I just walked in the door from a meeting in Utrecht. I figured I would play it safe today and take public transit instead of driving, which was probably a wise choice. The next appointment on my calendar is marking the time that Mom passed into the sunlight. Looking at it is terribly difficult, I don’t want to delete it because that feels terrible all on it’s own. I can’t fast forward past it since it is set for moment that we feel it happened, while I was on the phone to hospice that day. Since this is the digital age, it appears across every screen.

I really don’t know what to do with myself. Normally, I take this day off because I know I am relatively useless but this year it wasn’t possible. I know that yesterday, things were so bad that I couldn’t turn off my shower and flooded a good portion of the bathroom. I couldn’t make the knobs work in the right order to turn off the water. It’s not like I needed to solve a Rubik’s cube, I needed to combine the right 2 of the 4 dials, which I couldn’t seem to do. Eventually, I remembered the right combination and George came running in to start drinking up the excess water before it could splash out to the wood floors.

So, you can see why I made the choice to trust public transit today instead of myself.

Last night, I srarted wandering back down the path of all of the things that I thought up to the point that we knew Mom was sick and then second guessing every single choice I made, combined with a hearty dose of “what if you had done this earlier/instead? Maybe she would still be alive.” It’s a fucked up thing to do to yourself and to anyone near you, in this case GG and the pets. Sometimes, I expect that I will be surpised by some official looking people at my front door, presenting me with a bill for all the secondary stress and therapy needed for GG and the pets. It wouldn’t be an unearned bill…

I remember talking with my Mom once about how she got through those days when all of us kids were blowing up and out, her divorce and the day to day struggle to make it all work. She told me that Ninja helped keep her sane, he needed her to have it together. He was her great rock. Also the primary reason that if she had to do it all again, she would have four Akitas and not four children. I completely understand that, even if I have the smaller model and all three of my pets don’t equal 20% of Ninja’s size.

I want to remember my Mom in her full glory today. I want to remember her like this, laughing at how much stuff you had to put on the Yukon to go out to the bathroom and to think that she might still come in the door one winter’s day full of stories about where she has been since I last saw her.

I love you, Mom.

The past few days have been hectic, especially in terms of weather. Lots of high wind, sleet, hail, snow, rain and even thunder and lightning. In between, there has been just enough sun to make you think the weather is changing… it usually lasts about 30 minutes. Right now, it is one of those periods and the boys and I should make a run for it to have a walk outside before the next winter wave starts. However, I am waiting to have my weekly Skype call with my mentee and so we will probably have to wait until the next window.

Last night, I got out the Crock Pot. I was struggling with making a decision about what to make for dinner – stress tends to do this to me. I would be fine with making a decision about the nuclear codes but which types of potatoes to choose in the store – fast cooking vs crumbly will take me a good 10 minutes. I decided it was time to clean out some of the cabinets and experiment. It cooked all night and it is pretty good. I think it was really more about the idea of something warm simmering that was appealing.

Monday is the 16th. This past week, without the distractions of family, I’ve become more and more anxious. While I am conscious of it, I still haven’t found a way to avoid it. And I might not ever. It may simply be that I simply honor the fact that this time of the year is hard for me and I am going to be slightly off during this time. Hence the potato indecision.

I also don’t want to see anybody at the moment. I had to be at the office a lot this week which wasn’t ideal for me when I want to hide out in my house and be left alone to work. Last night, I had promised to drop by my 2nd living room since I hadn’t been there in a while. Around 10PM, I thought to myself “Not going to” and about 15 minutes later someone called me and asked if they could come over. Which I certainly would not say “No” to. It was a good conversation, we spent a lot of time strategizing over her business plans.

I am still waiting to hear about the next job. I finally gave in yesterday and sent a message to their HR department since it was a week later than when they had promised to have an update. I heard back from him that I need to have more patience and wait another week. He thinks that over the coming week they will have reached a decision. ARGH. In the meantime, I had an interview of another sort this past week. The job doesn’t exactly exist at the moment, it was more of a discussion of what the right approach is to take on this particular program. Of course, if you don’t have an actual recquisition, that makes it somewhat dubious 😉 It would be a job I would be great at and it would be my dream job if they actually turned it into a job. But for the moment, it is kind of like playing fantasy football.

Tuesday night GG and I went to see Rufus Wainwright in Utrecht. We were once again in row 1. It appears that she has a special affinity for buying tickets in that row. It was kind of awkward to sit that close because you really have no where else to look. The performers can see you because as we took the train home, we were walking behind two of the violinists and one turned to us and said “You were in the first row, weren’t you?”

