On the Bright Side

by Hendrik Groen

  Mr Bakker could also see the possibilities, as far as coming back from the dead.

  ‘If they can do it with a mammoth, why not with me?’

  ‘If I had my druthers, I’d choose a mammoth over you,’ said Evert.

  Bakker started swearing like a banshee, until the attendant threatened to have him moved to the nursing ward.

  Saturday, 28 March

  Mrs Stelwagen has sent out a letter to all residents announcing that there is to be an attempt to set up a Residents’ Committee again. The election will be held on Friday, 1 May. Candidates may apply until 14 April.

  So Part One of our plan is in the bag. Now we can only hope and pray that no one else steps forward. If necessary, we’ll strongly dissuade any prospective candidates by pointing out all the wrangling that went on with the last committee. Evert is even prepared to resort to pressure tactics involving physical violence. That’s because he’d enjoy being able to say, ‘They sometimes call me The Nose Senior,’ in reference to Willem ‘The Nose’ Holleeder, the Netherlands’ most famous crook with the prominent nozzle. After his sisters and ex-girlfriend testified against him, the ladies here knocked The Nose off their list of ideal sons-in-law.

  Crime is always a very popular topic of conversation. If I were to make a Top Ten list of subjects most often heard over a cup of coffee or tea, it would look like this:

  The weather

  One’s own ailments

  Other people’s ailments

  Other people in general

  All that’s wrong in our care home

  What’s on the telly

  What’s wrong in the world, with emphasis on crime, both major and minor

  How expensive everything is (compared to before)

  Children and grandchildren

  The food

  New residents who arrive with a cheerful and positive outlook have to stay firmly planted on their orthotic-supported feet if they’re not to get sucked, slowly but surely, into the slough of grievances and complaints.

  The Old-But-Not-Dead’s first action, once we represent the Residents’ Committee, will be to establish complaint-free zones.

  Sunday, 29 March

  Stormy weather: rain and cold. No sign of spring. I think I have an attack of gout coming on again. Antoine had a fall and bruised a couple of ribs.

  There, I have just given you the top three from yesterday’s list.

  I shall get nice and drenched later today on my Sunday scooter ride with Geert. We have made a bet: whichever of us spots the first duckling wins a chocolate Easter egg. I’ve already bought an Easter egg, to be on the safe side, since if the first baby-duck doesn’t show up until Easter’s over, it will be too late to buy one. We didn’t think of that when we agreed on the wager.

  ‘It’s a bit like the Catholics and the Protestants in the old days,’ Mr Dickhout said in summary of the conflict between the Sunnis and the Shiites. That did bring some clarity, because people found ‘all that business with those Arabs’ very hard to understand.

  ‘One faction is for Ali, and the other for Abu,’ Dickhout went on. He must have looked it up on Wikipedia (he belongs to the small contingent of iPad owners), which sect was which, he’d already forgotten. ‘Yes, well, nobody really knows. Not even those folks themselves.’

  I am very happy that the Catholics and Protestants buried the hatchet a good while ago and that we in the Netherlands don’t have to deal with the most extreme of the Christian Bible-thumpers. In Zeeland and the Veluwe region we still have some strict Calvinists who are forbidden to watch the telly except in secret, but they don’t really bother anyone. I have no use for Islamic fundamentalists, and Ali and Abu can get stuffed as far as I’m concerned.

  Monday, 30 March

  In spite of the stormy weather, Geert and I went for a drive through Waterland once the worst downpours finally let up a bit. We scanned the ditches to see if we could spot the first mama duck with her ducklings all in a row. Since I was paying more attention to the ditch than to where I was going, I swerved off the bike path, coming to an abrupt stop in the deep mud on the verge. I almost went flying over the handlebars into the muck, but was just able to hold on. Got off scot-free, though a bit shaken, but my steed was stuck fast in the mud. Ten metres ahead, Geert nearly split his sides laughing at my flummoxed face as I looked round for help. In the end I was forced to climb off my perch and wade through the sucking clay to the path. There we stood, Geert and I, staring helplessly at a stranded scooter.

