I’m leaving for France this afternoon. Slight fear has kept me company since yesterday. Spent the day with friends and family; running from one Dutch city to another to enjoy their company and say my goodbyes. It scares me how everything is changing so quickly; it left me inert. Like a train coming into a station, it rests for some time but it knows not too get too cozy because it is leaving again in a couple of minutes. It’s tired but time is ticking to its next schedule. Before it has to leave again to another world, another reality.

I guess I am still rather scared, I have to admit, but I think it helps when I realize that I myself is the conductor who set the schedule. The one and only person who are able to write the time and destinations on the board. That no matter how hard it may seem at the time, I wouldn’t have it otherwise.

A funny thing happened last night when I was waiting for my train back to Rotterdam. It wasn’t coming for another 20minutes so I decided to be a loner and sit all the way at the end of the perron. It was before I took my seat that I noticed that the red plastic seats are lightly engraved; travelling quotes to accompany travelers as they wait for their trains. It quickly amused me, and before long I was reading through it with a smile. It was what I needed, and the unexpectedness of the encounter baffled me, leaving traces of joy in that cold, rainy and windy night in Holland.

I think I am ready to go.


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The soul of a journey is liberty, liberty to think, feel and do as one pleases. –Unknown