Tag Archives: Past

Primary Reunion

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The other day I checked in on my FB profile -the one that I don’t visit that often- and to my surprise I’d received two messages from people I haven’t seen or been in contact with for a long long long time: I’m talking primary school… I opened message one, because I was curious to read it, both messages were from different girls (or should I say women ;) ) that I used to be friends with at some point early in my life. The other message, message two, I left unopened for a while. This one was from a girl I used to be friends with from the age of seven or eight(?) until 13. To be honest I didn’t feel like opening that message as I was expecting the usual blah blah anyway. The other one was somehow more interesting to me.

She wrote me about a primary school reunion that she is organising, they’ve found everyone except me and if I was the person in the picture, that she was looking for. Of course I could’ve left it at that but I didn’t, I replied to her message. The moment I received her second message I felt some kind of regret about sending that first reply. She was asking the usual: how are you doing, what have you been up to, are you married, do you have children? etc. Of course I was expecting these kind of questions and I didn’t mind answering some of them but then I realised the moment I would make her my FB friend, more requests would come in and I’d have to answer the same unimportant nonsense again and again.

I had a look at her profile page and noticed each and every classmate from back then, in her friends list. Also the one boy I had a major crush on, I remember I went to the beach with his parents, him and his younger brother. When we arrived back at their appartment in the evening, his mum asked me to take a shower before dinner, to rinse all the sand and dirt off. It was a bit of an odd situation for me. His parents were extremely nice people, especially his mum. She braided my hair when I got out of the shower. I guess I must have been the daughter she never had ;) But just the fact that I had butterflies in my stomach whilst being around this boy all day long was something special that I remember to this day.

But I also noticed the girl -one of a pair actually- who came from a questionable family (it was rumoured at the time that her mum was a public woman). They were common people, she was friends with another girl and both lived in the same estate, were quite heavy, already used too much makeup at that age and weren’t popular. These were the type of girls you weren’t supposed to hang out with. I remember they were also quite the bullies at school, potty-mouthed and often looking for a fight. And I remember one time where they were picking on me -just out of sight- around the corner of the playground. I punched her right in the face, which she didn’t expect of course… Bullying problem solved for ever!

There are more stories of course, but does it really matter? I’ve replied to the first message and said to her that I’m not keen on reunions. The truth is that I wonder what the hell I’m supposed to tell these people who are desperately holding on to a few memories of the past. Most I can’t even remember because I was so young and so green at the time, a child. What’s the point of meeting up again after so many years knowing that I’ll probably have nothing in common with any of them. Is it their curiosity speaking? Do they expect me to add them all to FB just like that because of something we’ve shared ages ago *don’t thinks so!*? I’ve moved on, I’m not that child anymore, I’m an adult with an adult life now.

I really don’t see the point in meeting up to tell them how successful I’ve been over the past decades, how much I earn a year, how many kids I have, how many times I’ve been married and tell them by the end of the night ‘sure… we’ll keep in touch’… Something that will obviously never happen otherwise it would’ve happened already. There will be nothing to relate to. Absolutely nothing. It’s been too long. I was a child at the time still figuring out how to memorise twenty words for the test on Wednesday whilst my mind wandered off, counting down the minutes to the lunch break at noon. My bubble was small but large enough to hold everything dear to me and I still like to keep it that way, plain and simple.

The second message was from one of my closest friends at the time. She wrote about how long it has been (I know; things happen for a reason…) and how she would like to stay in touch again. She approached me because of the same reason, that reunion. Funny thing is that I will attend a reunion in June this year, only because some friends asked me to please come and yes they are still my FB friends nowadays. It’s organised by the school I attended where I studied graphic design. Yes I had doubts but this reunion seems more realistic somehow. The doubts are about the whole reunion thing in general, because I don’t feel the need to add all the extra noise to my life while I’m already juggling on a daily basis.

I guess it is a ‘to be continued…’ ;)

The Youngsters

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I’m traveling by train each day and I’ve seen and heard lots of weird things on my way to work back and forth. Lately I’ve noticed that young people these days tend to speak annoyingly loud. The concept of privacy and/or private space of others is either something they’re not aware of or don’t seem to grasp at all. They also lack a serious amount of courtesy and show no respect for others. Pointless chatter by one or two of them seems to be the standard morning ritual. Utterly annoying and most of the time extremely loud. They don’t seem to have a clue about the fact that everyone is overhearing their conversation or when they’ll start bragging about things which makes it even more annoying and ignorant.

The other day I was on the train back to Amsterdam when I girl next to me was talking so loud to the person on the other end of the phone connection that all six people around her where sitting with an expression on their faces of total disbelief. The girl was exposing her so-called problems to the world around her in such a way she probably wasn’t even aware of. The woman opposite of me started grinning at some point and had to put her hand before her mouth to cover her laugh. I saw her face and was grinning as well. We were all spectators of the utter drama of a 20-something-year-old.

The woman opposite of me even asked her to lower her voice which she did after staring at her for a while, unfortunately it didn’t last long as within three minutes the decibels were back on the same level as they were before the remark. It wasn’t just the loudness that was causing us six to chuckle it was also the total absurdness of the conversation; the topics that were discussed and how it was discussed. She made it sound like each and every pathetic issue was the end of the world. She sounded and looked like a spoiled rich child, making us witnesses to her little drama of a soap opera.

The moment she got up and left the train, everyone around me started to laugh and remark on the ignorant attitude of this creature who unfortunately is not one of a kind… Another time -during rush hour- there were these two guys, one sitting opposite of me with his friend standing next to him and another guy also sitting opposite of me talking on the phone. The guy on the phone was speaking so loud that the other two were constantly battling and raising their voices in order to be heard by everyone nearby. One of them talked with excessive pride and self-satisfaction about his achievements.

He just got a new advertising job and his manager and colleagues had invited him to join them on a retreat to Thailand for five days. He was constantly bragging about everything he had accomplished and the guy he was talking to barely responded. I could tell he felt really uncomfortable about his boasting ‘friend’ and the volume that was used to bring the news to the whole train. In the meantime the guy on the phone couldn’t stop blabbing either. It was like a hen fight somehow and all these meaningless and pointless conversations -again- made me chuckle. What is wrong with these people?

I honestly feel blessed when I get on a train in the morning and people just don’t talk, when the quiet is so loud it becomes overwhelming. I can really really enjoy those journeys to work, where I stare into the distance and watch the meadows passing by, the beauty of nature, the sun rising and the tranquillity of the morning. I cannot imagine I would’ve been so loud at that age, I would’ve been talking that same kind of nonsense or discuss drama with someone so everyone could hear. It is not my nature nor am I the boasting type. I guess it’s a generation issue and a matter of courtesy and respect.

I’m getting ‘old’.