Adjusting to closed doors

“Should we continue with Thursday Doors through this current Covid-19 pandemic?” That’s what #ThursdayDoor creator Norm asked in his weekly (door) post yesterday. Most participants were eager to keep going, even if dooscursions are impossible for many of us now. It looks like we’ll keep up the door posting, in any way we can make it work. If we can’t visit outdoors, we can at least visit each other’s doors. And feel part of our loving door community. And help each other with some beauty and human contact.

For me, these are strange times. Life had just gotten back to almost normal after months of broken foot immobility. I was working again, and earning money. I could ride my bicycle again and go places. I could go for walks, not too far and not too fast. And now I’m back to being almost house bound.

I’m not complaining. In my household everyone is healthy. My partner works from home and is still able to provide income for us. My son is not really enthusiastic about having to follow a schedule for homeschooling, but once he likes to learn in general, so not all of it is a struggle.

I guess I’m still in the adjustment phase. Trying to get used again to staying at home so much. Finding my way through the worries I have for people around me. My sister’s family is in quarantine, and both she and her partner are ill. They won’t get tested, there are not enough tests in the country to test everyone with flu-like symptoms.

I find it hard to concentrate on my work. The normally quiet house is filled with people with their own schedule, their own needs, their own plan. My partner is calm, collected and focused. I hope something of that will rub off on me 🙂

For now, I’m listening to Mongolian heavy metal with my headphones on, enjoying the regularity of searching for doors and inspiration for a blog post. I may go out for a walk later, we’re still allowed to as long as we keep our distance to other walkers.

Stay safe everyone! Let’s get through this together.

Last doors

Drop
stolen chewing marks
from the balcony

Burn everything
but the doors

Claim stabilised stairs
your source of power

And seek
the end of
– my pharmaceutical lab

Norm asked us to de a review of our Thursday Doors this year, and post our favourite ones. Since I have only participated for some months, I wondered what I could do instead. I got an idea when I visited Dan’s post.

I put all my door pictures next to each other, and tried to use them as prompts for a poem. Each picture a wod or a line. This is the result.

Happy holidays everyone, and see you next year!

Quintessentially Dutch

I identify more
with riding a bike
than with being Dutch
which makes me
very – very – very
Dutch

I was able to make pictures of this windmill this weekend, thinking ahead for #ThursdayDoors. But what to write about windmills, to turn it into a post for #OctPoWriMo too? I ended up writing about being Dutch. I can assure you it’s really, really, really strange for me to not be able to ride my bike. I’m in my 16th week of not being able to cycle due to my broken foot, and it influences my life immensely. Basically I’m going nowhere. Can’t walk, so no public transport. Can’t use my foot, so not riding a bike. No car driving either. Luckily people take me out for walks, pushing me in a wheel chair (which I could loan through our Dutch health care system).

Tomorrow I will have to find a way to write about the GoFundMe page a friend set up for me. It’s no use having one if I don’t dare to share it…

 

Waiting for fulfillment

Time was here
but didn’t tell
just one of the uninvited guests
invited to witness and celebrate
the turning of the eons –
dawn and dusk collided
shadows created shapes of light
the horizon peered at me
clapping, opening up
the space of freshly baked paint
peeling unnecessary layers

Time is here
I am not separated from my people
grief and pity join us
laughter and play unite
neither nos nor yesses
either shoulds or coulds
whoweare is not divided

Time will be here
the square root of an emotion
equals travel in space and time
mere metal materialising dreams
flawless dimensions, hard to perceive
infinity unknown
DNA passing on messages in tongues
waiting for fulfillment

I’m on my own prompt for #OctPoWriMo today. And joining #ThursdayDoors. I’ll explain.

In Zagreb this morning at 10 AM a workshop started, that I would have loved to attend. It’s called Transgenerational Haunting, and I’ve attended it in Amsterdam in June. It was incredibly healing and enriching. I can’t be in Zagreb, due to a broken foot and financial issues. But I CAN picture myself there in the workshop, because I was there last year (and wrote poems).  So I decided to attend the workshop in spirit, from my own house.

In the Amsterdam workshop I got to know a poem by Czeslaw Milosz, called Late Ripeness.  My poem today was written after reading that poem again, creating my own associations line by line, in the spirit of the workshop. I recommend reading the Milosz’s poem. When I looked it up, I read that “Czeslaw Milosz ranks among the most respected figures in twentieth-century Polish literature, as well as one of the most respected contemporary poets in the world: he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1980”.

