26/06/2005

One of my oldest memories is something which happened about 28 years ago. I was 4 years old and it was my first schoolday. It was only a short walk from our house to the school. My mother brought me there and standing amidst the other children at the schoolyard I waved at her cheerfully when she left. I remember a lot of those children were crying. They wanted to go home. I didn’t. I jumped into the sandbox and started digging. Maybe I build a castle. I don’t remember. My memorie stops here.

Years later, my mother told me she remembered that day very well. When she left me at the schoolyard she cried the whole way home and felt terrible the rest of the day. Not because she had to leave me there but because I seemed to have forgotten her the moment I entered school.

I have never been very good at saying goodbye. My friends throw parties when they move house or go for a trip around the world. When they finish their studies or emigrate. I lived in Ireland, in France, in Germany, I finished two studies and I never threw a party. I never said goodbye.

I remember the day I arrived here. It was dark and cold, we had driven for two days and were rather tired. There seemed to be no end to the road from the trainstation to the centre of town. We found the Bridge Guard Residency, unpacked the car and made our first walk through the streets of Sturovo/Parkany. I looked around and felt at home. This is where I wanted to be.

And I still do. I feel at home. I love being here. But Friday I will leave and I won’t say goodbye. I won’t cry. I will simply go. I will enter my house in Amsterdam and it will feel like I’ve never left it. Which is true. Because I haven’t. Just like I never left my house in Ireland, in France, in Germany. Just like I never left my mothers house on that first schoolday. I am still there. Because I felt at home there.

Next Friday I will leave. But I will stay. I won’t say goodbye. I only say thank you. Thank you all for making me feel at home.