While I didn’t get around to counting the number of eyeballs on his pants, it was close enough for me. Unlike the Suzanne Vega experience, where we were diagonally facing the stage from row 1, here we were full on.

During this evening, I discovered the difference in cough medicine definitions in countries. GG had a pretty bad cough so in the train station, she said she was going to get something for it in the HEMA. Okay, makes sense, she comes back with a bag of things which I assume are cough drops. During the concert, she is coughing alot. I keep thinking to myself “Why are those stupid cough drops not working?” On the train ride home, I finally get a good look at the bag and after translating in my head, I realized they were JELLYBEANS. Which then lead to a conversation about why you would use jellybeans as cough suppressants. They have zero cough suppression effectiveness. Next time, I will be checking for the menthol content 😉

Tonight, I am supposed to go to an Italian themed party, hosted by Italians. I am not really feeling like going. But since this is the Netherlands and I said I was coming and they limited the number of attendees, I can’t really back out. So I will put on my extrovert pants and go for a time long enough to show that I value the invitation. Or long enough to consume my contribution of 18 euro in Italian food and wine since we all chipped in.

I am working my way through an enormous salad and there’s no sound except that of George jumping up against my leg to convince me to give him some more avocado. GG and I went with Rupert and Meredith to the airport and then after coffee went our separate ways to work. After being with people constantly for the past two weeks, it seems strangely still.

I did immediately turn the heat down to 17 degrees when I came home today. 😉

We spent our last day of this trip bowling and hanging out in the neighborhood. Which was a wise choice considering the weather was stranding some trains. My bowling arm is not quite what it was, if it ever was. However, I did manage to only bowl in my lane this time. Small steps!

The office today was crazy. It felt like all 700 employees were there. Partly because they were making some big announcements today to clarify other big announcements from last week. I did my best to try and hide in the study carrels section so I could get through all of the mail that I did read but not answer on vacation. People still found me so it wasn’t quite as effective as I would have liked.

I also had the awkward conversation today with my manager, since we haven’t talked in two weeks with the holidays. She wanted to know where I was in the process of leaving and I told her what I was waiting to hear. Which convinced her that the other company is going to extend an offer so now I have a flurry of meetings scheduled over the next few days with other people she would like me to talk to before I make the decision to leave.

We’ve got some great photos from this visit. Over the next few days, as everyone adds theirs, I am going to enjoy looking through the ones I want to print. There’s one of Dylan on skates with gluhwein that is definitely a candidate!

And in between the loads of laundry, going back to eating salads and other healthier things, I will try not to miss them all too much. 🙂

Last night, as Cedric left to walk back to his hotel, snow started falling! I was excited since this is the first time it has snowed in Amsterdam since I have lived here. This morning, there is still some on the ground. George went out first and did a series of elaborate steps to keep himself from touching the ground.

Cedric and Dylan leave today to go back home. We all gathered together one last time yesterday and had our Dutch family with us. It was sort of a day long open house, we started officially at 1PM. It was a good day, we even took a group photo thanks to the selfie stick that I won at nerd camp two summers ago. It came in handy and since I never use it, it was a lucky thing that I knew which corner it had been gathering dust in. 😉

Thinking back over the past 9 days, I feel like I can say that this trip has been a really good one, especially in terms of creating more and different memories. On New Year’s Eve, it made me really happy that my family could be outside and amazed by the fireworks display. It was something they had never seen that closely before and certainly not together. We haven’t been together for a New Year’s celebration since we were under 21! GG’s sister came up for that celebration and stayed with us the next day to go to brunch. I am sure that other people experience this in their families as well, that at some point, everyone is an adult and there are no parental figures at the table anymore. Which means there’s no one to tell you to mind your manners and it really is up to you to make of the experience what you will.

While I am tired and wishing I wasn’t going back to work on Monday – because that’s been a other chapter of drama while I deliberately took this week off and did not travel with any screen bigger than my e-reader – I am so appreciative that we had this time together. I am hoping we will do it again. That we know that we can do this as siblings. It helps, of course, to have the chill out twins of Meredith and GG balancing us all out. I would also like to think that the four of us siblings are learning to bend and work with each other.