I’ve decided to also use this poem for #ThursdayDoors, a fun and inspiring initiative hosted by Norm. I remember clearly how the very first picture I took in Zagreb was of a door. In a less literal sense, the workshop in Zagreb last year opened the door for me to start a new education. I simply wanted more of this.

So, now I’m here, with my broken foot. Logic says I can’t go to Spain for my education this year. My heart refuses that logic, and still searched for ways to attend. I want the learning, I want the connection, I want the healing. I’m filled with desire. Which I usually find a scary place to be. At the moment I prefer it over denial of the desire, or accepting the very possible reality of not going. IF I end up going, against the odds, I promise to take pictures of doors!

 

Thursday door – 3

This door was hiding something. Scroll down to find out what!

Mode d’emploi

To be me
To feel me
To experience me
To acknowledge me
To accept me
To allow me
To love me

To be me
To feel me being me
To experience me feeling me
To acknowledge me experiencing me
To accept me acknowledging me
To allow me accepting me
To love me allowing me
To love me loving me

To be me
To be me feeling me
To be me experiencing me
To be me acknowledging me
To be me accepting me
To be me allowing me
To be me loving me

To feel me
To feel me being me
To feel me feeling me
To feel me experiencing me
To feel me acknowledging me
To feel me accepting me
To feel me allowing me
To feel me loving me

To experience me
To experience me being me
To experience me feeling me
To experience me experiencing me
To experience me acknowledging me
To experience me accepting me
To experience me allowing me
To experience me loving me

To acknowledge me
To acknowledge me being me
To acknowledge me feeling me
To acknowledge me experiencing me
To acknowledge me acknowledging me
To acknowledge me accepting me
To acknowledge me allowing me
To acknowledge me loving me

To accept me
To accept me being me
To accept me feeling me
To accept me experiencing me
To accept me acknowledging me
To accept me accepting me
To accept me allowing me
To accept me loving me

To allow me
To allow me being me
To allow me feeling me
To allow me experiencing me
To allow me acknowledging me
To allow me accepting me
To allow me allowing me
To allow me loving me

To love me
To love me being me
To love me feeling me
To love me experiencing me
To love me acknowledging me
To love me accepting me
To love me allowing me
To love me loving me

Today the poem came first, then I went looking for a door to go with it. After all, participating in Thursday Doors needs a door! This poem/exploration felt like a prayer to me. So I decided to go look for church doors in my city. Then I realised church doors, when closed, have a rather impermeable quality. They’re there to protect what’s inside. So I realised I wanted to go look for welcoming doors, and make that my quest. A door that says “come in”. Or, even better, “come in I love you”.

Since I tend to practical, I wondered if that could be combined with buying fresh bread. With going to the library. With whatever that’s on my to do list. And I remember how this poem started… The original title was ‘to be list’. I think I need to go outside to be instead of to do.

Today’s #ThursdayDoors brought me a lovely quest. What looked like a boring door with nothing but emptiness behind it, turned out to be interesting and fun. The dinosaurs will be travelling to Enschede to day, which is about a two hour drive. I smile when I picture the cars who will meet this unusual convoy, and the children (0-99) in there who’ll be as surprised and happy as I was to meet them.

To-d’s door

The door to do
doesn’t differ
from the door to don’t
both have handles
the deceiving difference
is their paint

I’ve seen Manja‘s Thursday doors so may times, that when I saw this beautiful door in Denmark I thought of her straight away. When I told her I had a door to share with her, she invited me to share it for Thursday doors. I hadn’t thought of that yet, but I liked the idea. I then had the choice between two blogs: here, where I share my poems. Or on the blog where I share posts as procrastination coach. I thought a poem would be more fun 🙂 I considered using an old poem that features doors, but I felt this beautiful door deserved a new poem.

This picture of the door is mine. I’ve found a picture of the full door here.

As a bonus, a song that came to my mind when I thought about the Dutch word for door, which is deur The refrain says: After every door you open, there’s another one you close. And that’s how you remain hidden, it’s never more than a tip of the veil that gets lifted. The songwriter who wrote the text is a wizzard with the Dutch language. My translation doesn’t do him justice.