mijn eerste graded paper, The things I carry

Ok, ik had beloofd mijn eerste grote paper ook online te zetten. Dus hier is ie dan.

Ik zal even uitleggen hoe en wat. Het begon met het lezen van het boek van Tim O´Brien The things they carried. Een boek over wat de soldaten in Vietnam allemaal bij zich moesten dragen, echte spullen maar ook gevoelens. Daarna gaf onze lerares wat voorbeelden, over bijvoorbeeld iemand die een eetafwijking had en zichzelf te dik vond en daarom altijd tissues bij zich had omdat daar wel vezels maar geen calorieën in zitten. Of iemand die suïcidaal was en daarom altijd een scheermesje bij zich had. Op dit moment had ik echt zoiets van wat moet ik in vredesnaam gaan schrijven. Ik ben een gewone jongen, ik heb niet zoiets raars bij me. Dus uiteindelijk heb ik besloten om te schrijven wat ik bij me droeg toen ik in Düsseldorf op het vliegtuig stapte.

Gerrit-Jan Justin Voortman
Professor Kraszewski
College writing 101
23-September-2010

The things I carry:
Monday, August 23 2010, Düsseldorf International Airport.“That will be 55 Euros please”, said the old, gray lady behind the desk. 55 Euros, the way she said it makes it seem like a lot of money to pay to bring one extra suitcase on a plane. One extra suitcase, with extra shirts, extra sweaters, extra socks, extra shorts, extra pants, extra pajamas. The same stuff I already have with me in my other suitcase. Most of it, at least. This extra suitcase also carries pictures, of my family and of my dog, and a digital picture frame my friends gave me. With over 300 pictures of them. Pictures that I can look at when I feel alone. Pictures that remind me of my wonderful family and great friends. This extra suitcase carries even more. Good luck cards from all my friends and family. With messages like, “we are going to miss you”, “Good luck and good health in the U.S”. Two of them are special to me. A large poem from my father, mother, and brother about how they are going to miss me, but also how proud they are that I am going to do this and that they will support me as much as they can. The other one is from my grandma saying, “Justin, Good luck and above all good health in the United States. Love, grandma and grandpa as he lives on in our memories”.

Grandpa passed away just a few months ago. He passed away on the day that I graduated from high school. The best day of the year and the worst day of the year. I never thought that a person can be so happy and so sad in twenty-four hours time. It was hard missing the grandpa I always knew. It was even harder, because I will not be able to tell him my stories when I get back. He told me earlier how much he would like that, seeing one of his grandsons coming back from the U.S. He would be so proud. I know he will be proud anyway. He was proud when he heard I was graduated, together with my two cousins who also graduated that week. I know he was, although he could not show it anymore. Lying in the hospital, in his bed, hooked up to all those machines. In his mind he was proud. When I forget, I just look at that little message on my desk. 55 Euros, that is not even that much for such a suitcase.

I also carry a bag. In that bag I carry my laptop. A new Acer Aspire with an high-quality Crystal Eye optimized webcam. So I can Skype with my parents and with my friends, keep in touch with them even though I am 6500 km away. In the bag I also carry some candy, Dutch candy to remind me of my home, and two extra thick books. Dan Browns most famous book The Da Vinci Code and its predecessor Angels and Demons. Those two are real page turners and that is what I need on this long trip because I have to spend 13 hours on a plane, all on my own.

These are not the only things I carry with me, in my head I carry far more than any suitcase or bag could carry. I carry this room in my head. With eighteen years of my life. Eighteen years living in the Netherlands, eighteen years living in Rijssen. That small town I grew up in. The town where I learned to walk, learned to talk, and learned to cycle. The town where I learned to play and the town where I learned to go out and party, sometimes until late at night. The town where I learned to play tennis. The town where I learned to learn. The first of these things I learned at my elementary school in Rijssen and later I learned the rest at my high school which was also in Rijssen. The last three years, I had to learn in another town, called Nijverdal, because that is where the other building of our high school was. I learned a lot in all those years, knowledge and facts, geography, history, math, everything they teach in school, but I also learned how to make friends.

