The biggest lesson of all

Last Friday two television-network helicopters crashed in mid-air during a pursuit of a story in Phoenix, Arizona. Four people died instantly. One of those people was my best friend's brother, Jimmy. He was only 37, too young, and so full of life and passion. I only met Jimmy a few times but what I remember is his energy and vibrancy.

I have no words for the deep sadness I feel in my heart for my friend and her family. These past few days, Robert and I have done our regular thing, but heavily, and silenced, our minds constantly wandering and reflecting on how fragile life truly is. And how hard it will be to go on, to pick up again with this loss in their midst. His family wrote the obituary that was in today's Austin American Statesman and here is a part from it that I want to share with all of you: "While we will never get over this loss, or recover from this tragedy, I do hope that we can learn something from Jimmy. We should try to live life like him - passionately, with conviction and with a true zeal for life." That is the biggest lesson of all and the only one that truly matters in this life.

written from Texas, with love and sadness, vanessa

The weather, snakes, and Lientje

It is funny how it feels as if I have not posted anything in a long, long time, and yet, it was only 12 days ago. Maybe that is because it seems as if so much has happened. Not necessarily on a personal level, but wordly... I try to watch some news daily, and it seems that the world is flooding and burning. I just wonder if it is all just coincidence or if our big Mother is fed up and angry with us? I am sure that the fact that I only recently watched Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" adds to my sentiment. Austin has had more rain than any July I have experienced here, in Belgium several towns have been flooded, and that is only on the small scale. China just can't keep up with the down pours it is experiencing. All that wetness while the Western US and Athens are burning....

I must say I have enjoyed the slightly milder weather here, but today again was brutal! It was 98F (37C) and while we were walking to the overly airconditioned mall, on the parking lot with the tarmac and all the cars, it felt like 105 (40). Brutal! For all you readers not in Texas, imagine what the car feels like after being parked in that for a few hours. According to the forecast the mild (i.e. 80sF and 27C) weather is over now and we will be back to our "normal" summer heat.

Speaking of normal and Texas... I wanted to share a photograph with you that I took one morning after parking my car on campus and walking to the pook for a quick swim before starting work. As I mentioned before, I always carry my camera with me, and it served me well this morning. Here I am, strolling to the campus pool, alongside a little creek that runs through campus (Waller Creek for those of you who know UT campus.) Most of the time this river bed is dry but due to all the aforementioned rains we have been getting it is actually a nice little stream now. I was admiring how clear the water was when I suddenly noticed ...


Yep, a genuine watermoccasin. These things are not friendly to say the least. And that is when I thought, wow, not too many people run into snakes on their way to work. This is TEXAS for ya!













Let's stick with that subject for the next picture. The three of us went to Fredericksburg, Texas a few weekends ago. Here is a shot of a shop window in this little touristy town outside of the state's capital.













I can't say that, after all these years of living here, I have ever really experienced what this shirt so proudly advertises, but maybe I have just been going to the wrong places -- or I should say, maybe I have not been going to the right places! ha. Notice the taxidermic armadillo slurping Miller Light through a straw! Just thought I would call attention to the details that might otherwise be lost on my friends over there in Europe.

The Fultons have been having fun in the weekends and I thought I would share some pictures of some of our excursions. So here we go, lots and lots of Evelina shots! But first a first. A few weekends ago we ran into some friends of ours at a playground. They have a little boy and Evelina and him ran around together. Here she is goofin' around.

















And then, suddenly (well... encouraged by his father whose legs are in the picture) he smacked her on the lips. To my knowledge, this was her first uninitiated kiss! He then put his arms around her while she ran away. It was pretty cute. She is usually the dominant toddler, but little Stevie took her by surprise. Older men, oh well.

















So here are the rest of the pictures. We have been swimming, shopping, eating, museum-visiting.... I will be brief about them and will post the pics in small format. You all know that if you can always double-click on a picture to see it bigger.




