Why I want to leave again

I was two when I moved for the first time, with Ankara as the destination. So it's logical that I barely remember anything from the years I lived in London. After a few years in Ankara, it was off to Paris (my great love) and after Paris we moved a bit higher north among the Danes. I still remember how exciting my sisters and I always found it when my father had to indicate at the embassy in which countries he might want to live and be transferred. When he heard it was Copenhagen, he said we were going to live somewhere that started with a K. Don’t ask me why, but I think I thought for a week that my family and I were moving to Kentucky in America. Thank god that wasn’t the case.

 
After Copenhagen, where my oldest sister graduated, we were lucky that my father was sent out again to Paris. It felt like a sort of homecoming because we had lived there for a number of years with intense joy. I was happy, I dare to say that the four years of high school there might have been the best years of my life, which again caused the Netherlands to be about 6-0 behind when I moved there.

 
I wanted to study in America just like all my friends, but my parents had other plans. My sisters and I all had to study in the Netherlands, and as annoying as I found it, they were right; back to the motherland. Now, over ten years later, it finally feels a bit like home here. Amsterdam then. It took a while. ‘Home’ was always where my parents were. So if they were in Aruba, then Aruba was my home. Same for Antwerp. After the passing of my father my mother moved to Noordwijk (they always had a little house there), which means home is also partly there. As much as I love Paris, Amsterdam has got a hold on me. In a month I’ll be turning twenty-eight and everything suddenly feels right here. My job, my friends… I might miss a man in my life, but that has never been a priority for me, as long as I was happy with myself. It took a while, but I am.

 
The urge to pack my things and move again wasn’t there, until last weekend when Lenny Kravitz happened. Unfortunately not in real life, no, but Lenny made a spontaneous appearance on my Spotify (‘Fly Away’ to be exact) and suddenly that urge was back: I want to live in a strange city again. Just like that, pack my bags and go. The excitement of a new place, the challenge of making something new your own, meeting new people – I’m ready for it again. ‘Leaving On A Jet Plane’ by Janis Joplin might have been a clearer reason, but it’s Lenny who brought out my inner Third Culture Kid again.

 
I’m not going to do it, you know. Not for now at least. But who knows, give it a couple of years and maybe I’ll be writing from one of these cities for Amayzine.