took a seat near me at the bar. At first, I made some polite conversation with the out-of-place civilian, but then… we really started talking.
It’s not often that you wholly connect to someone on the deeper levels of your soul, but that is exactly what happened that night, I had found a soulmate. Over the next couple of weeks, she became a regular visitor to the barracks and we talked more (and more). Before long, we found ourselves meeting up outside of the barracks as well. It wasn’t at all ‘love’ related though.
Even if that had been on my mind, she already has a boyfriend and I’d never mess with that. I just find her fascinating and feel very very comfortable in her presence. As a chemistry student, sailor and scuba-diver, she’s got interesting things to tell me that distract me from the tedious daily grind of army life.
At first, the army had been very exciting, but over the years it all has become a bit of a drag. Because of this, as the army is my whole life, my life has gone kind of down the drain as well, so having this new civilian friend really is just wonderful.
We talk a great deal, but besides that, we also do a lot of stuff together. Since I now have a driver’s licence [Read: Everything for Free] and a car, it’s easy for us to get around. We often go to nice restaurants, have visited theatre festivals and stopped by at the Arnhem Zoo, a place a hadn’t been since childhood — how disappointedly small all the animals were. I’ve even been on an exciting sailing weekend with her father and sister. Today, we’ve just come back from the ‘romantic’ Winter Wonderland Experience at the Efteling theme park.
After a long night of conversation or when we’ve come back late from an outing, I often sleep at her apartment (on a camping mattress on the floor). It’s a mystery to me why her boyfriend isn’t insanely jealous. Maybe he is and does she keep that to herself or maybe he just isn’t. There’s no reason for him to be jealous anyway, we really are just friends and I really love having her as my best friend.
It’s not going to last though. We’ve become way too close to not be seen as boyfriend-girlfriend. It’s not at all what I want and from her snappish remark about the way I look at her I figure she’s also become uncomfortable with the situation. O well, in a couple of weeks I’ll be going on a trip around the world, maybe that will cool things down a bit!?
P.S. Shortly after this little incident, we went to the carnival in Maastricht together. Carnival is only celebrated in the south of the Netherlands and, as I’m from the non-carnivalesque West, I’m a complete fish out of the water there. But with her it was just great fun, exactly the reason why she’s been such an enrichment to my life.
However, it was the last thing we did together. A couple of weeks later, I left for my round-the-world trip and when I came back nine months later, it was over.
While I was away she’d broken up with her boyfriend and found a new one. I noticed how she’d become really uncomfortable with my presence. In her budding new relationship there was simply no room for me anymore. Even though I now lived and worked in the same city, I rarely got to see her and slowly she just faded from my life.
For quite some time, I felt what can best be described as confusingly heartbroken but I understood. People come into your life, play their part and then leave when they’re done [Read: Far l’Amore (Smyge mig som støv)]. As the great bard once said:
“All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,”
The world’s still turning and life has moved on since then. We now live several thousand kilometres apart and both of us are married and have a family. I will, however, never forget the beautiful couple of years we shared as close friends in those carefree days of my late twenties. Thank you!
Anouk – Love on Lost Tracks [CD]. Hilversum, the Netherlands: Dino Music. (2001)
This autobiographical sketch comes from my bundle In the Moment: A Disjointed Audiobiography which is available at Amazon.com. (USD 9.50 for a paperback or USD 4.50 for the Kindle version)