  After a few minutes a car drew up beside us. A farmer, from the way he was dressed – boots, overalls and cap – got out.

  ‘It’s a good thing I’m wearing my wellies,’ he grunted. I started on a longwinded explanation of how it had happened, but that didn’t interest him much. Without further ado, he began pushing and pulling.

  ‘That’s good and stuck, that is.’

  In the end he attached a chain to my scooter and used his car to pull it out of the mud very carefully.

  ‘There you are, then,’ he said, nodding at my steed. I started thanking him profusely, but he didn’t consider it necessary.

  ‘Yeah, it’s OK now. Cheerio.’ He raised a hand as big as a shovel, climbed back in his car and drove off.

  ‘It would have made a better photo if he’d been in a tractor,’ Geert chuckled.

  We turned and rode home. I was still a little shaken. At home we raised a glass of cognac to the fortunate outcome. Evert almost fell out of his wheelchair laughing when I told him. He pointed at my feet: tell-tale mud tracked all over the carpet, and my good Sunday shoes hardly recognizable under all the sludge.

  Actually, I have no idea when the first ducklings are supposed to emerge from their eggs. Not until May, maybe?

  Tuesday, 31 March

  Old people have an above-average fondness for vla, or custard pudding. It’s nice and sweet, inexpensive, and you don’t need your teeth in order to eat it. Vanilla and chocolate custard are high on the list, but the indisputable favourite is vlaflip, which is like trifle. All those new-fangled puds, if you ask us, are just stupid fads.

  In many a room the little fridge always contains a carton of custard, for when you’re feeling peckish. And the kitchenware drawer always has an old-fashioned bottle-scraper spatula. It’s a pity that the custard doesn’t come in glass bottles any more, but in cartons. If only the cartons were round; then you’d still be able to flick out the last remnants, but they’re square, so there’s always some custard stuck in the corners. True penny-pinchers will cut the carton open to scrape up the very last spoonful.

  These important aspects of the pudding conundrum were raised at teatime, in response to a report about a new coating for the inside of food cartons.

  ‘Won’t it leave bits of lubricant in your pudding?’ wondered Mrs Van Diemen.

  The word ‘lubricant’ generated some appalled looks; Mrs Van Diemen blushed.

  No, we’re not that keen on those new cartons. Especially not if everything tastes of lubricant from now on.

  People are longing for warmer weather, but the spring is hesitant. The bulbs are starting to push up everywhere, but they’re not in much of a hurry. Young sunlight on old bones is one of the best antidotes to depression. It’s as effective as the pills many of the residents swallow to keep their spirits up a bit. Too much sun isn’t desirable either, of course. It’s a delicate balance; the window of happiness is but narrow.

  Wednesday, 1 April

  ‘Right, I know, I know, my shoe is untied. I still know what day it is, you know.’ Two minutes later, Mr Dickhout tripped over his shoelace. His fall was broken by a planter, but his collision with the sansevieria left him with a nasty cut.

  The sansevieria, or ‘mother-in-law’s tongue’, has brilliantly outlived every plant fad of the past forty years here. You can’t kill them. Evert once experimented with killing a sansevieria in an orange pot dating from the 1960s, but with little success. He tried putting it out of its misery by feeding it coffee, so
y sauce and bock beer, although in inconspicuous amounts, to avoid detection. The soy sauce seemed to have the most effect, because a couple of those long pointy leaves did turn brown, but it went on sending up new shoots all the same. Evert gave up in the end. This mother-in-law wasn’t worth risking a temporary banishment from the home. That was the punishment he once received for sticking some cups and saucers together with superglue. It created a huge mess, because people tried pulling the cup and saucer apart with the coffee still in it. Mrs De Roos, arriving on the scene, spotted a tube of superglue sticking out of Evert’s pocket. Even Evert saw no point in trying to deny it. He was banned from the premises for a week, forced to spend seven long days cooped up in his sheltered flat.

  I went to visit him several times, of course. Even he had to concede the joke had gone a bit off the rails.

