Things I Do Not Want to Do

Last week I did something I didn’t want to do.

I was in the Netherlands for the International Literature Festival (I did want to do this)—just arrived, in fact.

Fifteen hours previous: I boarded the red-eye flight from Virginia.

Six hours previous: I sat on the floor with the rest of my flight at the baggage carousel, waiting an hour for our delayed luggage, reading Taleb’s THE BLACK SWAN to keep myself awake (only sometimes discovering I had reread a paragraph two times already).

Five hours previous: I got into the car the festival had sent for me. My driver had googled me so that he would know my face; he also knew I was into cars. "Do you know that car show?” he asked me, in good English, but with a heavy Dutch accent. “Top Gear?” I guessed. “Grand tour?” Yes, that was what he meant. He launched into an impersonation of Jeremy Clarkson, one of the presenters, reaming on the electric vehicle that he and I were currently riding in. It was perfect, no trace of a Dutch accent, camera ready. I was not entirely certain I was not dreaming.

Four hours previous: Wondrously, my hotel room was ready for early check in. Utrecht was waking up, but I was falling asleep. I didn’t need to be anywhere until my festival event the next afternoon; there was nothing stopping me from giving in to my Eastern Standard sleep-deprived desire to sleep until evening. There was a catch, however. I’d asked readers what they recommended I see in Utrecht if I had time. I’d gotten loads of suggestions, more than enough to fill this entire day off and then some, none of which felt important to explore more than the inside of my eyeballs, except . . . one reader had told me that there were free concerts every Saturday at 3:30 pm at the ancient Domkerk, a twenty minute walk from my hotel.

Three hours, forty-five minutes previous: I debated. I didn’t want to go. Everything in me—the human, the writer, the autoimmune condition that was already working its dark magic because of the overnight flight—wanted to sleep. Perhaps order take out, and then sleep. But no part of me wanted to change socks, scrape my hair into a ponytail, and appear visible on the streets of Utrecht with my eyes open. No concert would be superior to this. Self-care, whispered my body. You’re right, I said. I set an alarm for three hours, knowing I would turn it off and go back to sleep when it went off.

Forty-five minutes previous: The alarm went off. I turned it off. Sleep was the better option. But now there was a voice. The voice said: Do you want to remember Utrecht as this hotel room. I sure as hell did, I thought. I wanted to remember Utrecht as this pillow and my pajama shirt. I did not want to go.

Thirty minutes previous: I was up. I was scraping my hair into a pony tail. I was stuffing a granola bar in my face. I was assessing the weather outside to see just how big of an asshole I would look like if I wore my sunglasses over my triple eye bags. Sunny. Great. It was decided, then. I was going. Down I went, spending the elevator ride leaning against the wall and trying to decide if I’d dreamt the Jeremy Clarkson bit. Hoofing it through Utrecht.

Ten minutes previous: “Are you here for the music?” asked a man standing just inside the Domkerk. “Yes,” I replied, resentfully, and took a program. As I slid into a pew, Dutch voices whispered cheerfully all around me. I thought about how the building underneath me had been in some form of construction since the 10th century. I read the Latin on the wall. I read the Latin in the program. I was fairly certain the taxi driver had been real, but my growling stomach thought the granola bar was imaginary. Why I had chosen music over a meal was beyond me.

Zero minutes: A handful of cantors emerged in red. Arranging themselves in a circle, they began to sing music from the time period I’d chosen to study in college, Dering, Praetorius, voices in precise counterpoint. In between these transcendent pieces, the organ player improvised deep, dreadful tones that I could feel through the seat. I forgot I was tired. I forgot that time was a thing I was every particularly fussed about. If there was a meaningful difference between dreaming and waking, I forgot that too. Ninety minutes later, we lingered together in the aftermath, somewhat altered. My seatmate said something to me in Dutch and I said, apologetically, “Sorry.” He translated, “Marvelous.”

Anyway, last week I did something I didn’t want to do.

I’m sure it’ll happen again.