Paradise Lost, Part 2

You know, as kids we participated in or looked on at almost every element of farming. The milking, the feeding, the gathering of eggs. You name it and we were there with our noses on top of it. I vividly remember winter evenings after the milking was done. The farmer and his helpers would rest on a pile of hay in the back of the barn where the cows were. There was an opening in the ceiling which gave access to the hayloft. From there the farmhands would throw hay down into a big pile to feed the cows or give them a soft bed to lie on. While the cows were eating hay or munching away on sugar beets mixed with turnip and a special kind of cereal or whatever, we would lie on the hay with the men and listen to their talking and telling stories. Outside it was cold and windy and getting dark, inside it was cozy and warm.

Don't ask me how we fit all this in with home and homework and mealtimes, etc. for I have no idea. They were two different and separate worlds somehow.

When I was a child we never had very much snow. But it did freeze in the winter and that meant skating. Beside our house was a wide ditch which had been formed when they used to excavate sand for whatever purpose. It would freeze over and become our skating rink. Now mind you, the skates we had were not the fancy steel ones with boots on them you have today. They were just a long piece of wood molded to the shape of the soles of our shoes. A steel skating blade was fastened into that wood. The skate was fastened to your shoes with bands. It was always important to tie them on in the right way of course and since they were often wet from the snow it could be a pretty cold and painful business, especially when your fingers were wet and half frozen too. One of the ways to come on to a girl was to ask her if you could tie her skates for her. You wanted it because it meant that you would skate with her and still at the same time you hated the thought of other boys seeing it and teasing you about it.

These skates were what you might call "tour skates." It was impossible to play hockey on them (although we had never heard of ice hockey! The only kind of hockey we knew was field hockey). You could not do figure skating on them either. You could only travel on them. A long section of the blade would be in contact with the ice and you would make long sweeping strokes to get up speed. The way you see speed skaters do it on their fancy skates. We called their kind of skates "Noren" (Norwegians) because the Norwegians had introduced them. Those special speed skates were the envy of everybody because they were very expensive and you needed special boots for them and they were not generally available.

Every winter there would be speed-skating contests of course in which I never won. I was never a great expert at skating although I liked it a lot. But I did not like the freezing cold. Oh, I still remember the pain in my fingers and hands when slowly they warmed up. But skating made you feel nice and rosy. It was wonderful to come in and sit close to the stove to warm up.

You should have seen some of the Frisian farmers. They skated on their socks! It was funny to see them "step into" their skates. I mean, the bands of their skates were all frozen and stiff. They never loosened or tightened them. When they quit they just shook them off their feet and when they wanted to start again they just kind of "stepped into" them. But boy, could they skate. With their arms folded across their backs, a piece of cigar in their mouths, bent over into the wind, they would go! They would fly over the ice.

It was interesting to see the changes ice brought. All the canals would freeze up and the Ice Ways Association would put up directional signs at the intersections of the canals, like you see the signs at the crossings of roads everywhere. On the ice too the signs would indicate the distance in kilometers to the nearest cities and towns. Often on the outskirts of the towns you would find stands where they would sell coffee or hot chocolate milk and baked goods.

People would travel long distances on skates. As a minister I have gone visiting people on my skates because along the canal the distance was much shorter than via the road. On Sundays whole families would come to church on skates.

But in the Netherlands the winters are short and it was always a sad thing to see the ice melt and that whole winter world would crumble and disappear.

In September 1939 the Second World War started, although our country was not engaged in it till May of the next year. To prepare for an eventual invasion by the German forces the Dutch army was mobilized. Close to our house on the way to Amersfoort huge parcels of land were inundated. The people who lived there were evacuated. They had to leave their homes and farms. There was a defensive line of forts and concrete bunkers and all the trees in front of it were cut. It became "no man's land". That flooded area formed the most beautiful skating rink you have ever seen. People travelled long distances, visited farms, even skated right into homes here and there, where the people had left the doors open.

As kids we never fully appreciated how sad it all was. Growing up in our little town far away from the cities we lived in our own little world. It was plenty big enough for us. I often think: We grew up in paradise. It is a sad thing to think that this free and happy way of life hardly exists anymore anywhere in this world.