Armchair Travels: Amsterdam, a Pleasant but Blurry Dream

I have been fortunate enough to travel to Amsterdam twice in my life. Both times conjure up very blurry memories.

I definitely took pleasure indulging in the exciting herbal offerings of the city and really am a lightweight when it comes to any sort of altered state. I recall the street names being long Dutch ones that I couldn't begin to pronounce and all the streets seemed to moved in circles around canals which is very pleasant for wandering and biking, but terrible for getting lost. On my first trip, I ended up meeting a friend from the UK. We went to a small pub on a chilly evening and spent the night smoking, talking, and drinking with a very peculiar stranger. The older man sitting across from us kept pulling flotsam and jet-sum from his pockets and dumping it onto the table while drunkenly mumbling about a brother, a possible murder, and several other things we couldn’t make out.

He inspired me to write this short story back in 2010:

​He sat in a wooden chair, pressing into the back of his legs like tennis shoes on hot concrete and to any outsider he probably looked uneasy at the edge of his seat.  His corduroy jacket twisted awkwardly about his shoulders, which reflected the haphazard way he had thrown it on before leaving his apartment. In this confined position, he found himself contemplating his year and even more so, his life.  The 1936 Fiat hood ornament, residing in his right hand pocket, and the pocket watch belonging to his brother, were the only possessions he cared to keep track of.  

Both of them were with him that night in the bar.  Every once in a while he would reach his hand into the flesh of his coat to finger the nostalgic charms and reassure himself that he was still attached to a bit of the past.  Between each gulp of tasteless beer and each hit of his overflowing joint, he felt himself drifting away.  His mind was slipping out of his ears and created pools for a moment as it rested on his shoulders only to continue its slow journey down his back.  It sunk between the grooves of the material on his coat and one drop at a time it hit the filth soaked floor like bullets.  

Now he sat there, empty of thoughts and devoid of memories.  He would laugh in a sporadic and almost disturbing way as the weed and alcohol infected his sanity.  He began to blurt out stories of his past to any stranger bored or quiet enough to listen as he flailed wildly in his seat.   The end of the road had approached so quickly and there were no more breadcrumbs on the ground to tell him which way to go.

 He was born across the street sixty-two and a half years prior and he would make it no further than his block.  After his brother’s murder and his recent diagnosis of cancer, he saw that the street would not stretch or carry him away as he had hoped.  He had settled with the fact that there were no more numbers on the clock and he ordered another drink.  His eyes stumbled in his skull to find something to focus on, behind his thick spectacles.  Instead, they found themselves closing as his fingers searched once more for the objects next to his hip.  He traced the outlines of the F, I, A, and T, each letter piercing the tips of his work worn fingers.  He polished off the remnants of his pint and dropped his roach into the ashtray.  In one clumsy movement, he fell from the wooden chair to the wooden floor and let the momentum of his weight carry him out the door like a pendulum.  

Just like the clock, he moved forward into the night, leaving the past in the cracks of the sidewalk, stepping left, right, left, right, tick, tock, tick, tock. 

If you have any favorite memories from Amsterdam I would love to hear more in the comments below!

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Thank you for following along on this visual journey through Amsterdam! If you enjoyed these images and would like to see more, check out our print shop! These prints add beautiful art to your home or are an incredibly thoughtful gift. All the proceeds benefit our future creative work and 10% of the year-end proceeds will be donated to the NAACP in hopes that more people will have access to travel to learn about themselves and the world!