  ‘It was never my intention for anyone to burn themselves on the hot coffee, naturally,’ he admitted.

  ‘But it was rather to be expected,’ I said primly, letting out the schoolmaster who forever resides inside me. I wasn’t headmaster of a primary school for thirty-five years for nothing.

  Thursday, 2 April

  Mrs Hoensbroek leaves at 9:30 sharp every day for the HEMA down the street. There she buys one napoleon. Snow, ice or Code Orange or Red are the only reasons she’ll stay home. For those rare occasions she keeps a couple of napoleons in the freezer compartment. At 10.15 a.m. she sits down at a table in the lounge and unwraps her little cake. Then she waits until the tea lady arrives with the coffee, about 10.30 a.m. Only after she’s had her first sip of coffee does she pick up her cake fork and start tackling a corner of her napoleon. The pink top layer fails to give way, so that the pudding layer is squeezed out on all sides. Then she tries the other end, with the same result. Next Mrs Hoensbroek decides to pick up the cake with her fingers, and takes a little nibble. That works, although it does dribble blobs of yellow pudding all over the tablecloth and her dress, which she calmly proceeds to scrape off with her coffee spoon. Finally she licks the pink icing from her sticky fingers. Sedately, one finger at a time.

  ‘You just can’t win, can you, with a napoleon,’ said Mr Helder. And after a short pause, ‘The same goes for mimeo machines.’ He’s right: you always end up smeared with either pudding or ink.

  Mr Helder is a wise man, and a nice bloke too. The next time someone in the Club dies, I’ll propose him as a new member.

  There are some inmates who get frightfully annoyed at the daily napoleon ritual. They could, of course, go and sit at another table, but it isn’t that simple; it’s their table, after all. They were sitting there every morning long before Hoensbroek first decided to join them. Earlier this week one of them asked, ‘Can’t you take your napoleon and go sit somewhere else?’

  ‘I certainly can,’ she answered with a tight little laugh, ‘but I won’t.’

  On Queen’s Day the residents used to receive a festive orange napoleon. The filling would squirt everywhere, all over the carpets, and get stuck in the grey hair. Shortly after Willem-Alexander was crowned King, the director discontinued the napoleons. People are still expressing outrage about it, but not when she’s within earshot.

  Friday, 3 April

  ‘Have you heard? The English Queen’s palace staff are going on strike.’

  No, I hadn’t heard. The loyalists amongst us are terrified that Elizabeth may soon have to clean her own toilet-throne and mop the floor on her royal knees.

  I wonder if she’s ever carried a pail of soapy water? Fetched a loaf of bread from the bakery? Maybe she’s never even had to make her own sandwich.

  It appears that the exorbitantly wealthy British Queen pays her staff below the minimum wage. I mustn’t rush to judgement, however, since all this information comes from the gossip in the lounge, hardly a reliable source.

  On Good Friday you don’t see very many gaily coloured frocks. The prevailing mood is dark. This afternoon there’s a special service in the meditation room, which draws many of the residents every year. I may even join them this afternoon. On religious holidays the old priest and the old vicar team up. Ever since the vicar confessed to me that he no longer believes in God, we’ve had a special bond, atheists amongst ourselves. We’ll occasionally get together over a bottle of wine, with art and food the main topics of discussion. He is extremely well versed in both. His speciality is films dealing with food. Sub-speciality: glamorous film stars. Most of his favourite leading ladies are dead, which sometimes makes him a bit melancholy, but the most beautiful one of all is still alive.

  ‘Claudia Cardinale would be a reason to start believing in God again, if I were permitted to spend just one afternoon in her company when I got to heaven.’

  After the service, we have a special activity: Easter egg painting in the recreation room. The eggs are rather on the small side for the shaky motor skills of most of the artists, but the participants are kind when they judge one another’s work. Someone will say, ‘Very whimsical,’ not, ‘What’s that supposed to be?’

  Saturday, 4 April

  Yesterday afternoon a little girl was wandering down the corridor with her doll and pram. She opened my door, stepped inside and said, ‘Hello, Mr Grandpa.’

