‘She kept texting when we came by’

It couldn’t be better in the Spanish sun, where the verdejo flowed freely and the evenings were filled with new best friends.

Anne-Sophie (34), lives with Lex (40), mother of Tim (9), Juul (6) and baby Gijs.

“It was so nice that evening at the campsite on the Spanish Costa that the verdejo flowed freely and we had the feeling that we had found our new best friends in Alice and Wout. Tim and Juul got on well with their twins who were right in between our kids in age. And since the children had been playing continuously for three days, Lex and I decided to invite the parents for a glass of wine.

That wine became three bottles and we were not finished talking yet. It felt special: we didn’t know each other, but it was as if we had known each other for years. We had the same humor, the same ideas, the same attitude to life – the next morning I woke up with, in addition to a slight hangover, a muscle aches from laughter and a special feeling.

Incredibly different

The next evening we immediately arranged to meet again. Of course, I wasn’t blind to the fact that we were actually incredibly different. For example, Alice and Wout had been coming to this campsite for years, with a lot of Dutch people, loud music, more than two thousand places and a kind of village in the middle with a Dutch snack bar and a supermarket where Jumbo products were available.

‘We’ll never go anywhere else again’, Alice declared, even though I was sure we’ll never go here again. Anyway, we got on well and we spent a lot of time together for the rest of the holiday. Of course we promised during the goodbye hugs to visit each other in the Netherlands.

Also read – On holiday with friend with benefits: ‘When the children are in bed, we switch partners’ >

Back in the Netherlands

But as it goes, that resolution soon faded when we got home. Daily life is already busy enough and since we live in Drenthe and she in Brabant, such an appointment was not easily arranged. I actually thought they were too, but Alice kept texting whenever we came over.

As autumn set in and the memories had sort of faded, I couldn’t remember why we had promised. But in the end, mainly to get rid of it, we went that way. We hadn’t even been there for an hour before I really didn’t remember why I had felt such a click on the Costa. The same ideas? The same interests? The same humor? None of that – Alice and Wout were so different from us. One PVV comment after another flew across the table. Fine, but I vote differently.

“The same ideas? The same interests? None of that – they were so different from us”

Only now did I notice how much Wout actually swore and Alice had to show her extensive collection of nail polish – 51 colors and she had just ordered four new ones, did I want to see them on the internet too? Well no. Don’t get me wrong, this is not a judgment, but there in Brabant it turned out that we are actually completely different and had zero basis for a friendship. With the white wine under the Spanish sun it felt very different and it should have stopped there. Even the children, who had loved to play together in Spain, were constantly at each other’s throats.

Do it again soon

Lex and I were tired before dinner. “Shall we do it again soon,” Alice said, and I, not brave enough to say I didn’t have to, nodded in agreement.

Unfortunately she turned out to mean it and a few days later the texting started again. “Next time with you!” I didn’t answer for a week and then kept quiet. It took her four months, I think, to realize that follow-up appointment wasn’t going to happen. When she had booked the Spanish campsite again, she asked if we were coming with us. I texted back that we had booked something else. After that I never heard anything again.”

This article is featured in the Kek Mama Summer Special 2022.

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