There is Lientje and me at Barton Springs -- wow, the water was cold! Spring-fed and fresh! There is Lientje and Robert at the mall. She loved the little car. A $4 rental and sooo much more fun than her regular Bugaboo stroller. Then there is Lientje while eating her very first Nutella sandwich. Now, I suppose I feel obliged to make a little caveat here to anyone who thinks children ought not to have sugar. In Belgium Nutella is considered (even though it is Italian and not Belgian chocolate) one of the essential food groups in the food pyramid. And I must concur with my friend Leslie here, that chocolate is OK, all other candy-products are no-no's. Plus, this was just a taste, and it is not her daily breakfast or snack. So please no judgment on my mothering. Because see, next there is Lientje eating guacamole with much gusto. Avocados are superfoods, and she gets plain unseasoned and unsalted avocados very often. She loves them, and screams out "Cado!" when I offer it to her.

We went to Houston last weekend, where we visited the Natural History museum and saw the dinosaurs and butterfly garden. Here is a picture of Evelina and me with Sam Houston in the background, whom Evelina liked because he is on a horse -- so he must be a fine man according to her. And then a picture of us with the dino-remains, and one of her walking around in the very tropical (i.e. muggy and sweltering) butterfly garden.
























I will end with a few shots from our first trip to the Austin Children's Museum. Evelina absolutely LOVED it. She gave her all for about 2 hours and then passed out in the stroller once back outside. She ran around, touched about everything there was to be touched, made friends (again an older man though no kisses this time) and was in constant amazement. We will be returning.


















And then this is just too cute not to post. We had dinner at Chuys tonight, and they have a photobooth. So here we are. Lientje was not quite sure what the clicking and the lights were doing (hence the slightly freightened look -- deer in the headlights!) but she sure thought it was super cool when our pictures fell out.
So that is all for now. No news on the house. Belgium is still in its mandatory construction-sector-vacation. I certainly get more work done without the emails and phone calls from architects and contractors. So I brace myself as the quiet will end in a little over a week. Lots of people are working out bids for us, so when it all starts up again I might need some valium. Ha, just kiddin' (or am I?) As always I will keep you posted, greetings, from Texas with love.

Confessions and then to bed with Mussolini

I have a strange confession to make. I just spent a few minutes browsing on the internet and found a site that compiles blogs from various expats (www.expat-blog.com). Considering the fact that I have been (am?) an expat twice in two rather very different countries, I am slightly fascinated by other people's expat experiences. Moreover, I am confused about what being an expat truly means as I am facing my (in essence) sixth (!) transatlantic move, but this time "back" to Belgium, i.e. "home." Odd, because I think of it as yet another expat experience whereas I don't think of myself as such at the moment, living in Texas. Oh dear, I truly have been here long! Anyway, for anyone interested the site lists blogs by country of current residence and nicely shows by means of a flag where the author is from. Here's some trivia: there were 910 blogs for Western Europe, of which 24 for Belgium, 84 for Italy, and 214 for France! Does that mean that there is more to write about as a foreigner in France (or should I say, more to gripe about? ha, kidding!) Or do more people move to France? Obviously, these numbers mean nothing, but for some reason (maybe because it is late and I am tired....) I thought they were interesting. More than half of the authors writing about Italy were American. And from a first glance it seems that the majority of authors for both Italy and France were women who had fallen in love with a native and followed them home. Ha! I guess that is what I did way back when in 1993. If only there had been blogs then.

So what is my "confession"? I am strangly fascinated by the fact that so many people have no problem at all with going public with these things. They are filled with pictures, thoughts, etc. for just anyone to read and look at. Here is me, and here is my house and my dog, and here is a picture of what I cooked for dinner..... Some of the blogs are actually geared towards being useful to others, for instance people collecting information about an upcoming move to Italy and wanting to make it available to others. (Hey, I could help out all those other people who would want to buy a house in Belgium and then try to renovate it while living in Texas! Yeah, I betcha I would fill a real gap there!) But most of them seem to be blablabla-blogs. Like mine, actually. Although I must also say that looking at them I was actually not interested in reading any of them. Feels like a waste of time... so then, why do people do this--writing blogs I mean. (And why in the world would I think any of you are interested in what I rant about!) And what is the attraction of going public? Now, I suppose in order to get an sort of reply to this, I oughta go public, no? Several bloggers have numbers on their blogs indicating how many people have looked at their rantings. Wow, some are up there in the 800s. How bizarre that is. Yet also how fascinating. I guess they make the world yet again a bit smaller. What an incredibly strange phenomenon this internet is. I will never understand it really.