  ‘Hello, miss, what’s your name?’

  ‘I’m not a miss, I’m Frida.’

  I said I thought it was a beautiful name, and asked if she had come to visit me. No, she was just giving her doll a tour of the home. Picking up her doll, which turned out to have just one leg, she carried it about the room, pointing out things it should look at.

  I asked her how old she was, and who she was visiting. She was six, and Mrs Quint was her granny.

  I would have liked to ask how such a delightful little girl could possibly have such an old sourpuss for a granny, but I didn’t, naturally. We spent a little while chatting. Silvia was her favourite doll, and she loved pancakes.

  I said I loved pancakes too, and that my best friend also only had one leg. It didn’t bother Frida.

  ‘What do you like best about yourself?’ she suddenly asked.

  ‘Well, uh, I’ve never really given it much thought, to tell you the truth.’

  She cocked her head sideways and looked at me quizzically. To give myself some time to think, I asked what she liked best about herself.

  ‘That I have a little brother. Do you have a little brother?’

  ‘Oh, here you are!’ Frida’s mother stomped in through the open door with a great deal of noise, grabbed the child by the hand and dragged her off. A little nod in my direction was the least she might have done. But no.

  ‘Well, Frida, I very much enjoyed your visit,’ I said as the girl was being tugged out of the room. She looked over her shoulder and waved.

  ‘See you next time,’ she sang out.

  Sunday, 5 April

  It’s Easter and we have Easter brunch later this morning. Every deviation from the daily routine causes a great deal of upset and confusion. A meal that’s neither breakfast nor lunch, for instance.

  ‘When exactly are you supposed to eat, then?’ asked Mrs Smit.

  No one really knew.

  ‘How about just eating whatever you like, whenever you feel like it?’ Antoine suggested.

  Well, nobody had thought of that option, but it might be a good idea.

  The prohibition against eating too many eggs was recently lifted. It appears that whole cholesterol thing isn’t all it was cracked up to be. One egg more or less doesn’t make that much of a difference, according to the latest guidelines. Convenient, isn’t it, coming so close to Easter. Mr Bakker has announced that he will attempt to beat his personal best of six eggs in one sitting.

  Yesterday I spotted my first two ducklings. Which means that I won the bet. Geert presented me with a chocolate Easter bunny. We finished it between us. At this stage we aren’t too worried about our weight. Geert is fat and I am thin, and that’s unlikely to change very much any more.

  What do I like best about myself? The
question has been preying on my mind ever since Frida asked me yesterday, although it has never in my eighty-five years occurred to me before. An important question nonetheless. Especially when combined with the opposite: what do you like least about yourself?

  I’ll ignore external features, such as big ears or bow legs. Or even nice grey hair. I’ll confine myself to character traits. It isn’t easy to give an honest answer. I wish I had a chance to talk it over it with Frida.

  Monday, 6 April

  This afternoon, Easter Monday, I’ll take off when all the children and grandchildren come to visit their relatives. I shall go for a ride by myself, since Geert is expecting his daughters. The weather is nice enough to stay away for a good while. I’ll head for the Twiske, a modest but bucolic nature reserve between Oostzaan and Landsmeer. I’ll have to be careful, however: the bicycle paths will be congested. There’s a café to the north with a waterside terrace, where I’ll treat myself to a cup of coffee and a slice of Easter cake. So as not to feel sorry for myself. It’s a bit lonesome, really.

  It is high time for another Old-But-Not-Dead outing again, and fortunately there’s one in the pipeline for next Wednesday. Antoine and Ria are the organizers. An endearing pair. After fifty-eight years of marriage, you’ll still find them side by side on the sofa, holding hands. Sometimes, seeing that happy couple, their bond undiminished by age, I worry about the day one of them dies and leaves the other behind alone and broken-hearted.

  I am in a bit of a funk these days. Maybe I should ask the doctor for a pill to jolly me up a bit. Maybe all I have to do is wait for the season to change. It’s not unusual for me to feel tired and low in the spring.