So what did happen with N?
After Schipol, N and I are intermittently in touch. By December we’ve started emailing about my returning to Amsterdam in March. Inspired, N builds me a bike for the occasion. It’s based on the frame of a 1948 women’s racing bike and super sleek (dig that saddle).
After Schipol, N and I are intermittently in touch. By December we’ve started emailing about my returning to Amsterdam in March. Inspired, N builds me a bike for the occasion. It’s based on the frame of a 1948 women’s racing bike and super sleek (dig that saddle).
I feel completely undeserving, but can’t wait to ride it all the same. Then the pandemic hits. I write N with apologies that I’ve had to cancel. He understands, says it was the right thing to do. At a loss, I begin to write about my trip to Amsterdam in this blog, secretly despairing that I will ever ride with him again - or ever ride that bike. I don’t keep my blog a secret but doubt he’ll find it anyway. I mean, I’m not famous. What are the chances?
One hundred percent.
Because there’s something I’ve forgotten to mention: for most of his working life, N was a librarian. For anyone too young to know, librarians are what we had before we had Google; they are human search engines. Before I can say Ultegra Compact Crankset, N has found this blog and, in its flattering description of him, the answer he has been waiting for.
By April, the phone lines are buzzing between us. The first time we talk, we’re on for an hour (N gets free calling after 6pm). It’s like those get-to-know-you conversations we might have had in person if I’d only stayed a few days longer (dammit). I tell him about my larger-than-life father, killed at a race track in Britain when I was seven. N, ever the librarian, sends me this:
One hundred percent.
Because there’s something I’ve forgotten to mention: for most of his working life, N was a librarian. For anyone too young to know, librarians are what we had before we had Google; they are human search engines. Before I can say Ultegra Compact Crankset, N has found this blog and, in its flattering description of him, the answer he has been waiting for.
By April, the phone lines are buzzing between us. The first time we talk, we’re on for an hour (N gets free calling after 6pm). It’s like those get-to-know-you conversations we might have had in person if I’d only stayed a few days longer (dammit). I tell him about my larger-than-life father, killed at a race track in Britain when I was seven. N, ever the librarian, sends me this:
A photo of my father taken just hours before he was killed - I’ve never seen it. It is precious. It is shocking. It is beyond words to have it. I feel incredibly grateful, and profoundly linked to N.
As the world goes deep into lockdown, we begin to create a world outside of it. A world of personal histories and humor, music. We seldom talk for less than an hour; we never mention the pandemic. N sends me cards he’s made (or humorously doctored). We are definitely on the same beam:
As the world goes deep into lockdown, we begin to create a world outside of it. A world of personal histories and humor, music. We seldom talk for less than an hour; we never mention the pandemic. N sends me cards he’s made (or humorously doctored). We are definitely on the same beam:
But he also sends: a bike bell, Belgian chocolate and -
The way to this woman’s heart - a Dutch wheel lock, impossible to find during the Pandemic, even on the web (I’ve tried and failed).
He designs me graphics for a T-shirt (N started out as a graphic designer)
I send him face masks of the NYC subway system (no, I did not make them)
Video of cycling in an empty city:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iO9xtQ0mIs
Of the 7pm Thank Yous for our healthcare workers, going on throughout New York
https://photos.app.goo.gl/xAUiqMmc9H3XN1DV9
NY’s COVID numbers soar. I begin to study Dutch. N overcomes a fierce dislike of digital, to FaceTime with me once a week.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iO9xtQ0mIs
Of the 7pm Thank Yous for our healthcare workers, going on throughout New York
https://photos.app.goo.gl/xAUiqMmc9H3XN1DV9
NY’s COVID numbers soar. I begin to study Dutch. N overcomes a fierce dislike of digital, to FaceTime with me once a week.
When New York erupts into protests over the murder of George Floyd, I attend Black Lives Matter rides (15,000 bikes)
Visit Occupy City Hall, the center of the #DefundThePolice movement.
I send N photos and video of all of it.
I can’t give an Xmas party this year, but with the election around the corner I decide to have an Xmas tree I’ll keep up until the election is over. And I decorate it with cards N has sent me (we're the only ones who are going to see it anyway).
I can’t give an Xmas party this year, but with the election around the corner I decide to have an Xmas tree I’ll keep up until the election is over. And I decorate it with cards N has sent me (we're the only ones who are going to see it anyway).
By now most of you will be thinking, OK it’s obvious she’s bonkers for this guy - studying Dutch, the Xmas tree, the wheel lock – I mean come on. And sure, he’s funny and creative and witty (and yes, devilishly handsome). Yes he understands bikes, he’s generous and really seems to dig me. I want to say I’m not so easily swept off my feet, but after two years of attention like this, who am I kidding? I break down and sign up with Sprint for unlimited calling at $15 a month. They have no idea what they're in for.
The week of the election feels like a year. I develop a crick in my neck that forces my head sideways on FaceTime (N doesn’t seem to mind). When Biden is finally declared the winner, I explain to N (who doesn’t need it; he’s a librarian after all) that the fate of the Senate - and thus the country - rests on two Senatorial elections in Georgia. Returns are due the night of January 5.
That night, I stay up until midnight (he’s 6 hours ahead of me) because N has asked me to wake him at 6am with the returns; but they’re not all in, so I’m up early the following day to watch for results. Georgia has given us the Senate! I call N to celebrate - but while we’re on the phone, the insurrection explodes onto the screen.
The week of the election feels like a year. I develop a crick in my neck that forces my head sideways on FaceTime (N doesn’t seem to mind). When Biden is finally declared the winner, I explain to N (who doesn’t need it; he’s a librarian after all) that the fate of the Senate - and thus the country - rests on two Senatorial elections in Georgia. Returns are due the night of January 5.
That night, I stay up until midnight (he’s 6 hours ahead of me) because N has asked me to wake him at 6am with the returns; but they’re not all in, so I’m up early the following day to watch for results. Georgia has given us the Senate! I call N to celebrate - but while we’re on the phone, the insurrection explodes onto the screen.
N stays with me the entire time, listening to the BBC and downloading TV snapshots I send from my phone. We are riveted by the news – and glad to be sharing this perilous moment with each other. In a related event, Sprint is forced to sell itself to TMobile. I feel responsible.
As I write, we are still learning the backstory of the insurrection, still hoping our democracy will survive. But the first thing that changes in January, is that Anthony Fauci is unmuzzled and Andy Slavitt (former head of Medicare) takes over the vaccine roll out. N and I get vaxed and begin to plan a trip. But it’s no longer just a visit for me – it’s become a trip for the two of us, traveling together. Whatever this is, we want to pursue it.
And then one day in August, a day not unlike the one two years ago when I stepped off my first flight into Schipol airport, I arrive in Amsterdam. And there he is, dashing as ever, waiting for me, with Belgian chocolate in hand.
As I write, we are still learning the backstory of the insurrection, still hoping our democracy will survive. But the first thing that changes in January, is that Anthony Fauci is unmuzzled and Andy Slavitt (former head of Medicare) takes over the vaccine roll out. N and I get vaxed and begin to plan a trip. But it’s no longer just a visit for me – it’s become a trip for the two of us, traveling together. Whatever this is, we want to pursue it.
And then one day in August, a day not unlike the one two years ago when I stepped off my first flight into Schipol airport, I arrive in Amsterdam. And there he is, dashing as ever, waiting for me, with Belgian chocolate in hand.
How did I get so lucky? I drop my bags and fly into his arms. “N we did it!”
And so begins a chapter neither of us ever expected and neither of us will ever forget.
And so begins a chapter neither of us ever expected and neither of us will ever forget.