This ain't no disco

One week in, and it feels like ages. I've been back in the Dutchlands for just over a week, and I've already accomplished so much and made my mum very happy. And that makes me happy.

Mum only moved into this place a few months ago, and when I arrived, it need me. And by that I mean that I am the uber-organiser and this house needed 'a few' things sorted. Every room in the house needs something sorted out, fixed or organised, including the garden. There were still boxes everywhere, Mum had lost things during the move that she couldn't locate. For example, I found her iron in the bottom of a box that was full of toiletries and was labelled 'bathroom'.

Me, I like order. My friends will attest that I am a bit obsessive about order, as in slightly OCD. As in, I make my own handbags (with 26 pockets) out of the frustration that normal handbags don't have enough pockets. Yeah.

So far I've put handles and catches on Mum's wall unit (it has 13 double doors, just to give you an idea), I've organised her tool shelves, which is crucial to me being able to build/fix and organise things in any place, I've sorted out her plasticware box (lids! Why so many lids with no containers?), I've unpacked the boxes in the bathroom and sorted them all out, emptied the perished food from the fridge, I've gone through the all stacks and stacks of  boxes in the attic (which is also my bedroom) and labelled them and moved them around to the other side of the room and reorganised the furniture in there, and I spent a whole afternoon with a hoe in the garden. Yes, a hoe. And the hoe gave me a huge blister. (The Dutch word for hoe is schoffel, in case you were curious. Can you pronounce that?)

And of course I cleaned the floors and the kitchen a few times already, as this house needs to be swept several times a day thanks to the black dust cloud that roams around here (a.ka. dog). Oh, and I cooked my mum my famous Chili Con Carne, and put the leftovers in containers (lids! Where is the lid for this specific container? No, it looks the right size but it doesn't fit!) with labels on them in the freezer. That that is entirely unheard of in this household.

And there are about a million things that still need to be done. Probably more than I've already done so far. But that's ok. I like getting things done.

Every time I tell people back in Australia that I'm going to Europe and for how long, they get jealous and excited and wish me a wonderful trip, envisaging the kind of trip that most Aussies who go to Europe experience: galavanting from country to country eating food and seeing sights. But that's not my trip.
In parts yes, it is very enviably that I can visit Europe every year. But I feel that they often don't realise that I do more cleaning and organising here every single day than I do at home, and that I go first and foremost to see people that I love. I know I don't have to do any cleaning or tidying. But my Mum has looked after me all her life, and I want to do the same for her. Also, as I said before, I can't relax when there is mess and disorder around me.

I am also writing my news articles every day, to make euros for us to spend on fun but mostly necessary things. I have to work 7 days a week, 365 days a year. It's not a huge amount of work, and it's great that I can do it anywhere in the world (well, except Dubai, because you are not allowed to visit online casinos there, or even access a wordpress page that has 'casino' in its title) but it's still a daily responsibility that I need to attend to.

I do have a fun trip planned, I am taking mum on a trip to France, to England and back to France, all to see some great people whom we care about so much. I love my family in the UK, so I always make an effort to go and see them when I'm in Europe. And there are some very precious friends that I will get to see as well, so I'm very excited about that. But it's only a very short time in comparison to the time I spend sorting and organising and cleaning, but that's ok.

I'm not complaining at all. I hope I don't come across that way. I choose to do this and it makes me happy. I think I'm expressing this because I don't want people to think I'm a spoiled brat who gets to go and play in Europe for months every year. And because it helps to write down what you feel to sort out your thoughts.

And in my down time here I do get to read heaps, I am halfway through the Divergent Trilogy (thanks for the tip, Sherrie) and I intend to read lots more while I'm here. And the weather is much nicer here than it is in Australia.

Also, I get to drink lots of tea with my mum and hug her heaps. And that's the best.

Words for myself

Hi Team. I know, it's been years. Sorry. Well, it's not like I had a huge following of people, or tried to get people to read my blog or cared whether people read my blog. It's just some words I'm writing, just 'cause. And I haven't had time or inspiration to do so for a while.

But I had promised myself to write for me again, and now that I have time, I am doing it. I have spent a good while writing for others now, and it's my turn again.

I am in the good old Dutchlands, where I grew up. Where I once belonged and now I don't but I still feel like I am attached here and it ties in quite well with the situation going on with my ears.

One of my ears is blocked, and the other has a burst ear drum, courtesy of one of the most unpleasant flights of my life, and being a Dutchstralian, I have taken a few flights in my life. My stern warning to you is: DO NOT FLY WITH EVEN A HINT OF A SINUS INFECTION. But then again, I was so keen to get over here, I might have quite possibly told myself this a few days ago, but I didn't listen. And now I'm struggling to listen because I just can't hear very well and it's hard to follow conversations. Especially when most of the conversations here (other than the ones with my mother) are in a Dutch dialect called Brabants, and well, it's hard for me to follow it even with fully functioning ears, not that they ever worked that well.

Has my life changed in the last few years? Hell yes. I am possibly the happiest I have ever been. My life might be the boringest it has every been, (or maybe not), but it's because I am content. I am a happy little Dutchstralian and I am so grateful that I am.

It's quite strange being so aware of the slow disconnect I am experiencing from my childhood, my teenage years, all that is normal to Dutchies, my youth was here and now I am not young anymore, or specifically Dutch. I am Dutcher than an Aussie, but I am too Aussie to consider myself Dutch entirely.
It's not like I don't belong in either category, but if I had to give myself a description, I would say that I am an Aussie with Dutch tendencies.

Dutch people and Australian people are very different as a society, but they blend well. They both appreciate a good beer (not that I do) and they both like a good football match (not that I do), and at the moment the Dutch are united in hoping to win the soccer world cup, and the Australian are united in feeling irate about a certain Tony Dumb Dumb. I dislike both of those.

Me, I feel kind of tired and jet-lagged and far away from people and puppies than I want to look after because I love them and I feel I could make them feel better. My little dachshund pup Louis has just had surgery today, quite unexpectedly, and I can't stop thinking about how small he is and how much I can love something so small, and how much I can worry about a little dog that tends to be just fine.

It's in my nature to care and look after people, I do it every day. But over here, I can kind of look after myself a bit more than I do at home, and it's quite nice. And to be fair to myself, I need to because my ears are totally busted and need to heal, and my body and mind are exhausted of a few stressful weeks finishing assignments for my postgraduate uni course amongst other things. Life back home is lovely but hectic.

Here, it's slow and though I have spent a serious amount of time being the handy woman that I am yesterday, and I only arrived the day before yesterday, today I did a bit less and it felt nice. Nice but weird. I am not used to having not a million things to do. I love my little doggle, but it's nice not to have to walk him every day. And I love my comfy house and my wonderful husband, but it's nice to not have to look after either one of them.

Mum's house is a mess no matter what I do, mostly thanks to her big black monster of a giant dust cloud dog, but I'm not responsible for the house or the dog or anything at all really. It's really nice.

So now I'm going to do another thing I had promised myself to spend time doing: reading for fun and leisure. Divergent, if you must know.