The first friends I had at my elementary school. Where we would go out and play together. Hide and seek or bicycle races around the block, on my little yellow bike with extra thick wheels so I would not fall, when the weather was nice. When the weather was not nice we would play inside with Lego or miniature cars. Although when we grew up and had to go to high school I lost sight of most of them. Most of my friends, but not all. I still had some friends from elementary school, but I also gained new friends at high school. We did not play anymore though. We would hang out because children play and we were not children anymore. We came together to study, to do what we had to and we came together to chill and do what we wanted to. We gathered quite the group together in those six years of high school. A group where we could share the fun in our lives, birthdays, Easter, New Years, but also a group where one could get support when he or she needed it in hard times, when it was going bad at school, or when a family member or close relative was sick. That group is what I have to leave behind now, I cannot carry them with me, at least not physically. That is why I carry them with me, in that room up in my head.

Friends are not the only people I carry with me in that room. I also carry my family. Father and Mother, the two people who raised me and who taught me the facts of life. Who punished me when I did something bad. Not because they wanted to, but because it was for the best. Father and Mother who rewarded me when I did something good. Not because it was for the best, but because they wanted to. Father and Mother, whom I never lived without. Who were always there when I got back from school. Who cooked my meals and did my laundry. Who I could always talk to when something was bothering me or just when I needed someone to talk to. Father and Mother, whom I also have to leave behind. Physically, but in my room I will always carry them around.

I have even more family. I have a brother, an older brother, he is three years older than me. A brother with whom I had a fierce past. We fought a lot when we were kids. We fought about toys, we fought about our Lego, we fought about whose turn it was to play on the computer. When I was 6 we fought using our mouths, shouting at each other. When I was 12 the mouths became fists, because we were bigger. When I was 16 the fists became hands, because we had grown up. Two hands reaching out for each other. Two brothers who helped each other out in hard times and laughed together in the good ones. Of course we fought every once in a while, of course we had an argument now and then. But that is because you can only argue, with the ones you like. You can only hate, the ones you love. If you do not love someone, you do not bother hating them either. If you love someone that love will always win eventually and then you will come out stronger. Two brothers working together at the same place, every Saturday from 7 a.m. till 4 p.m. doing our job, washing trucks. In the summer when it was hot, we fooled around with the water, but in the winter we literally froze our hands. We did it together, felt the same. We did our job, even in the cold and even in the early mornings. We worked hard, but we were also talking about what to do that night. Where to go out. He was the brother with whom I could talk about the things that I could not talk about with my parents. He was the brother that taught me the things, my parents could not teach me. He became not just a brother because he had the same parents as me. He became a brother in the strongest sense of the word. A brother, whom I also had to leave behind. Physically, that is why I carry him with me in my room.

And then the last member of our family. The smallest, but certainly not the least. A dog, a 7 year old English Spaniel. A dog I had seen since the day it was 6 weeks old. Since the day it would not want to stay under the sun screen in that hot summer of 2004. I heard its first bark, short and high. I have seen its first tricks, giving a paw, or even two if you ask nicely. Well it was not about how you asked it, it was more about the cookie in your hands, but anyway. The dog was always there. When I came back from school, it would run towards me waging his tail, jumping up to me to say hello. When I came back from a tennis match, it would steal my cap when I bowed down to cuddle with him, and it would run around the table in our kitchen until I caught him and took back the cap. It would also lie at my feet when I was sick in bed and it would sit on my lap when I was sad. Trying to lick away my tears, trying to cheer me up with the long hair on his tail waving in front of me. That dog I have to leave behind as well, but in my room I still carry it with me. 55 Euros. The women behind the desk said it wrong, it is not much, no it is nothing for all the things I carry with me.

That room, full of memories, full of knowledge and experience, full of everything I did in my life. That room is what I carry, carry with me on the plane, carry with me on the bus, carry with me into my dorm, and carry with me around this university. Carry with me in my mind.

It is a closed room now and I carry another one. Another one right next to it, another one that just opened up. Not a room full of memories and knowledge, not a room full of friends and family. A room full of questions and expectations. Questions about my roommate. Questions and expectations about my university. I hope that if I leave the U.S. again and go back to my country, go back to my house, go back to my friends, go back to my family, go back to the place that I call my home, that this second room is also filled. Filled with knowledge and experience, filled with new made friendships and filled with a whole lot of good memories. So that if an old women charges me 55 Euros at the airport again, I can laugh about it, thinking that this time, I will carry even more than the last. The same suitcases and bag, but this time, I will carry two full rooms.