Travelogue 1116 – 29 December
The Questions

Hey ho, the wind and the rain. It's been a Shakespearean Christmas season, even the Netherlands feeling the stress of too much water. River levels in the east reached fourteen metres above NAP. NAP means the Normal Amsterdam Level, which is the standard in the Netherlands, a measure just below sea level.

I’ve been spending vacation time working on a research paper about assessment. This is for professional development. I’m analysing an exam given last year in a course that I supervise. That means going over the exam again and again, examining the questions that make it up. I find weak questions, and I make recommendations for improvement.

At night, the rain strikes up a steady rhythm. It falls on the roof and patters against the windows. The drops become so many questions falling on me from the sky.

I’ve also been using vacation time to catch up on dental work. I sit in the chair as they work in my mouth, staring into the bright light over the dentist’s shoulder, asking myself questions. “What am I doing here?” is a prominent one. I reflect, not for the first time, that what distinguishes the human from the animal is the ability to submit oneself to pain, to appoint a time when another human will inflict pain, to contentedly submit to the administration of pain, motivated only by an abstract idea of health. I feel some amazement every time I ease myself into that oversized chair.

Seeing doctors and dentists more often than friends does something to your head. You begin to think a lot about mortality. There was a time I thought questions came with answers. The two were complements, like protons and electrons: free in space to match when the time was right. Now it looks like a universe of protons. They fall from the sky, upsetting the NAP and lulling us finally to sleep.

Travelogue 1115 – 19 December
Pooling

The water that lured Narcissus didn’t necessarily run deep, but it was still, still as a mirror. It captured him as surely as a fly in honey, trapped him in its pool of pure mood. Narcissus was the son of a god, and he was a beautiful man. He had many admirers, including the timid mountain nymph Echo, who pined away for him until she was nothing but sound. Nothing would save him from himself, or from the terrifying power of water. Prophecy warned that he should avoid his reflection, and yet the picture of oneself is too seductive – count the people you pass in one day checking themselves out in their phones. And - let’s be fair - avoiding all water is rather difficult. The mood mirror catches us all eventually.

The subject of an article I read recently in the Guardian was the shift in global power relationships around the world. It was a legitimately interesting topic, the shift away from binary Cold-War models and toward a multipolar order in which smaller powers mix and match their alignments, meaning economic alignments with China and military agreements with America, for example. Biden had recently met with Xi in San Francisco, as the author mentioned in the introduction. But none of this was the lead. The pretext for the article was a poll.

Among the findings in this European Council on Foreign Relations and Oxford University project were that big chunks of “those we asked” in a selection of countries (1) believed the U.S. was at war with Russia; (2) believed Russia would win its war against Ukraine; (3) thought the U.S. would go to war with China over Taiwan in the near future; (4) believed the E.U. would fall apart. Most of “those we asked” would prefer to live in Europe or the U.S. but would rather trade with China. And so on. (Here is a nice essay about the role polls play in news cycles.)

This sort of poll, so ubiquitous now, begins to sound comical to me. I picture a Kimmel sketch in which people on the street outside his studio are peppered with random questions. Ask people questions, they answer. No matter how distant the topic; no matter how little they cared a moment before; no matter how fantastical the topic, they will manufacture an opinion. A poll is more Rorschach test than exercise in thought, but the very seriousness with which polls are treated emboldens people to confuse impulse and reason. Democracy stands at risk of devolving into opinion polls, which are at best, let’s admit it, nothing more than barometers of fleeting emotion.

We read polls the way Narcissus read the waters. What matters is our glorious selves. Polls that support our assumptions make us glow with affirmation; polls that counter our assumptions make us glow with indignation. The latter is more addictive than the former. In either case, we have learned nothing, accomplished nothing, exercised no critical-thinking or problem-solving skills.

Travelogue 1114 – 13 December
Coolhaven

Our routine this autumn has been to take the Metro to school, two stops to Coolhaven Station. We cross the bridge, and then we descend to the waterside. It’s not the most direct way, but I find walking along the water peaceful.