I will have to think some more on expatness. Can you ever un-become one? Have I lived here in the US long enough not to feel like an expat anymore? And can you be one in your home country? Aha, that is the biggest question of all. I will have to wait and see. There is the title for my next novel "A foreigner in my native land." I will keep you posted. For now, I head to bed. Mussolini lays there waiting for me. (well... his biography that is. Yes, I suppose it is an odd choice for evening reading, but oh well, I have my reasons.) Benito, here I come. Buona notte, da Texas.

the stillness of the photographic image

Another week starts tomorrow. One with new goals and resolutions. As you all know, my blog is not a public blog. I am not an avid blogger, and I don't really care about blogs other than those of my friends. But I will admit that I have done a search here and there to see if there are any American ex-pats living in Belgium who are sharing their thoughts and observations about that odd little (seemingly humourless-- as someone called it) country... Well, I found one, but I think if I were to meet that person we would not like each other very much. Plus, said person simply wrote too darn much for even his best friends to remain interested I'd say. In my search though, I also came upon a blog titled "frombelgiumwithlove" ! Now, that had to be checked out. This person hardly uses words at all, but posts his photographs. And very amazingly captivating photographs at that! Anyone interested in the still image is hereby encouraged to go take a peek. It reminded me of the fact that I too love photography and that sadly, I have not been able to do very much about this lately. But, even while taking random shots -- hooray for the digital camera and its minimal size, for I always have it with me now -- there is the occassional interesting subject just waiting to be captured. So, I thought, inspired by the 44-year old stranger in French-speaking Belgium, I would post, completely randomly, two of my slightly-better-than-the-random-shot pictures. I think these are perfect proof that even in every-day life the surreal and mysterious are right there in front of us. Often while we are moving we don't notice it, it takes one to look through a camera to halt that moment and realize how bizarre it really is. It is the stillness of the image that truly makes it come to live. To keep these images captivating, I will not explain their origins, except that one was taken in Hasselt, Belgium, and the other in Austin, Texas, from whence I write and greet you with love.

The week of the fourth.

The German artist Martin Schongauer made this engraving in 1475 representing the temptations attacking St. Anthony who though wearisome remains unfaced by the various demonic creatures plucking and pulling at him. Now try to replace St. Anthony's face with mine more in the state of that other, most likely more familiar, great work of art, Edward Munch's The Scream, and you will have a pretty good visual picture of how my week was. I.e. I was less serene in dealing with all the tugging and pulling than dear St. Anthony, but then again, I am no saint. Anthony was trying to medidate and through all of this he prevailed. I am trying to write a dissertation... but somehow all of my devils take priority.

See the creature with the long snout beating at poor Anthony with a stick, in my week that was a miscommunication with the architect (had in May) which now came to light and escalated. At the very best, some major work which we expected to be done in September (one of the things I was actually planning on flying down for) will not be able to get done until December (if we are lucky.) At the very worst, this miscommunication will cost us a very large sum, because we ordered and are having made all the windows, which it now turns out we should not have, and could be rejected by the historical commission. Yes, we are just a little irked at the architect, but we are working it out. Hopefully.

The ugly things at the bottom tearing away at the saint's robes were the fever and rash caused by a nasty virus that got into Evelina's little body and which caused her to be sick for two days and two nights, and morphed her into a very cranky and clingy little toddler. On top of that she got three major shots yesterday morning at her 15 month check up which made her even more miserable. She did not really fall asleep until 5 a.m. this morning. After about 4 nights of waking up several times a night I am very much reminded of what it was like when she was just a few weeks old. Except that she is now much heavier to pick up, more difficult to deal with when she is screaming, and I don't get to take naps during the day. Hopefully, she is on the better hand. Although we have been warned that the chicken pox shot could flare up next week sometime. Yeah!
Then there is the problem with my email. Minor really, but quite annoying. I have already made two trips to the MAC store to get it fixed and will now have to go a third time taking the desktop computer in. Quite a drag!

