forget it. There are too many other fun things to do

Sylvia WittemanSeptember 9, 20229:00 am

The newspaper featured a nice summer series about writers and the books that shaped them. For Guus Kuijer, Theo Thijssens was The tough inconvenience one of those books. For me too. It’s almost as nice as Kees the boy.

I remember that as a child I initially ignored it because I didn’t like the title. I ended up reading it anyway, probably because there was nothing on the TV. For all know-it-alls who think that ‘dereading’ can still be reversed: forget it. Today’s kids don’t read so much because they’re lazy or stupid, but because there are so many other fun things to do. That’s how the children of our generation stayed effortlessly slim: there was simply not an abundance of good food. You ate at home (usually with slight reluctance) what your mother cooked, and that was that.

Times were different when it came to clothes. Today clothes cost next to nothing. For 100 euros you have brand new jeans, a nice sweater and a great jacket. That’s what I thought when I The tough inconvenience reread.

The book is about clothes. More than a century ago, these cost a huge chunk out of the family budget. Main character Joop van Santen says: ‘The girls – that’s okay; but it’s awful, as much as we boys cost: Henk and I at least, Jantje costs nothing yet. Some small leftover piece of cloth, or a few cool spots from a worn-out tube of ours, and Mother will quickly sew something out for him.’

‘No, that’s where Henk and I are. A new package, that is so eternally expensive! Then there is the accusation that we are wild and never think well of us, but that is not the point. It’s in that mean, sneaky wear. You do nothing against that. Even if you think about yourself all day long – it wears off for a while, that’s the bad thing.’

Who ever wears out anything? One third of our clothes are thrown away without ever being worn. We never or almost never wear more than two-thirds of the clothes in our closet. And then poor Joop who had to make do with one ‘daily’ package and one for Sunday, and then there was still something wrong with that package.

‘Never has a boy worn pants like this. Those pants don’t fit, those pants hang out from under the tube, the two pipes are like two narrow skirts, which dangle next to each other. (…) Oh, our mother isn’t the worst, but she should never have mentioned that to Miss Volkamp: a seamstress can’t make boys’ clothing, can she?’

And then those dreaded cast-offs: ‘I see it, that raincoat, and recognize the species at a glance: such a crazy coat without sleeves; and with silly wings on her; I never understood how boys ever wanted to walk in such insane coats. I’m just standing there staring at Mrs.’s outstretched arm…’

There is no other option: he has to put on the coat and take to the street with it. ‘All around me are people; men, women, boys, girls, all equally normal, equally ordinary; and in between haunts that queer creature in billowing black robes. Oh, if I only have the canal first, the Prinsengracht, where it’s quieter… then the coat will go off, then I’ll be a normal boy again…’

Kids today will certainly recognize that feeling. The shame, if there is a wrong brand name on your shoes! Yes, that tough discomfort is, despite the prosperity, of all times.

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