Excitement

Disillusion

From the age of eighteen, David had to work alongside his studies. It started with ten, twelve hours a week. A year later, his studies were his part-time job. Yet he graduated quickly. The world was at his feet. And at those of his girlfriend. Lotte didn't let her lottery ticket pass her by.

Things weren't going fast enough for him. At 35, he, and especially Lotte, felt it was time to make a change. The long hours had to be good for something. He went for it, towards the Board of Directors. When he was 42, the cards for the long-awaited change of Management had been shuffled. For David the joker.

He accepted a staff position. Not that he had any other choice. The earnings were reasonable. The status not. He hadn't-made-it. Everyone knew it, and David felt it.

Closed trap

He would have preferred to start somewhere else. But that's not possible. 45, misunderstood, but trapped in the small world of his industry. And to be honest, he is too tired for it. Starting over again. Another five, six, seven years of fighting. And the first few years a big bite out of his salary.

Sometimes he feels burned out, the menace of the mortgage like lead on his shoulders, and Lotte and the children do have their price tag as well.

 The doctor says that David should not be so pessimistic about it all and should take it a bit easier. He and his family should take a nice break. The idiot. Stress shoots through his body at the word 'holidays'. Wife and offspring are simply not satisfied with a week at the country side. Last week, the list of demands for the coming summer came on the table. Wife and children had to go south, they demanded.

David had to throw up.

Crisis?

Olga is in her mid-40s. She doesn't like the canteen either. During lunch break, they often eat their sandwiches together at their department. When the weather is nice, they go for a walk. They talk about everything. Olga is not interested in status, and certainly not in money. She likes cycling holidays in Brabant, a countryside area with peace and quietness in abundance.

David has also been cycling to work for a week now. Eight kilometres is actually a little too far, but that could be due to his physical condition. It might be a good thing if he would continue doing this for a few months.

That day after office hours, the weather is nice. David goes for an extra ride on his bike, enjoys the April sun and the smell of the meadow, and lets his thoughts run freely. This afternoon, Olga showed her holiday photos: cycling through the woods, past a small picturesque lake and through a little village. Coffee with a cinnamon roll on a terrace. Spending the night in a zero-star guesthouse, or putting up your own tent. And patching your own tyre. Enjoying the sun, sheltering from the rain.

He comes home half an hour later than usual.

“Hey dad, where are you from? You wouldn’t work overtime at your old age, would you?” one of his offspring calls from behind the remote control.

“No guys, don’t worry.” Lotte puts her two cents in.

“Dad has spring on his mind. Must be the midlife crisis.”

He ignores his wife, offspring and the tablet that is demonstratively put on the table with a lit up Greek website.

Devil

From somewhere in the depths of his brain, a little devil tries to force its way to the surface. It starts whispering. Stoking. Rubbing salt into his mental wounds from a forgone quarter of a century. David tries to extinguish the little devil. At the sideboard he pours himself a generous whisky, stubbornly ignoring the disapproving look, and downs the liquid in one gulp. The effect is counterproductive. The whisky works like a devilish fuel.

You’ve let yourself be sucked dry, boy. Everything you brought in, it was never enough. All your energy: they suck it out of you, until you are too paralyzed to even rebel. 25 years of hard work and still at square one. No… even further back. You have lost your freedom and your zest for life. And you have a noose around your neck. A noose of 400,000 euros.

David makes a decision. Something needs to be shaken up. Hopefully by fair means.

The change must be clear during dinner. He feels it himself: he sits up straight, feels almost authoritarian. He looks around the table. Lotte feels it, looks at him in surprise. He looks back arrogantly, almost scornfully. From the corner of his eyes, he sees one of his offspring sitting at the table, busy with texting. “Put that thing away,” sounds his icy voice. He feels that they are startled by his frozen tone. The device is put away without any protest.

The silence is deafening. He knows: today it’s holiday-day. Lotte and the sweethearts have democratically decided to go to Greece this year. Small detail: this still needs to be communicated to dad. After all, he has to join, too.

And, at least as important, sign the check.

Bomb

They don't have the guts. He can feel that they feel it: Dad is so… well, what actually?

After his last bite, he wipes his mouth with his hand, stubbornly ignoring his napkin, while he decides to drop the bomb.

"As for the holiday…" he begins.

The scions look up. A sense of tension now appears in their empty faces. Normally, only gadgets and social media can do that. Lotte stops eating, her fork halfway between her plate and her mouth. Time stands still, as in a paused movie. He enjoys the moment, tries to stretch it out a little longer, only to know foresee that, a little later, he will ask where they will be going on holiday… and then just to agree again. Like every year.

But something subtle, something almost intangible, calls his devil back. In a flash he sees the corners of Lotte's mouth twitch, at the same time a flicker in her eyes: Hurry up, man! Don't be such a wimp. You know you’ll have to bite the sour apple! He looks around the table one more time, and then drops the bomb:

“I would rather go on cycling holidays in Brabant this year.”

Ravage

He gets up and walks out of the room, leaving the havoc of the bombing behind. Upstairs, he turns on the bath tap, but first he walks to the bedroom and picks up the phone. Bingo. He hears Lotte, from the phone in the living room, animatedly talking to Vera, another mistress of evil and coincidentally her best friend.

“He’s gone mad!”, he hears Lotte shouting through the phone in a breaking voice, with the occasional sobbing outburst. Vera tries to comfort her, to explain to her that she and her husband have already booked their holiday to Sri Lanka and that JR wasn’t very enthusiastic about it at first either, but what would he expect, because they really have to get away for a while, and so on.

“Cycling in Brabant… cycling in Brabant! That’s what he wants! I feel so belittled, Vera. Do you believe that? And the children? They are completely distraught!”

He carefully puts down the phone and decides to take a nice long bath. He hasn’t felt so relaxed since a long time.

September

Of course, they went to Greece. Succumbed to terror? Well… David doesn’t know. Sun, sea, wine, souvlaki… it was quite nice. Lotte was extra nice to him for a few weeks, and the children enjoyed it. Even the plane was on time. And by the end of this month, the bank balance will be back in order.

At the office, John and Bert had looked really wrecked. The three of them had celebrated a modest ‘glad to be back’ party during lunch on their first day at work. “On to Christmas,” Bert couldn’t help but say, while working on his third glass of liquor. “You’ve had enough,” John had replied, as he quickly emptied the bottom of Bert’s glass. Bert suffers from Christmas allergies, David knows.

Next month they will have a company course. Four days in the middle of the forest. An extra day at the office's expense, for those who want to avoid the Friday traffic jams. The countryside of Brabant is beautiful, early October. You can also rent bikes there.

Olga knows her way around there pretty well.