This time of the year is always when I want to hibernate and miss my Mom. That’s not going away any time soon. What did come out of this time together was a reminder of how much she is in each of us, even if we don’t recognize it in each other right away. As long as I can keep seeing that, I think it will be easier for me to figure out how I can best build this relationship with my brothers as adults.

Colgone was a great city to visit 🙂 Heartily recommend it.

As for today, we will take a walk to the Albert Cuyp Market to get Meredith her stroopwafels fresh from the cart and spend some time in Amsterdam itself. Tomorrow, depending on the iciness, we make take a day trip. According to the weather service it is “bacon slippery” out there. Not sure why bacon and not sausage slippery for example, but that’s the literal translation of the Dutch expression for you 😉

We are all here and it is going pretty well. Today is Mom’s birthday so things might be a bit more intense. I’ve got to see what Cologne has for Mexican restaurants so we can celebrate her.

Except for me, I am working today. Henry and George are tucked into their basket by my desk. Rupert and Meredith are tucked into my guest room. Outside it is cold, grey and foggy. I feel quite content knowing that Administrator is still running the Asylum 😉

I am listening to the soundtrack of “Juiste la fin du monde”, the film by Xavier Dolan that GG and I saw with the meetup on Monday night. It is melancholic and meditative which makes it good music to work by.

I have a call with my mentee this afternoon. He’s applying for a graduate scholarship from Carnegie Mellon’s branch in Kenya so we’ve really got to get his essay right. I think we will probably meet some day. I know that I am redirecting some of my grief over Raven to this relationship. I am okay with that. I know that for me, working on something helps me process the grief, it makes it feel safer to have the emotions and feelings rather than trying to shut them down.

The construction crew is back at it next door. They took Monday and Tuesday off, which was so nice even if I did have to rely on an alarm again instead of their noise. They also removed the honey bucket from the sidewalk out front so I believe that is a sign that the toilet has been installed indoors 😉

The mail just brought my absolutely lurid new phone case. It is terrible, so terrible, no one would want to be seen dead carrying it. Just my style 😉 The second thing was a Christmas card from my Dad. Reading his handwriting made me realize how long he has been writing cards and letters. I would recognize his handwriting anywhere. Growing up, that was how we heard from him: postcards from exotic locations stamped with US Navy postage and cassette recordings of his voice. So outdated now in the age of the internet but that’s the way we knew him when we were kids.

I heard from the HR person yesterday. My interview rounds are finished but those of other people are not yet. I should hear something from them at the end of next week. If I do, it won’t be another set of interviews (I asked), it will be an offer. That could be exciting, it could be disappointing but either way it will be a way forward. If I give notice in January, that means I will be able to start on 1 March. None of this two weeks business!

Okay, time for my call 🙂

I’m just back from meeting Cedric and Dylan at Schiphol early this morning for breakfast before they continued on to Innsbruck. It was intense… it took about 9 minutes to get into the political. WOW. The twins are going skiing for a few days and then will return here on Friday.

We went up to the Panorama Terrace to drink coffee and eat breakfast. My mom and I used to go there when we would land. It was a good time, even if the conversation was intense. And it gets to that level fast!

Like many other people out there today, I am also listening to George Michael. I wouldn’t say I am a fan, it’s more like listening to the music and remembering the time period that went with it. It’s suitable music for trying to prepare another computer – which is taking forever – and for working on a Power Point.

It is super quiet, not a single coworker online. YES! Can you say productivity goes up? I thought so 😉

First Christmas Day with GG’s parents, sister and some friends was actually really nice. Also intense conversations, mostly related to skating, sport and the Elfstedentocht. Since I didn’t really know anyone very well or at all in the case of the friends, it was less emotionally overwhelming. Since it was all in Dutch and Vlaams (Belgian Dutch), I also really had to pay attention to the words which put my emotional stuff firmly in check. The boys were on excellent behavior, super charming, until George was sitting comfortably in someone’s lap and started letting them rip… You quickly get your dog handed back to you at that point!

For Christmas, I got a framed Shepard Fairey print of Henry Rollins. It is signed by them both and for the 2016-2017 tour, which I saw twice this year. It is super cool and now hanging in my dining room thanks to GG. She got the Raspberry Pi Starter Kit so I look forward to seeing a robot that will walk the dogs or other such useful thing 😉

It’s Christmas. GG just left to go to start working in the kitchen. We will head there much later this afternoon. Although, I have to leave extra time since I can’t actually park Astrid near GG’s since she lives inside the milieu zone in Rotterdam and my girl is too old and too polluting according to the law *rolling my eyes*. I park outside the zone, under a bridge, and then the boys and I cross the highway and walk into the milieu zone. And every five steps, I mutter “good plan, Rotterdam”.

