A Thoughtful Tuesday (07/08)

I have been thinking a lot this week about my youth. Thus it seemed fitting to go with my Mum to look around De Kaag, a place where she used to play with her school friends. It’s a small island with around 300 inhabitants so to get there we hopped on the boat. The boat journey was less than 30 seconds but it felt like we had gone back hundreds of years. There was a sense of tranquillity in the apparent simplicity of their lifestyle: the traditional looking houses with clogs hanging by the doors, the well-trimmed gardens and the little old shops selling handmade merchandise and food. The calm currents of water which enveloped the village only supplemented my sense of peace.

It was as we walked around the village that my Mum recognised the farm in which her friend had lived, we approached in a bemused fashion to see if the family still lived there (family surnames are printed on the front doors) and they did!

We found out from her sister-in-law that Mum’s friend had died over 15 years ago from cancer. It made me think about everything that my mum left behind when she moved to England at just 19 and everything that has happened since. I felt fortunate and blessed, love you Mum!