The Email garden

Published
by
ronet
on 9 May 2008
in Hasselblad and photography
. 4 Comments

Last weekend, I took my final trip to the Kroller Muller museum. Dumbfunk and keksofant came along with us. We ate pancakes, rode on the free white bikes you can pick up at the gates to the Hoge Veluwe, whizzing along in the dappled sunshine. And when we found the sculpture garden we got out our cameras and spent a few hours wandering the extensive ground and snapping away.

The Hoge Veluwe is one of the few areas of natural landscape in the Netherlands. The sculpture garden in the heart of the park, set in more of those dappled woodlands we’d been riding through, contains works by some of the finest sculptors in the world. There’s a Hepworth and Moore, even a Rodin.

Somehow among all that beauty, it was hard to get the right shot, but we enjoyed ourselves, strolling and chatting, laughing and snapping. The grounds are so big there are signposts to lead you to the pieces hidden deeper in the woods.

One sign caught our eye: “jardin d’émail”.

The email garden.

I should have remembered one of the most extraordinary pieces in the place, the hidden gem that you always seem to stumble upon at the end of the visit. But instead as we joked about what it could be I imagined a quiet lawned garden, equipped with benches and tables, with solar power points and wifi.

At a time when I am beginning to wonder what life will be like in June. In our move to England, and the temporary accommodation we’ll be in for the first few months, I only have a couple of requirements. A kitchen so we can cook. And an internet connection so I can work. And with this warm spring weather, the idea of an email garden, a tranquil place with wifi is my idea of heaven.
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Then I remembered what the email garden really was. Émail is a French word meaning enamel. I kept quiet, so as not to spoil the surprise for the others, but then I knew it would make the perfect spot for my self portrait of the week.

And even though Dumbfunk didn’t have any sunglasses and we were standing on a huge reflective white surface he valiantly stood guard over Vlad, protecting it against the excited kids who scampered around. Keksofant made the perfect body double as I set up my shot.

There was a moment of calm when I took the portrait - everything seem to go quiet and still. I’m sure it didn’t really, but I experienced it like that, in the split second before the shutter snapped and a child scampered in front of the camera. Life goes on around me, as I prepare to leave. But there is something still and quiet at the centre - a sense that this is absolutely the right moment.

If you look closely you can see a scampering child, closer still and you can see the moment in my smile.

Staying the course

Published
by
ronet
on 6 May 2008
in Running and stuff
. 6 Comments

I ran in a marathon recently.

Ran in, not ran. I didn’t start and I didn’t finish, I just did a few hundred metres towards the end.

So why bother running a couple of hundred metres on a decidedly hot spring day, in a race I had no intention of even entering?

The truth is I was helping out a friend who actually, and heroically in that heat, ran the race from start to finish and even ended up with a medal to prove it.

And the winner is...

I’ve been to a few events before, the most memorable of which was a time trial for the Tour de France in 1999 where I saw UK cyclist Chris Boardman take part in his last Tour. It was a fun day and I did my bit cheering Boardman on, but I didn’t allow myself to believe he might win the day.

And that’s the reason I’m not a fan of spectator sports - they only work when you’re rooting for someone. You have to have a stake in the game. Why else would you care about how it ends? And most of the time I just don’t give a damn who wins.

But when keksofant ran in the Hamburg marathon we went over to cheer her on and I can honestly say it was the most exciting spectator sport ever.

I wasn’t sure what to expect, maybe that we’d see her off at the start and idle a few hours until she passed the finishing line.

But keksofant had a better idea.

She planned a route for us, calculated on travelling times on the underground system and which side of the street we’d emerge from the subway stations. We had timings for her expected best and worst pace and a strict timetable. And I ended up being the one in charge of ensuring we kept on schedule.

Ross had printed up some Team RonTM T-shirts for her supporters to wear, which turned out pretty well, since not only did we have the perfect theme for a group 52 weeks shot (taken in Timmendorfer Strand on the Baltic sea), but it meant that keks could spot us as she zoomed towards us.

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I am proud to say that despite some initial confusion at the start and some unscheduled photo stops at the 10K mark, we made almost all the meet up points (except the one that keks expected us not to). The sun shone, one of the team brought along cup cakes, and we whiled away the waiting time snapping each other and sometimes even took a shot of the runners.

