Split Personalities

I never truly realize how much I actually live in two worlds. I don’t think about it when I switch languages in mid-sentence, or when I watch a Dutch kids’ show with my husband, or when I get really excited over a soccer match thousands of miles away. It’s what I do and who I am, and there you have it. It tends to take a friend or other innocent bystander who points out the obvious extraordinariness of my actions for me to realize that not everyone is like me. That is, until a few days ago, when I started playing my “Ik hou van Holland” CDs in my car on my way to work.

“Ik hou van Holland” (I love Holland) is a collection of four CDs that my parents gave to me for Christmas. It has the most imaginative mix of music on there, from melancholy songs from the 1960s (“Het Dorp” by Wim Sonneveld), Eurosong hits from the 1970s and 1980s, folksy partysongs (“meezingers”) such as “Geef my maar Amsterdam”, horrific tearjerkers such as “Telkens weer” and “Pierrot”, to more modern classics such as songs by Wonder Woman (Who? Yes, I don’t know either), Doe Maar, and De Dijk. I think it takes an expat to appreciate the eclectic collection, for no real Dutch person in their right mind would like Andre Hazes, Ramses Shaffy (“Zing, Vecht, Huild, Bid, Lach, Werk, en Bewonder”), and The Golden Earring all on one CD. But that doesn’t really matter to me – I love it. Just this morning I found myself singing along to “De bom” by Doe Maar, and imagining being back in the early 1980s, wearing neon pink and yellow wristbands, and wondering why all those girls kept passing out at Doe Maar’s concerts.

And that’s where the weirdness comes in. Whenever I listen to these songs, it’s as though I’m somehow in a different world. When I listen to Doe Maar (a 1980s punkock-ska band), I’m back in the 1980s, the cold war is a reality, and there are still only two Dutch television channels. Listening to Ramses Shaffy or Boudewijn de Groot puts me in a car with my parents listening to their favorite music, while anything by Andre Hazes, de Havenzangers, or Anneke Groenlo puts at any student party where listening to folk music is considered “camp”. In my head I’ll be riding my bicycle in the cold, wondering if I should go shop in Amsterdam or Utrecht that weekend, and knowing I need to stop by the Albert Heijn to get some cheese. And then, in the midst of all this Dutch-ness, my eyes will refocus on the road, and I will, for one second, find myself wondering why on earth all the traffic signs are green, not blue, why the Volvo behind me has such a little plate on the front (instead of the long yellow one), and why on earth I’m stopped at the “Willie Harris Parkway”. And then, just like the Celine Dion song, it all comes back to me. I’m not in Holland, I’m in Georgia. You know, the place where I live. Where there are no bikes, no Albert Heijns, and no cool shopping towns for miles around. And that’s when I really feel like I am two people. One who is happy living here, driving her car from stripmall to stripmall, looking out for green signs, and listening to 106.3 classic rock. And one who wants to ride her bicycle in the cold, have pea soup on really cold nights, and yearn for sun and warmer days.

I think I need to listen to my Dolly Parton CD on my way home today.