First Full Day: Almelo

Now a music school.

Or as the locals say (at least it seems to me), Am-lo. 

For many centuries we humans have been wrestling with the simple and the complicated.  In the time of Greek and Roman philosophers it is sometimes referred to as the one and the many.  For religion this has had implications.  Mmmmm.  Religions develop differently partly as to whether they are mono-theistic or poly-theistic.  And I suspect ordinary human life is directly related to this too. 

How complicated do lives get as we try to make them simple. 

My new word for today is, “ubiquity”.  There was a lot of ubiquity today.  Whether I’m in Toronto or here in Holland young people and older folks for that matter, dress very similarly.  The smart phone is UBIQUITOUS.  Everyone has got one. 

Some buildings here have been rebuilt

I came to Almelo not to see any monument to liberation from war, but to see ordinary life being lived.  Kids doing the same things in the streets that I remember – throwing a ball, running, laughing. 

 War thankfully is an aberration, and underneath it really while it is still going on is the struggle to live ordinary lives.  When men came back from the Second World War, they sought certainly not the extraordinary or the super.  Most desperately wanted to taste what is ordinary.  The effects of the war lingered in their families and the onset of the Cold War reflected a widespread fear in humanity itself.  That’s not to say that there were not nor should not have been fears.  They were real, doubly so because of the double sting of war already in the 20^th century.  Why would humanity NOT use nuclear destruction? 

We are one human family, so it is not that unusual to want to break down the borders that might exist in our appearance or in other ways.  As with all things there is risk.  One is that we may lose some of the collective intelligence, wisdom and beauty built up over centuries in various cultures.  

Almelo is now a small city with a shaky economy.  Much industry has moved out.  Local businesses struggle.  As I’ve seen already in the Netherlands, the population is diverse.  I met a Chaldean Catholic restaurateur who was most hospitable.  Lots of folks were riding bikes and scooters.  Young and old visible in the marketplace and the shopping streets.  

Aah.  Ice cream. 

I spotted some of the same old buildings that were in my father’s postcards.  Most are stores now.  In between are many modern buildings – testimony perhaps to the destruction of war. When my dad was here people desperately wanted to return to this sort of life. 

Wherever we are from, the ground we stand on has a history, which we can neither allow to limit us nor ignore.  Sixty-six years ago is a long time and how many stories of life have been played out since?  Many.  Ubiquity in some things may be the norm now, but ubiquity in all things would take us away from the relationships that have brought us to this life and to these moments we cherish. 

Catholic Basilica of St. George.