By sultry kilometre 25, keks was struggling and moxiee valiantly stepped up to the plate and walked the next 2k with her. And at the next stop, kilometre 39, it was my turn to do the first 0.2k I have run all year. I hadn’t planned to do it, but it just felt right. Hardly dressed for the part in my jeans, but at least I had trainers and not high heels on, I set off. After a few paces I was a little out of breath, but as we went a little further, I found myself actually enjoying the feeling. I was running. Ok, not far. But I was running.

Keksofant did an amazing job, with temperatures in the mid-twenties and having only just recovered from a particularly evil gastric flu ( I know it was evil because I came down with it the next day) she carried on all the way to the end while others were dropping like flies and completed the course in an incredible 5 hours. She is truly a star.

And though I was nowhere near earning a medal I took away two of the most valuable things: I took away a sense of team spirit, true team spirit that means that you’re not working for yourself but contributing to a bigger goal. And in that 0.2k I remembered how it feels to run.

It’s high time I dusted off my running shoes and got back out there.

spring clean

Published
by
ronet
on 22 April 2008
in stuff
. 5 Comments

Here I am, wobbling on a ladder hanging curtains in my living room which has the highest ceiling. Ever. With every tremulous movement my eye catches something:The fair trade curtains that we had a pay an extra premium for because at 4.5 metres, they’re too long for the seamstress’s table.
The windows that we set to work paining as soon as we moved in because frankly, that eighties grey paintwork was just depressing. The aluminium Venetian blinds are long gone, thank god.

As I move around the place, cleaning, sprucing up, I think about all the stories in this place. The kitchen that took 18 months to complete. The floor we laid ourselves, a rite of passage, emerging from 18 months of chronic fatigue and finding I could finally do something so strenuous. There are so many good memories tied up in this home, it will be a wrench when the time comes to say goodbye.

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But things move on. Our relocation is beginning to evolve. This week we’ve seen four estate agents. Some come round and are as enthusiastic about the place as we are. Others are a bit sniffy. One advised that we need to make an effort to tidy up. Another told us to “keep it really tidy, just like this”. One remarked on the good security. Another asked if we had problems with break ins. Whoever handles the sale, hopefully it won’t take too long. We’ve already had a neighbour enquire on behalf of a friend.

I know I’ll never live anywhere as wonderful and extraordinary again. But I’ll be happy to leave. Already, I’m thinking about writing workshops, courses, conferences I can attend in the UK. I might even risk joining a writer’s group (even though my last experiences would probably have put an inexperienced writer off writing for good). I don’t have a job to go to, not yet, but something great will turn up. I can feel it in the air.

Now the apartment is done it’s time to start spring cleaning the rest of my life.

reasons to be cheerful

Published
by
ronet
on 14 April 2008
in Travel, friends and stuff
. 9 Comments

I’m coming home!

It’s been in the planning for a long time, but now at last I am able to say it.

No matter how often I’ve written and rewritten this post in my head, I couldn’t commit the words to screen even in draft form, because until it became a reality I wouldn’t be able to guess how I might feel. And it’s not how I expected - not at all.

I am coming home, to beer in pubs like the Unicorn, to friends and family, to wide open spaces, to watching my friends kids grow up, (not to mention my nephew who doesn’t like having his photo plastered all over Flickr).

The last 18 months have been a roller coaster of raised hopes, broken promises and finally, an end in sight. I have raised more than one glass on the way hoping that this time it was real.

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And now it is.

I have a date in mind. I will spend my last Queensday in this crazy beautiful city, but by the summer I will be settled in somewhere new. On the Solstice I will watch the sunset from an English hillside. That’s my plan but even if it rains, I’ll be happy to be home again.

But today I am a mess of emotion. I feel like laughing out loud, jumping, screaming, crying. And none of it feels real. Not yet. Something I have spent so long dreaming of, planning, wanting is finally within my reach and I can’t take it in.

I’ve been on the verge of tears all day because Amsterdam is the kind of lover that you know right from the start that things will never work out with, but you still love them with all your heart.

And I know England isn’t the same place I left behind, but nor am I. Maybe we’ve both grown up and it’s time to set aside our differences and get on with being reunited.