The Coolhaven, or Cool Harbour (‘Cool’ pronounced like ‘coal’), was dug about a hundred years ago. It appears as nothing more special than a widening of the River Schie before that river turns south and empties into the Nieuwe Maas. The stretch of open water separates Delfshaven from what once were the furthest western stretches of Rotterdam, and it’s peaceful because there isn’t much traffic anymore. There’s nothing particularly scenic; it’s lined along most of its banks by calm residential areas. But this place has been so central in the geography of my life in this town, its meaning enhances its beauty. It’s like Loring Park in Minneapolis, a place I saw almost every day for years.

I walk the same way after dropping the girls. It’s only been ten minutes, but the light has changed. On the way to school, we walk under dawn’s first light. The night has not yet been overcome. By the time I’m walking back toward the Metro Station, the dawning day has become ascendant, and the sky is more blue than black, more day than night. The waters are calm, and I drink in the sight of them, absorbing quiet contentment.

They say water is a symbol of mood. I accept the gift of stillness from the Coolhaven this morning, this whisper of comfort during a time of year that feels chaotic.

Travelogue 1113 – 3 December
Be Real

“Why are younger voters flocking to the far right?” worries the Guardian.

I thought I had better check Instagram for an answer. There, a young lady told me with a blissful smile that she had been sent to this earth to experience ‘every human emotion’. Odd that human emotions comprise such an exotic menu for all the disembodied souls. Is it that much of a privilege, given the scope of this universe? After the hormonal cascade of emotions in adolescence, what is left but dread and anxiety? But there you have it: those tears at the high school prom are a real draw.

It would seem that popular scifi mythology has seeped into general culture. We are now encouraged to believe, from the cold lips of Spock and other alien boosters, that we are a savage but a special species, so violent but so romantic. Visiting extra-terrestrials marvel that one human stops to drop a coin in the cap of another human … who was abandoned by the rest and sleeps on the pavement; are astonished by the little girl who feeds the baby birds left motherless … by her big brother and his slingshot.

I thought I had better check the hard news, instead. Headline: disgraced former congressman George Santos is talking to the press. He is quite indignant about the way he was treated. And now Santos, this man who conned an Amish man out of his puppies and who used donor money for Botox, is scandalised by the behaviour of his former colleagues, and he promises to tell all. Scrolling down the page, I find out that there is an international conference on climate solutions going on. Oh! It seems quite a number of experts feel we’re approaching a crisis point, and all of civilization is on the line. Hm!

Anyway, young people are voting for right wing parties again. “…the woke ones from the big cities,” says one, “care about the climate and gender stuff but they are ignoring the real problems that we have here and now.”

Travelogue 1112 – 1 December
Dark and Light

The winter cold has descended. Rain has become intermittent hail. We have fished out our gloves and hats. And now everyone is counting the days until holidays. The youngest eagerly anticipate Sinterklaas, or ‘pakjesavond’, which is only a few days away. Little Ren is counting the days until her birthday, which happens soon after Sinterklaas. And I’m counting days until our winter break. I don’t think I’m alone in that.

It’s a time of close spaces and crowds. The cold drives us inside. It drives us into the Metros and trams and buses, all of us together, made bulky in our coats, awkward in our boots, carrying umbrellas, made grumpy by the intrusion of winter. The season drives us into stores, where the aisles are crowded, and the stock is becoming thin. We’re wet; we’re shivering. We are unusually tired, simply from the lack of light and from all the minor discomforts that follow us among our errands, like the gnats of summer, but more persistent.

That said, there are surprising appearances of good cheer. Everywhere there is sudden largesse. Last night, Little Ren had her gymnastics class. The teenage girls who run the class had turned the school gym in Blijdorp into a fun obstacle course. A contingent of Piets arrived and handed out little craft kits. At the end, the older girls distributed bags of candy. The little girls were very excited.

It's a funny season, full of contradictions. We do our best to spark other types of illumination as the sun withdraws its light.