Today’s walk

I did it. I went for a walk today.

I gathered up all our empty glass jars and bottles from the kitchen cabinets to take them to the recycling bin – I figured it was a good reason to get me out of the house and into some fresh air for a few minutes. After dropping off all the bottles (I felt like a bit of a boozer, even if my only contribution to the collection had once contained orange juice), I decided to keep walking around, just to explore the neighbourhood.

I picked a street at random. I kicked up the leaves as I walked, lifted my face to the breeze – the freezing chill is lurking around the corner, I know it, but today was still mild – sniffing the air. Somewhere, someone was barbequeing (which seems rather odd in November, but oh well). Somewhere, a father was wrangling a very upset child. Somewhere, someone had dropped a receipt and some blue, delicate wrapping paper with golden stars on it. I said hi to the old drunk tottering down the street; him and a young man walking his dog were the only people I saw until I hit one of the main streets. It’s Sunday. Everything’s quiet.

When I first came to the Netherlands, my complaint was that all the houses looked the same. It was rows and rows of townhouses that, while cute, made it impossible for me to remember which part of town I was in. And how boring it must be, living in a house indistinguishable from the hundreds of other cookie-cutter houses.

But today, while walking, I noticed that they don’t look alike at all. Some are red brick, some are yellow brick. Some are “traditional” townhouses, some are modern, square apartment blocks. Some have little, manicured gardens in front. Some open straight onto the sidewalk. Some have benches outside. And in some streets, it looked like the family who moved in first had a choice of doorways, and no one wanted one that looked like their neighbours’. There were white, blue, black, green, brown, red doors. They had ornate mailboxes or slots, they had stained glass windows, they had fancy doorbells, they had arches above the doorway, the had rosebushes crawling on either side, they had little plaster figures of the Virgin Mary and baby Jesus inlaid in the brick.

Another thing I noticed is that people display who they are and what they stand for through the big living room window sills. In Mark’s town, I’ve seen one window absolutely filled up with little (stylised) Native American busts, figurines and statues. There must be at least 20 in the window sill. Others have fancy white and blue China vases. Some have lots of plants, or a jersey representing their favourite sports team.

It’s amazing what you learn on a 20 minute walk. Now I just need some proper shoes – after a while I felt my knees starting to get sore, but I think that’s both due to the shoes and my pace. When I walk slowly, it puts more pressure on my knees. But it was nice. Now I just have to keep it up.

(P.S. The mittens I showed you yesterday? Frogged. Gauge was off. Will try again with smaller needles. It sucks big time, even more than having to frog the Mary Jane sweater. Poop!)

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