spring on the keizersgracht

I decided not to bring me laptop with me to Holland, so I'll transcribe my handwritten postings now that I'm back home.
Wednesday April 15
I arrived Schiphol Airport at 10:30 am (having left Palm Springs the day before also in the a.m.), having little sleep on the flight across the pole from San Francisco. I read (The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao), watched a movie (Slumdog Millionaire) and drifted between waking and sleeping while listening to dreamy ballads on my ipod (Iron and Wine). Whenever I started to drift off to sleep I could count on one of three things happening: the enormous man in the seat behind me would shift ponderously and push against the back of my seat for leverage, the Dutch folks two rows up would finish a hand of cards with a slap and a chuckle (or a groan), or someone would bump me as they passed down the aisle to the bathroom.
I know the drill by now. Sail through customs, "I have nothing to declare," take the train to Central Station, buy a strippenkaart and board either the 16, 24 or 25 through The Dam, Spui, past the Mint Tower, and get off at the Keizersgracht (king's canal), drag my bags on the cobbled street being careful not to be run over by cars, scooters or bikes, to the little Hotel Keizershof, where cheerful, stooped Mary DeVries awaits her guest. "Goiemorgen (hhhoy-ah MOR-hhhen), Peter. And how vas your flight?" I stayed with Mary last spring and must have made an impression because she seems genuinely happy to see me, and not just because the tourist trade is down due to the economy. I like to stay in the Mae West -- up three steeply convoluted spiral stairs, barely room for a sink, bed, chest of drawers and my suitcase, and sharing a hallway bathroom with Marlene Dietrich and other luminaries -- but with a view of the canal and only 65e per night.
After a nap I pull the lone chair up to the open window, pull the drapes aside and take in canal life on a sunny spring break day. All of Amsterdam is out -- all of Amsterdam, that is, that owns a boat or knows someone with a boat -- and all are parading lazily down the keizersgracht leaning back against the low gunwales, a case of heineken amidships, chatting and waving and relaxing. Oh, yeah.