Letter #50 - Evan

When my family moved to the Detroit area, I was devastated.  I was coming from an incredible experience living in Rotterdam, I missed Canada, and I was furious that my parents would dare uproot our family to come to a country that I didn't love (settle down all, it's grown on me).  I sobbed the entire 8 hour plane ride from Amsterdam to Detroit... I think the flight attendants were debating whether or not to call in social services on the chance that maybe I was being abducted... when my dad told them I was 14, they gave him a knowing look and walked away.  I was bound and determined to hate Michigan with a fiery passion, and had a plan to make my family pay for making me so miserable.  Then I met Evan like a week after the plane landed.  Damn him.

Evan quickly became one of my closest friends, and helped stave off some of my loneliness.  He would email me, call, we'd hang out sometimes, and saw each other every week at church.  He was my rock.  I don't think he ever realised this.  We stayed close through the next 3 years, including an incredible trip to Tahiti with a church group.  I still can't watch anything with Sean Connery in it without missing him desperately.  We were each others' prom dates, and then when he graduated high school he left me.  We never had a romantic involvement with each other, though sometimes I wonder if we weren't crushing on each other at opposite times.  When Evan moved to Arizona to start college I was sure he'd come back when he was finished with school.  After all, his family was in Detroit, and so was I, and we were such good friends.  He still lives in Arizona.  His family moved away, and here I still am.  He's been back to visit of course, and I've made it down there a couple of times as well to see him.

I don't think I think about how much I miss him normally.  The fact that I'm tearing up a little just writing this speaks to that I guess.  I miss laughing with him, I miss our shared sense of humour, our shared love for laser tag, our shared understanding of the joys and challenges of babysitting Brandon & Cameron... or Brett & Kelsy... or Tim.  I just miss him.  He gives great hugs, thoughtful gifts and even though it's tough to get him to be serious sometimes, I miss his insights on life and people.

Someday when I have an income again, I hope to take another trip to Arizona to spend some time with him.  I hope he knows how much I love him, how much I miss him, and how much his friendship has meant to me over the years... even if I suck at telling him that most of the time.

Letter #13 - Allison

Today was a sick day, which meant I logged a lot of time on the couch not doing a whole lot.  While I did get quite a bit of homework done, I also took a break to do some writing.

I've mentioned this week that there are a few kids I've taken to over the last couple of years.  Today I decided to write to another one of them - Allison.  Allison's mom was a colleague of my mum's for awhile, and the two of them became good friends.  I've known their family since before both Allison and her older brother were born.

As I've watched Allison grow up, I have observed a beautiful soul develop.  She's a sweet kid who loves to play princess and dinosaurs with equal passions.  The relationship she has with her brother reminds me a lot of my brother and I when we were their ages.  I'm very fond of both of them, and have been lucky enough to babysit for them on a few occasions.  It's really been cool to watch Allison slowly come out of her shell when she's around me.  Kind of testing the waters to see if I'll judge what she says or does, and gradually becoming more and more comfortable until her entire personality shines brightly.  I don't get to see her very often, but I do try to keep in touch a bit, and always enjoy the times we do get to spend together!

Letter #9 - Ylva

Today's letter had made me incredibly homesick.  One of our old babysitters asked me awhile ago if I would mind sending her one of my wedding photos, and today seemed like the day to do it.  Writing the letter to go along with it instantly transported me through space and time to our home in Rotterdam, sitting on the floor in my room (even back then my desk was rarely clear enough to function... she says sitting on the couch typing this because her desk is currently not even reachable...) working on whatever.

Ylva was one of those babysitters who made us actually suggest our folks go out for a night because we wanted her to come over.  She would play with us, watch movies with us, help us work on our Dutch, play with our cat (R.I.P. Domino!), take us out shopping, swimming or to the playground... downtown to the really cool library, grocery shopping, to the pet store to look at the rabbits (which we eventually got one... and learned that we prefer not to have rodents as pets as they are far too much effort!)  Her family lived right down the street from us and all went to our church, so a lot of times Ylva would even have us come to her house where we would watch wrestling with her family, play with their seemingly endless family of hamsters, or watch her mom work on whatever project she had in her hands at the time.

As I grew older and began babysitting I tried to model my style after Ylva's.  She had always treated us like grown ups instead of dumb little kids.  She would have conversations with us, really interact with us and care about what we had to say or wanted to do.  She was also good at keeping us in line.  Being cool didn't mean not making us follow the rules.  Even if she didn't agree with all of the rules, she always made sure we followed what our parents wanted us to do, and she did it with love.  She knew our likes, our dislikes, our friends, our bad habits.  When I sat for kids I would try to establish that same spirit with them.  I love kids and so it's pretty easy to just hang out with them.  The important part (which Ylva excelled at) was to also remember to be that influencing source of authority (in a good way) so that kids can learn right from wrong and learn how to operate within the society they're in.

Writing to Ylva made me reflect on all these things, and still get homesick for the life I lived then... I know for sure I'll go back and visit many more times before my life is over, but I wonder if I'll ever be lucky enough to go live there again and share that part of my history and culture with my family?

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for those interested in viewing photos from the Netherlands, here are two albums from my two trips back to visit:

Eurotrip 2006 Photos

Eurotrip 2008 Travel Log (with some photos)

Eurotrip 2008 Photo Book