Two separate pieces, one in English and one in Dutch, both about and dedicated to Alexander. I can't help myself.
Not quite yet.
I’m still counting the months, like I always do. I’m still dreaming away, as usual. My head’s still full with thoughts and my mind is still reeling. I can be distracted. I will be distracted. It’s not work. Work is from 9.30 am to 12.00 pm. Then I empty my mind again. The next block of work is from 1.00 pm to 6.00 pm. Usually I start pouring my thoughts earlier. I get distracted. Gladly.
He’s still in my head. I feel sorry for those who attempt to break into my head and heart. They’re only occasionally in my head and even less in my heart. He’s still in my heart.
He’s a fairy tale, a bad story, a prince. He’s still pulling at my heart strings. He’s even playing me. An impressive deed for a dead guy. My prince on the white horse? I don’t think so. Rather my white prince who used to talk to horses.
Business like, I direct my thoughts onto other paths. I think up mission statements and I try to define our views and our ambitions. Nothing personal, nothing private, nothing to do with him. Work is from 9.30 am till 6.00 pm. When I walk away I poor my head and my heart. He’s still there waiting for me.
Empty hands. A still heart. Haunted eyes. A long time ago.
Empty hands. A pounding heart. Dreaming eyes. Every evening.
I’m still counting the months. I’m not done yet.
Not quite yet.
Het is een vuur dat in alle hevigheid doorwoedt. Ongecontrolleerd raast het door het landschap van mijn hart en snijdt het alle strategieen de pas af. Ik heb geen uitleg voor wat ik voel, noch voor de redenen, het waarom. Ik heb geen woorden voor het stomme toeval dat hem in mijn zichtveld plaatste, of voor de tekenen aan de wand die wij nu zo hardnekkig negeren. Het alles dat wij nooit zullen hebben. Er is niets dat wij ooit zullen delen.
Vooral de eerste week was heftig. Zo heftig zelfs dat ik me zorgen ging maken. Ik die sowieso in slaap valt met denkbeeldige vrienden en dan, na langzaam wakker te zijn geworden, diezelfde vrienden weer naar voren haalt. Zelfs ik was niet voorbereid op de overweldigendheid waarmee Alexander zich op mijn netvlies vestigde en zich voortdurend aan me opdrong.
Showing posts with label Alexander. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Alexander. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 24, 2013
Monday, June 10, 2013
Alexander
Something I tend to do is mirroring my heroes lifes to mine. Jason Mraz’s life and his tendency to preach had me look at myself wondering if I did, or didn’t, whichever applied. Only in Jason’s case I found myself disagreeing quite a bit. In case of Jake’s life, I could only conclude not only his life is quite different from mine, so is his character, and a lot of the times I didn’t agree with him. John Mayer was a bit strange. There was nothing profound he said that had me looking at myself. Well, there have been a few, but those were so minor and uninteresting I decided it didn’t matter.
How many weeks has it been since we got a new King? Nearly two months. Which means it’s been nearly two months since I discovered Alexander. It’s been about one month longer than I thought it would occupy my mind. The initial shock has worn off for sure, but Alexander’s face and his life still lingers in the back of my mind sometimes forcing itself to the foreground.
In the first week his once existence jolted me to the chore. I had a few evenings falling asleep with his face in my head and waking up in the morning with him still very vividly with me. I can still recall the quiet shock caused by…by what exactly? And still. Writing this I’m almost simultaneously looking at his face on the left side of my screen and it catches my heart again. I still don’t know why. Typically, it’s a very untypical picture of him. Typical, because it seems I always first find the untypical photo. Untypical, because he’s wearing glasses. It’s the only picture of him I found in which he’s wearing glasses. What those glasses do is hiding his eyes. It gives his whole face a different look; more intellectual and sophisticated versus a bit haunted with squinting eyes.
What hasn’t changed is the offence I take when I read people calling him “ugly by appearance”. All the drawings and photo’s I’ve seen of him don’t leave the impression of an ugly man. Yes, he’s got small squinty eyes. His nose is a bit weirdly formed as is his mouth, but it’s all just minor. So minor it certainly doesn’t disturb his overall look. In some photo’s I even find him rather handsome. Neither can I imagine it would make much of a difference if the photo’s were in colour. Maybe he got a bit of a grey colour to him? It might be so. Or maybe it’s time doing that. Maybe taste has changed in such way, what was ugly then is not so ugly now. Who knows?
This is ridiculous, this pining over him. It’s ridiculous to feel anything than interest in him. Even the slightest sliver of interest in him seems somewhat out of place. He’s done nothing important. At the end of his life the only thing he did actively was hiding in his little palace. Nothing to be seen of him, nothing to be heard of him. It’s his tragedy and his tragic life and tragic being. It’s everything he could have been, but never became. It’s all things he could have done, but never did. It’s the mystery that was him and that became him. It was the mystery he fed and was fed by others and by objects and the things we never heard and we will probably never know of. It’s all that. That is Alexander’s legacy is; Mystery and tragedy.
