March 31, 2003 : chill relapse.

Well it's cold again. It looked like it was going to be a beautiful day, and in all reality it was; beautiful. But chilly. It's the classic warm-in-the-sunshine but coat and scarf in the shade. I suppose that's just a subtle reminder from the universe that it's only March which is almost April.

I went for a walk in the afternoon and tried to act out something I read recently about supporting your own community. (community being neighborhood.) I don't know where I read it or if it was from a notable source, but the concept was simply "buy local and in more than one place." I suppose it means if you can buy bread, cigarettes, flowers, vegetables, and milk at the supermarket instead of buying it all at the supermarket, you should buy your bread from the baker, the cigarettes from the corner newsstand, the flowers from a flower-shop, the veggies at the local Turkish market, and milk at the supermarket.

We'll see how long this latest idea of mine carries on. I just don't want to get in the habit, now that we have the car, to only buy from super-winkels. That'd be so easy to get in the habit of doing. Like us starting to buy water bottles in bulk or something. (We currently buy a new water-bottle once every 2 months and then refill it and stick it back in the fridge. Once the label has peeled away and the sides are sticky we buy a new bottle and recycle the old one.)

Well today I bundled up and went for a short walk around my neighborhood. I put this theory into action and bought yogurt and bananas (slightly over-ripe ones) at the supermarket and my newspaper (Wablief) across the street. I chatted with the checkout lady and we've both decided that I have to practice my vlaams with her each and every time I checkout--another person I'll avoid. (slight joke)

While I was getting ready for school I heard a commotion outside so as usual, from my third-floor (state-side, 2nd floor here) advantage-point, I can spy on others but not have them spy on me. Some stupid kids (same in any country) had been walking down the street and kicked the trash bag (prematurely set out) out into the street. Apparently I'm getting old or have never been the sort of person that thought kicking trash-bags was fun and/or funny. So there's a trash-bag out in the middle of the street which means that any moment now our delightfully clean street is going to be trashed up all in one instant. (this all happens in the span of 15 seconds or so, not long enough for me to run downstairs and save the trash-bag.)

A Mercedes approaches, stops, an older man gets out of the car, curses the kids (who are still walking), gives them the finger-less finger fist-in-the-air, puts the trash-bag back on the sidewalk, and then drives away. It was the last thing I expected to see and though I did side with him that the kids were "stupid kids" it was great to see that he was a "smart guy."

I got ready for school and headed there in the little Micra. Since our time changed yesterday the whole mood of the roads was different. It was the same time as last week, only twice as much sun and furthermore twice as much traffic. It's not really rush-hour, it's post-rushhour, but the traffic on the highway still looks dreadfully bumper-to-bumper and I'm pleased enough that I have only city-streets on which to maneuver.

School was a bit chaotic as well, the first part of the class seemed to last forever, but the post-pauze seemed to only last a few minutes. We talked about April 1st jokes and learned about the past tense, something I've been waiting for for months now. It could just be the thing that gives me another burst of zeal for learning Nederlands. Something about being able to say "I've done, I do, I will do" seems great to me. It opens up a whole other realm of language possibilities!

When I got home Eva and I headed to the frituur to get me an already-fixed meal. It was already nearly 10 so fries seemed better than fixing an entire meal. Eva also prodded me into ordering the entire thing for myself. I know that sounds completely ridiculous, and no wonder I don't feel more comfortable seeing as how I have lived here for a year and a half and make her order for me nearly every time. (it has gotten significantly better in the past few months) She was beaming when we collected my take-away and left. It was like I was her clumsy ballerina who she considered to be a dancing queen. (well something like that!) And I like making her so happy...I suppose I'll start speaking more and more.

We watched the last remaining bits of Inspector Morse and then settled in with some fake Baileys to discuss my end-of-year show in greater detail. I'm having problems with the validity of the journal vs. the validity of the installations. I think the installations have more weight as projects whereas the journal seems very journal-like and really for my own good. It does happen to be live, but the live part is more for accountability than access. I would have never done a journal for an entire year had I simply done it on my own--in long-hand or speed-typing. Eva thinks the projects have a great tie-together red-line of the journal, and though I agree, I can't say I have all of the confidence required to make the journal into literature. That sounds pretty big-headed of me if I were to attempt that. It's only really words, slightly edited to protect the protectable, though not for the most part, I swear. All I wanted was to hit record and so it's still recording--though only for a couple of weeks more, and after that, well I don't really know if I'll continue on, though it is fun to look back and see "what we did this time last year."

Since it's trash-night, we loaded up our own trash and chucked it out the window. (kidding, it's already April 1st here, and so I suppose that's the first of the April 1st jokes) Just when the trash-bag was almost full I told Eva to "grab the Quick bag" from our mid-day Quick meal in Waterloo. She remarked something fabulous in reference to trash. "Funny how the Quick bag is nearly 1/10 of our trash for a whole week." Yes, Eva, that is funny isn't it.

IN THE NEWS:
The first identified victims of the 1995 Srebrenica slaughter — Europe's worst civilian massacre since World War II — were buried Monday at the site where their relatives last saw them alive.