There are a few more devils which have been gnawing at me, but hey, this is a blog, not a diary. All to say, we enter into the weekend quite exhausted and drained and no, we did not see a spark of fireworks on the fourth. Oh well, I think in all these years I have lived here we maybe made an effort to see them 3 times. And since we are not reall BBQ fans either, not red-white-and blue-toting Americans, the 4th is not all that much of a big deal. It was a day off for Robert, but spent as I said, with a sick baby. We tried to leave town and make a little day trip, but we turned around half way there, because Evelina was so uncomfortable and that nasty rash just popped up suddenly making me quite worried I couldn't enjoy the trip anyway. We will give the day trip another shot tomorrow. Fingers crossed.

Good news is that everyone is indeed working very hard on our house and I expect to have some more pics next week. I hear that the contractor will start chipping away at the plaster and uncover the original brick work which we are keeping "naked" so to speak. We have also decided to fill in the open space of the loft with a glass floor/ceiling resting on steel beams, so we are pretty excited about that. We still need to hear from the engineer and of course are awaiting a bid on this. Let's hope we will not have to nix this as I have seen some pictures of this type of construction and it looks pretty awesome.

In Belgium today the "bouwverlof" starts. This is a three week vacation for all people who are working in the construction sector as well as sectors connected to it. It is an estimated 400,000 people who have off until the beginning of August. The entire construction sector is down. We are lucky as it seems our contractor equals the Duracell bunny and wants to keep on going. Gosh, I wouldn't be surprised if in Belgium one could fined for working during mandatory time off! This weekend then this break will result in nearly all of those 400,000 people and their families getting into their cars and driving to France, or Spain, or Italy, or where ever as long as it is South, there are beaches, and the sun will be shining. Imagine the roads!

And in the US the frenzy over Apple's Iphone has slowed down after last week's release. I will admit, it is the first gadget phone I silently yearn to own. But I will wait for its European release. I will just have to wait to be hip a few more months. Ha.

Will keep you all posted, greetings from Texas wit love, vanessa

The work has started!

Wow, it is finally getting real. The contractor took a team of about 5 guys to the house for two days and well, what can I say, the place looks different! I think in this case pictures say way more than words. So here goes: a random selection of what I have received from the contractor. Notice that the stair in the kitchen is gone--that took quite some deciding and lots of back and forward, yes, no, what-shall-we-do-kind of pondering. See how in many places the original brick is exposed. We will actually do this intentionally in several places. Robert and I see no reason in trying to make perfect and new a 100 year old house, so we will try to focus on some of those original elements such as the supporting beams and the brickwork. The openness that is created by taking away those ugly doors is amazing,but we are not sure whether we can work out something to keep this airy feeling. We have to pass the energy-efficiency exam and of course do not want to burn money to keep the place heated in the winter of course. A short post this time but a very important one indeed. Back to work now here in Texas.

Rob's Fulbright, my office, and Lientje's feet

June already. We have been quite busy since getting back. Especially Robert. He was thrown right back into work the very day after arriving. It was not an easy week with Evelina suffering majorly from jet-lag (i.e. up every night hungry, confused, and screaming and not in the best mood during the day) and us not being able to catch up on much needed sleep. We are definately glad that is all over! She is back to her adorable lovely self -- although I must admit that the toddler tantrums have begun. Oh my... we thought they would come at 24 months, not at 14! We are slowly learning to ignore them but it is very difficult.