I have been reflecting my life, or in better words, I have been taking this as a sign to open de windows and look outside. Compared to Alexander, I’m not doing bad. I’m going to work, I dragon boat, I walk in the park or the city, I’m learning new stuff and now I have to get moving concerning my career. The only thing I’m really not doing well is paying bills and doing other mail related stuff. Well, last week I paid most of my bills, but found out I lost a pile of mail. In any case, a bad case.
We’re like two silent dancers
Dancing lonley too
Seperated by time
I opened a window to come closer
But all I could find was wind
Maybe that’s why he kept the shutters closed
To evade the wind and not find I wasn’t there
So we’re dancing solo again
In quiet contemplation
Maybe one day we’ll meet
Amazing, the ability to make myself feel really very lonely. I’m almost impressed.
 |
| He looks a bit haunted. Though to me he smiles. |
In the first week his once existence jolted me to the chore. I had a few evenings falling asleep with his face in my head and waking up in the morning with him still very vividly with me. I can still recall the quiet shock caused by…by what exactly? And still. Writing this I’m almost simultaneously looking at his face on the left side of my screen and it catches my heart again. I still don’t know why. Typically, it’s a very untypical picture of him. Typical, because it seems I always first find the untypical photo. Untypical, because he’s wearing glasses. It’s the only picture of him I found in which he’s wearing glasses. What those glasses do is hiding his eyes. It gives his whole face a different look; more intellectual and sophisticated versus a bit haunted with squinting eyes.
What hasn’t changed is the offence I take when I read people calling him “ugly by appearance”. All the drawings and photo’s I’ve seen of him don’t leave the impression of an ugly man. Yes, he’s got small squinty eyes. His nose is a bit weirdly formed as is his mouth, but it’s all just minor. So minor it certainly doesn’t disturb his overall look. In some photo’s I even find him rather handsome. Neither can I imagine it would make much of a difference if the photo’s were in colour. Maybe he got a bit of a grey colour to him? It might be so. Or maybe it’s time doing that. Maybe taste has changed in such way, what was ugly then is not so ugly now. Who knows?
This is ridiculous, this pining over him. It’s ridiculous to feel anything than interest in him. Even the slightest sliver of interest in him seems somewhat out of place. He’s done nothing important. At the end of his life the only thing he did actively was hiding in his little palace. Nothing to be seen of him, nothing to be heard of him. It’s his tragedy and his tragic life and tragic being. It’s everything he could have been, but never became. It’s all things he could have done, but never did. It’s the mystery that was him and that became him. It was the mystery he fed and was fed by others and by objects and the things we never heard and we will probably never know of. It’s all that. That is Alexander’s legacy is; Mystery and tragedy.
I have been reflecting my life, or in better words, I have been taking this as a sign to open de windows and look outside. Compared to Alexander, I’m not doing bad. I’m going to work, I dragon boat, I walk in the park or the city, I’m learning new stuff and now I have to get moving concerning my career. The only thing I’m really not doing well is paying bills and doing other mail related stuff. Well, last week I paid most of my bills, but found out I lost a pile of mail. In any case, a bad case.
We’re like two silent dancers
Dancing lonley too
Seperated by time
I opened a window to come closer
But all I could find was wind
Maybe that’s why he kept the shutters closed
To evade the wind and not find I wasn’t there
So we’re dancing solo again
In quiet contemplation
Maybe one day we’ll meet
Amazing, the ability to make myself feel really very lonely. I’m almost impressed.
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Reflecting on the book “Wiwill”
Yesterday I finished reading the book about prince Willem IV, Alexander’s older brother.
To me it seems the prince’s governor, De Casembroot, really didn’t like the Queen, Sophie from Württemberg, King Willem III’s first wife, and gave a very coloured impression of her. The other way around is true too; the Queen didn’t like him much either, which might have influenced her behaviour towards De Casembroot. The book is not a very good basis to build a judgement on. Yet, I don’t like her much.
According to other sources, like the book about the Queen, to her friends she was a warm, intelligent, developed and sharp person. She might well have been, but it’s also known she found it easy to dislike people or thought them beneath her. She would behave according to her opinion on someone; not necessarily pleasant and all the above.
The only standard, in no way different view to others, is the view on the King. As is well known, the King was unpredictable, mean and unreasonable, but could also be jovial, generous and friendly. He even managed a few times to say something wise. Most of the time, however, he was the ogre we all know and love.
There were things said about Maurits, but it was so little and so insignificant, I can’t even remember it. The poor child never got a fair chance to make an impression on his own instead of being compared to his brothers who did live to be grownups.
