No Grandma in Amsterdam

It’s been almost one month in Amsterdam, but it feels like three months. The days go by too quick here, and yet I’ve learned much and have seen so many things every single day. 15 hours of being awake feels like a week. Am I repeating myself?

I’m happy floating from one event to the next event, going to the club where Mom’s a DJ, or stop and be still as everything moves around me and I appreciate that fact. Life always happens when you are making plans, as John Lennon said so well. You can never be fully prepared for what life hands you, and every single morning, when you wake and take a breath, make a conscious decision to either live life authentically and passionately or you can relish in the day to day activities without ever using your brain or your heart. I hope I never grow so tired or apathetic that I begin to choose the latter, whether it’s a mindful decision or not. I’m pontificating…cest la vie.

My Grandma passed away and that hit me really hard. The irony of it is that only a few months ago, I was pouring myself into this course called ‘Death and Dying’ and I spent my 23rd birthday at a funeral home. I was doing a group interview with the funeral director. I even wrote a sermon on Grief and planned my own funeral. I wrote papers on what to say to someone who had just lost someone close to them, and after my Grandma died, those sayings seemed hollow. But my last days with her before coming here to Amsterdam were wonderful. Irony, right?  It still was a good lesson anyway.

I was emailing with a friend who’s in his second year of seminary and he asked me if I could recommend one of the five star Amsterdam hotels as he plans to come by and visit me. I told him he can stay with Mom and me, but he preferred a hotel room. His mother just died 6 months ago, so we’ve felt simpatico with each other ever since. I miss Grandma.

Tags: Death and Dying, five star Amsterdam hotels