Day 49 – July 25, 2011 – Lose yourself…

Portrait of a Writer's Studio...

Number of days in Amsterdam – 49

Number of days without a bike theft – 45

Days since it last rained – 0

What can I keep saying about this lovely weather in the ‘Dam? Not much. Monday morning started out bright and sunny, staying that way just long enough for me to get cranky about having a rainy weekend followed by a beautiful day, before it said “HA HA! Joke’s on you, buddy!” and got rainy again.

It was, once again, a golden opportunity to hide out from the world. It was not a good day to see the city.

Apparently, not everyone felt like that. Like Prince, for example. He decided to come for two days. He was supposed to play in Oslo, but recent events canceled his show there, so he instead popped into the Melkweg (the same small space where we saw the Pogues) for TWO surprise shows – one last night and one this night. Both shows sold out, with people standing in line in the rain for hours so they could have the opportunity to drop €100 and see Prince.

I have always wanted to see Prince, but €200 in tickets, combined with the fact that I didn’t want to spend hours standing in the rain with a pregnant wife, just to get inside where I could then spend another few hours in a cramped, hot club packed to the gills with people who are soaked from having stood in the same rain for hours – well, it just didn’t sound all that appealing.

An item that I read in the news today involves a new liqueur that could probably only be produced in the ‘Dam. It’s called Agwa de Bolivia, and the main ingredient is cocaine, or coca leaves anyway. It’s produced in a facility outside of the city, but the thing that caught my eye was in comparing the news story and the liqueur’s website is that the coca leaves arrive here from Bolivia in 2,000 kilo bales transported under armed guard! I can only imagine these late-night shipments, and that they probably look very much like a drug shipment, albeit with a lot more paperwork!

This is going to sound like homesickness, but it’s not. It’s more a sense of nostalgia. One of my favorite things about living here is ALWAYS riding my bike to get anywhere, even in the rain. Even so, I do miss mountain biking. I miss getting out on a trail and just hammering my way through the woods. I’ve thought about that a lot since the Tree Farm Relay this weekend, and talking to my teammates who were there.

Someone from another team made this video from the race, and it gives you a good feel of what it’s like, and it also made me miss the flow of trails in Michigan a lot. The first part takes place in the chutes, but if you want to fast-forward to two minutes in, there’s some great footage of one of my favorite Michigan trails complete with a few crashes (on dirt, they tend to not hurt as much).

In addition, that’s one of my fellow Angry Monkeys with the innovative backpack design at 5:55.

Another bit of nostalgia occurred just before bed. After a comforting dinner of pasta and vegetables with so much garlic it created a haze in the flat, we retired to the living room for a little bit of television.

8 Mile was on.

For those of you who don’t know us, or know about 8 Mile (the road, not the film), 8 Mile is the border that divides Detroit from the suburbs. We lived about five blocks north of 8 Mile before we started over. It wasn’t one of the bad neighborhoods from the film (although they do exist along the border). It was a very nice, artsy community, but that 8 Mile border still hung heavily to the south.

8 Mile is a real border in a city that was revealed in the 2000 Census to be the most racially segregated large metropolitan in the States. It’s a city that has a lot of problems (we could hear gunfire nightly from South of 8 Mile on warm summer nights with our windows open, everything from handguns to automatic weapons), but it’s a city that instills me with pride.

8 Mile (the film) is about breaking down those barriers, and about chasing dreams. Eminem plays a white trash rapper who lives in one of the trailer parks along 8 Mile (they do exist), but he’s chasing his dreams to become a rapper, and also to break down racial divides. His crew isn’t segregated, and even though he is the target of racial comments he’s a part of it. He’s also very Detroit, holding down his blue-collar factory job as he tries to make a go of it.

And while I hoping I’m not giving up too much info for those of you who haven’t seen the film, what happens at the end? Nothing. Life goes on. We all get our minor defeats and victories in life, but the only way you recover or celebrate victory is to just keep going.

As we contemplated starting over, we had a set playlist of songs that we found inspirational. And I’m not talking about in the weeks leading up to our expatriation – I’m talking about for years prior. As we talked about just packing up and getting out of town for good, seeing the world, escaping Detroit and even Kalamazoo, where we lived before Detroit, we listened to the music that inspired us, and motivated us with the idea that there would always be hope to give it a shot, when the right opportunity arrived, as long as we watched for it and didn’t drop the ball at just the right time.

“Lose Yourself” was one of the songs that made that playlist.

Look, if you had one shot, or one opportunity
To seize everything you ever wanted in one moment
Would you capture it or just let it slip?

Also, it was also really great to just see a film depicting locations that used to be part of my day-to-day. Like that freeway exit at the beginning of the video. I took that exit every day, and it was about a mile from my house.

You better lose yourself in the music, the moment
You own it, you better never let it go
You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to blow
This opportunity comes once in a lifetime yo

For years, I’ve had two big fears. One was that I was going to drop my keys down a storm grate (that one will never go away, but now I’ve added “or into a canal” to that list). The other was that I might have had that one big opportunity and missed it, without ever knowing. Did I make a wrong choice at some point that ended up being the biggest mistake of my life – and I never knew it?

So, that was a catalyst to head to the ‘Dam when the opportunity arose. There was this fear that, should we turn this opportunity down, we would regret it for the rest of our lives. How many folks in the States are handed the opportunity to live in Europe, no matter how hard the conditions? Even if cash is tight (it’s an expensive city, and we did get used to the low cost of living in Detroit), we’re still living in Europe! A baby on the way cinched the deal – this needs to be successful. I’m here to make it as a writer, and as a dad, and failure is not an option. It never will be. Because this isn’t just about me. It’s about the three of us.

If You Go:

Amsterdam can be a city of excesses. For legalized marijuana to coca liqueur, you can go overboard if you’re not careful. Start with a street vendor strupwafel, though. I find it’s all the decadence I need.