As you can tell, I am full of the Christmas spirit 😉

Last night, the service at Marum was good. It’s a very different kind of church, from the start when you walk in, they offer you wine and cake (GG didn’t believe me) to the choir (all 8 of them) singing Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah. Last night’s message was based on the concept of Welcome. What does it mean to you? What do you really mean when you say it? And what are you (or not) open for?

The churchyard was dark, they don’t have a great deal of artificial lighting out there. The wind was quite busy and yet it didn’t feel anything other than it normally does, peaceful. I put new hellebores by the Greats and by Mom and Oma. I got my tears out by Mom and then managed to keep it dry during the service.

We got home around 1:30AM. Henry wanted to go straight to bed whereas George was ready for a late night adventure. I noticed last night that Henry has some hair loss on his tail over each bone. It’s making me anxious so we will be going to the vet and I am stopping with searching on the internet for a possible cause.

That’s what I am trying to achieve today, keeping myself distracted from the next few days. Of course, it is not really working so I just fired up Elvis Presley’s Christmas album and I am getting ready to let the emotions out. Or as someone recently said “emotional incontinence” which has a certain truth to it.

Let’s be honest, I really don’t like this time of year. There are number of dates during this time of the year that remind me anew of how many people are missing from my life. This year, I can add Raven and Moortje to that list. So, what am I doing? Poking the dragon, so to speak. I know I will feel better if I let some of this emotion out. So far, it is stuck somewhere around my chest and doesn’t want to come up higher.

This afternoon I still need to get food for the pets, flowers for the graves and a few basic groceries for the next few days since things will be closed here for 1st and 2nd Christmas day. I also need to take out the trash, the recycling to the 3 different drop off points and the boys to the park. Tonight we’ll go to the church in Marum for the Christmas Eve service. I am going to try to keep the tears down to 50% of the service…

Good thing I am getting some of them out now.

My aunt called last night since we won’t see each other on 1st Christmas Day. GG’s family got their names on the schedule first so that’s where we will be tomorrow. I am dreading it. Nothing to do with them at all, it is all me. I don’t want to be around anyone’s happy family at this time of the year. The boys are also invited so I will have my service animals handy. Also, having to take the dogs out to pee is a handy and polite way to get breaks to tell myself to “Pull yourself together” in my best English accent.

It was really strange not to spend lots of time on picking out the perfect gift for Raven and getting it in the mail so it would get to him ontime. It will be even stranger not to talk to him via phone during the next few days.

I’m going to struggle for the next few days, until the family is here — which will then distract me into Big Sister mode.

I love you all, thank you for being part of my life. I’m wishing you the celebration that fits you best this time of the year — xoxoxoxox, C

Oops… where does time go? Let’s see, here we are on another Tuesday morning, waiting for the phone to ring from a particular HR type. Actually, I am not really waiting that impatiently. I have pushed the whole process slightly to the side. If they come around to wanting rounds 7 and 8, I’m going to ask them nicely what information are they looking for? Because it might very well be that I don’t have what they are looking for or that I do. I feel like I could save everyone’s time with this question 😉

Last night, a coworker called me at 1830 and left me a voicemail telling me that I could reach him up until 2230. I was like “WTF?” It’s not like it was about anything urgent either, he wanted to discuss the meeting we had yesterday morning with the customer. I did not call back. I have worked hard to set boundaries for myself regarding my work-life balance and I have to be very careful about not backsliding! This past Saturday, another coworker sent me a message wanting to talk about another customer. The meeting is scheduled for 26 January 2017 and he wanted to talk on Saturday morning about it. Umm, NO. In case you are wondering, both of these coworkers are Dutch and not in my immediate team. One of them I have never even met prior to the email exchange.

I also work odd hours. Sometimes it is 2100 and I am working on something. However, I am very careful to only expect my coworkers to respond during normal work hours. And I certainly don’t call them at night. Let’s face it, none of us are brain surgeons or first responders – there’s nothing we do that is that urgent or that needs a night time response.

Speaking of odd hours, there’s 11 days left to 2016. I’m not quite finished with my work for this year yet. I am taking the first week of the year off since the whole gang will be here. I am looking forward to that, even if it means that I might need to find some additional chairs somewhere 😉