Oh, but I was writing about Robert. He was one of the main organizers of the annual James Joyce Conference this year. The conference takes place alternatively in Europe and the US. This year it was held here in Austin, organized in honor of Robert's boss, the director of the HRC, who is also a major Joycean. Robert was able to bring his mentor from Bologna, Italy over to Austin for the conference so that was a nice reunion. The conference was also a great venue for him to show of and promote his book! (He walked around with his book around his neck with a sign that read: Buy my book! -- Just kidding!) He also curated a very clever exhibition on Joyce from the Ransom collections, moderated a panel and presented a paper. The timing of it all was perfect. One other major thing was perfectly timed as well. Robert had just announced at his job that he will be leaving them because he was awarded a Fulbright Teaching Position at the University of Antwerp. We had found out about this a while ago but had kept silent for reasons of work-politics etc. It was hard to remain hush about it, because obtaining this very prestigious award is quite a feat and one ought to be very loud and happy about announcing it. So it was great that he was out of the closet (so to speak) about it and was able to tell fellow Joyceans that he will be working with yet another major Joycean in Antwerp next year. He had a busy week but a rewarding one. And of course the week ended in Father's Day.

How amazing that in just one year Lientje went from a little round-cheecked nonsense-babbling baby to a toddler running up to him in bed, screaming "papa!" with a card that she had scribbled on herself and accompanying the card with a big wet kiss. It was a very wonderful moment. She was incredibly sweet, as if she knew this was his special day. She also brought back a card from day care for him. I see her every day, but that footprint on the card nearly shocked me. Have her feet really grown that much? The little footprints we received in the hospital are etched in my mind. Wow, she has grown!
On Father's Day we took part in the annual Hyde Park Historic Home Tour here in our very own neighborhood. It was muggy and hot and not altogether pleasant, but we saw some interesting old houses completely renovated and pooked around for ideas. I have been wanting to do the tour since we moved here, and I finally got us tickets. See, it takes leaving to actually do these things!

Little news on our house in Antwerp. Work begins this week, so I will have pictures to post as they come in from the contractor! Stay posted.

I have moved in to an "office" at the university's fine arts library. It is a closet-size room with a desk and a shelf and white walls and I love it. It gives me a space to work away from everything else. There I do not hear the screams of the sweeper who wants to be run, the murmurs of the muffled laundry in the hamper, or the yelps of all the things in the closets that need to be cleaned out. It is quiet in there and I hope to be able to do lots of work. I will have to post a picture of that space sometime. It will show how little can make one happy, ha.

In Belgium on June 10th the elections shook up the country. The old established favorites of the Socialist and Christian parties were voted out for a completely new party called after its founder Mr. Dedecker. He tried previously to be adopted by one of the existing parties but no one wanted him, so he ran on his own, with great success thus. While the greens also won some votes back, the other major winner and especially in the province of Antwerp is the extreme right Vlaams Belang -- Flemish first, i.e. everything and everyone non-Flemish out. The most nationalistic party around, they are gaining prominence every year. The votes so completely shook up the existing parliament that a new one has to be decided upon. The current one immediately visited the king to resign. The prime-minister Guy Verhofstad had been in his position for 8 years and (in my humble opinion) had placed Belgium on the political worldmap. He was not necessarily Bush's best friend, and did not feel that just because Belgium is a small country it cannot have a voice in world-politics. At the moment a person appointed by the king called a "formateur" is trying to put together a suggestion for the king on how to proceed with further nominations based on the elected parties. In Belgium parties must form coalitions to reach the right number of seats (when a single party does not have enough votes) in parliament. This often proves to be a very difficult process, especially when parties have opposing views on major issues such as for instance the budget or immigration legislation. The country now waits. They hope to have some plan of action by July 21, the Belgian National Feast Day. It struck me, seeing the winning parties on the news, that everyone was cheering and singing with beers in their hands. (No champagne for the Belgians!) One winning party-leader said in his acceptance speech: I realize that the hard work now needs to begin, but for the moment I do not care one bit about that and I am going to focus on drinking as many beers as possible." He was applauded loudly. Yes, that is the country we are moving to! Can you imagine Obama (or Hillary!) saying that upon winning the elections, ha!

For now, greetings from Texas with love. I promise more pics next time.