Bol.com Google Literatuurplein
Monday, June 3, 2013
the book "Prins Wiwill"
Whether he was smart, I don’t know. According to Wiwipedia he might have been, according to other sources, which I can’t remember, he wasn’t particularly. Over the last couple of days I read, almost finished, the book “Prins Wiwill”. The book is a dramatized telling of events. Though an interesting and easy read, it does force the author’s interpretations and opinions about people and events on the reader. I wonder how many times the prince really was in tears and how many times the author decided the prince was.
One such thing, or rather person, victimized by this approach is Queen Sophie. In part the strong opinion ventilated in the book has been brought on by the prince’s personal care taker. This man, De Casembroot, has written a diary in the period he was responsible for the prince’s upbringing. The book is based on that diary. Very likely the author’s opinion about the Queen is mainly based on what De Casembroot wrote. According to De Casembroot, the Queen is a manipulative wench who’s not afraid to use everybody, including her own son, to oppose everything the King says, does and might think and does. In some accounts it is even said she was teaching her son where to lie down on the ground and how to press his ear to the floor to hear best what was going on in the room below.
I’m not sure how much of that is true. I’ve got the feeling a lot of those rumours are what they are; rumours, passed on by all the personnel. Maybe it is true, but there’s no way we’re going to see any evidence for that.
Not only the Queen doesn’t come off lightly, Prince Wiwil doesn’t come off very well either. According to the book he’s an uninspired, lazy, indifferent kid who’s suffering from tantrums and sometimes even shows behaviour foul and mad as his dad’s. Just like his mom, in this book, the view that is shed on him is pepperred in the opninions and ignorance of the time he lived in.
In both cases I believe parts of it, because I read it somewhere else, or because I observed, for as far as I can, certain behaviour before. A lot I will write off as “the view of the time”. For instance, De Casembroot is against everything Thorbeckian, which is very liberal, especially for the time. Thorbecke was once a minister in the 19th century Dutch government. He wrote the constitution we’re living on and extract our rights from to this day. I think it’s no surprise I am, to use the 19th century expression, a Thorbeckian.
In the coming week I planned to read a book about Queen Sophie, based on her letters, if I’m not mistaken. In this case I’m going to have to remind myself, Queen Sophie liked to dramatize everything. That has become very clear from the books about Wiwil and Alexander.
What will be left is to read about Willem III, their father. I think I have a fair amount of information about the man so far. What I’m interested in, in the King’s case, is why his marriage with Sophie didn’t work, but did work with Emma. What were the differences? What did Sophie do to tick the King off and what did Emma do to calm him down?
All this study is to try and understand Wiwil and Alexander. Their tragedy, especially their demise, puzzles me. Both did nothing to save themselves. More and more I start to believe Sophie has been the great cause for that. Sure, King Willem III didn’t help, yet, Queen Wilhelmina talks about her “dear father” and she turned out to be a good Queen. I know Emma has a very big hand in that one. Still, Wilhelmina’s “dear father” stands so far apart from the hatred both Wiwil and Alexander felt. Can one man really manage to have such different and strong effects on persons all by himself. Even so, could the King?
I’m not sure how much of that is true. I’ve got the feeling a lot of those rumours are what they are; rumours, passed on by all the personnel. Maybe it is true, but there’s no way we’re going to see any evidence for that.
Not only the Queen doesn’t come off lightly, Prince Wiwil doesn’t come off very well either. According to the book he’s an uninspired, lazy, indifferent kid who’s suffering from tantrums and sometimes even shows behaviour foul and mad as his dad’s. Just like his mom, in this book, the view that is shed on him is pepperred in the opninions and ignorance of the time he lived in.
In both cases I believe parts of it, because I read it somewhere else, or because I observed, for as far as I can, certain behaviour before. A lot I will write off as “the view of the time”. For instance, De Casembroot is against everything Thorbeckian, which is very liberal, especially for the time. Thorbecke was once a minister in the 19th century Dutch government. He wrote the constitution we’re living on and extract our rights from to this day. I think it’s no surprise I am, to use the 19th century expression, a Thorbeckian.
In the coming week I planned to read a book about Queen Sophie, based on her letters, if I’m not mistaken. In this case I’m going to have to remind myself, Queen Sophie liked to dramatize everything. That has become very clear from the books about Wiwil and Alexander.
What will be left is to read about Willem III, their father. I think I have a fair amount of information about the man so far. What I’m interested in, in the King’s case, is why his marriage with Sophie didn’t work, but did work with Emma. What were the differences? What did Sophie do to tick the King off and what did Emma do to calm him down?
All this study is to try and understand Wiwil and Alexander. Their tragedy, especially their demise, puzzles me. Both did nothing to save themselves. More and more I start to believe Sophie has been the great cause for that. Sure, King Willem III didn’t help, yet, Queen Wilhelmina talks about her “dear father” and she turned out to be a good Queen. I know Emma has a very big hand in that one. Still, Wilhelmina’s “dear father” stands so far apart from the hatred both Wiwil and Alexander felt. Can one man really manage to have such different and strong effects on persons all by himself. Even so, could the King?
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