Utrecht, November 2017

Hi Jitse,

The title of this post is something that we used to call in our tortuous team meetings ‘low hanging fruit’. When we were pretending that we wanted to accomplish a goal, we would say we would right away complete a few easy things to get some momentum, before moving on to the harder things, which invariably would never get done. Well, I hope this project we’re taking on actually gets seen through to the end, and the ripe produce I’m referring to would be my play on words on mourning. You wrote about your morning. And it was good. If you want to forget about the football, and tell me about your morning coffees, your morning peace, your morning routines, that’s just fine by me. Just make sure to always have that coffee. I feel I owe it to you to write about my morning coffee ritual, but since the arrival of the little one there is no such thing. I’m waking at all hours of the morning and everything is random. Sure, there is still coffee at some point, but it is often taken in haste and more often than not while performing some other pressing task. My nephew accidentally shattered my ten year old french press last month during his visit. I had to feign indifference, but sometimes that Jena press steeped my only pleasure for an entire day, and I had to take a quiet moment to grieve. Since then I’m using a Bialetti stove top Moka pot that was inherited from my old roommate Pasi after he left the Netherlands to return to Finland. It’s a model that is meant for Orzo, a caffeine free roasted grain. As far as I can tell, there’s no difference, but if I’m not making any sense it could be that the caffeine in my blood is insufficient, in which case I wouldn’t recommend you to get the Orzo Bialetti.

I’ve been in a stage of mourning myself, no, there was no large scale massacre around me, but the mourning of leaving my job and consequently a part of me. You can accuse me of being egotistical and self absorbed by comparing such a trivial thing as a career to bloodshed, but that’s how I’ve been reared. My modus operandi is about ME, and if anything it hasn’t been enough. Prior to sitting down, I had hoped to write several paragraphs about that. I told you before that a part of this writing would be a form of therapy for me, and for sure I got some bones to pick. But since I’m tired today, well, every day, but today especially so, I want to save this diatribe for when I’m percolating at a higher level.

For now I just wanted to say that these kinds of assaults on the English language, empty words followed by empty actions became all too familiar to me. You don’t want to know how many times I’ve taken a deep dive, and I’m now an expert on never letting a crisis go to waste. You must be familiar with Newspeak. It only makes sense though, we’ve replicated corporations into microcosms of the state. We have dictators at the helm, and to borrow another Orwellian theme, everyone is equal except some or more equal than others. Others extort more than others. I pretended to work, they pretended to care. And so on and so forth. That’s a taste, of what’s to come.

Alas, the football!!! We are three days away. How do you feel about it? My main source of news, the Guardian, is quite apathetic and critical of the event, and that’s kind of seeped into me. Or maybe I’m just too busy to give it a lot of thought. Let’s see if that changes once the games begin. You’re right that the value of sleep is at a premium, I haven’t yet looked at the schedule but there will be some snooze fests in there for sure. How do you intend to watch? What time do the games take place for you? Actually we don’t have a TV, so most likely I’ll be streaming on my mobile phone and asking TELE2 for more data at halftime. Heading out somewhere to watch is likely not a possibility, but even if it was, the excitement about the Orange wave of enthusiasm has waned for me, and I’d rather sit comfortably alone or with one or two friends to watch. The other problem is the mere fact that taking two, three, four hours out of a day is not feasible, so I’ll probably cherry pick the best ones during the group stages. I was also thinking of taking a page out of Angels with Dirty Faces and LISTEN to a match. That way I can also change a diaper or hang the laundry. Heck, maybe even get in that trumpet practice. It could also be an interesting experience to write about, I don’t think I’ve ever listened to a football match.

Now that I’ve brought up that book, I actually wanted to ask you about your reading experience. If you can at some point let me know what you thought of reading books by authors of the participating countries. A part of why I wanted to do that in the first place was to have some association, vague as it was, to football. And while there were a couple of stellar reads, I couldn’t help but feel a bit hampered and confined by not having absolute freedom in choosing my next book. It’s possible this restlessness was magnified by not having a lot of free time, thus when I had that sacred time to read maybe I wanted it on my own terms. And there’s some Roth’s, Houellebecq’s and others that I eagerly want to enjoy. I find it incredible that there were times over the last few years where my ‘really want to read’ list didn’t go beyond two books, I feared I wouldn’t know where to go next, but somehow it is constantly replenished and never reaches an end. If that can continue for life, it would truly be a blessing. I still don’t quite know how, or if even the books we read will factor into this writing. Maybe some ideas will come up. Let’s see. It could also be that we started that idea a little late, and I felt a little rushed to get in the books, even though we cut the list down drastically as we went on. Perhaps with a little more preparation, the exercise can be a little more, ahem, fruitful and in 2026 we start promptly to tackle 48 books. Actually, I’d also be interested in what you think of Knausgaard, the inspiration for this project. What did you think of his 2014 edition? Did you take a stab at My Struggle, or do you find him not to your liking?

Right, so I’ll have to finish for now as my time is up. If I go any longer a sense of guilt threatens, a guilt for being too long away from home where I am needed to help out with something. But I did enjoy taking the time to write, and that was one of the main purposes to start this. If I have any energy left, tonight I will go into my basement to play the trumpet. It’s a cold and rainy Dutch November night. You could not ask for better conditions to serenade, albeit poorly, my apartment block to the tune of Almost Blue.

Jack