A Poem for 2017's Departing

After a while

After a while 
you learn the subtle difference between holding a hand and chaining a soul
and you learn love doesn't mean leaning and company doesn't always mean security.
And you begin to learn that kisses aren't contracts and presents aren't always promises 
and you begin to accept your defeats with your head up and and your eyes ahead with the grace of a woman, not the grief of a child.
And you learn to build all your roads on today because tomorrow's ground is too uncertain for plans and futures have a way of falling down in mid-flight.
After a while you learn that even sunshine burns if you get too much
So you plant your own garden and decorate your own soul instead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers
And you learn that you really can endure, that you really are strong and you really do have worth and you learn and you learn 
with every good-bye you learn.

Author: Veronica A. Shoffstall

The Dance: A Belated Christmas Present

This past weekend I went to a jazz club because a DJ I knew was scheduled to play there. I didn't make it past the first set. 

I met a person who happened to be a woman of Dutch origin. We danced for a while pulling others into our groove. Creepers stared at us, the females on the dance floor. Our intent was not to swoon each other but to have fun.

The person shared with me that she was studying to be a "house doctor". We shared frustrations about our perceptions of working women in her culture and my own including forced expectations of motherhood. 

After the person left the jazz club where the trance music blared, I heard an American accent. I approached the source, which was the voice of a person who later stated she had been living in Amsterdam 10 years after arriving from Boston. With her was Silver, a person of unknown origin. 

My energy sparked high around this ambiguous couple. I followed them by bike on an adventure to The Place Where You Dance All Night. I had been to the location before, but it was much less crowded. 

"What's your Disney Princess?" I asked the person, who happened to be female and a venture capitalist. 

"Let me think about that." she said. 

She nodded to Silver, who pulled out a tube of lip gloss for her. 

"It will come to you," I told her. "But for now I will call you Jasmine. Maybe other times I will call you Sapphire."

#amsterdam #magic