Posted by kabouter on December 26, 1998 at 12:59:17:

It is the day after Christmas in my North Holland town. The great god commerce has been laid to rest for another year satiated and replete after days of frenzied worship. Even the old brick churches seem renewed as if yesterday's outpouring of devotion had purged them of their year of neglect and they stand erect and proud, their bricks washed and refreshed - or maybe it is the slow rain that slides down the canvas of the day limning the bricks with silver light drawing warmth out of these stones so that the hidden colours rejoice the drab afternoon.

The boys are everywhere. Swooping home from the cinema each of them an Abeltje in their magic elevators, faces flushed and excited. The fantasy still alive in their hearts and imaginations. Cars in the carpark move about slowly, sluggishly and stop, disgorging whooping, laughing boys into the late afternoon. Boys who need the fresh air as much as I do wrapped in my coat, muffled against the winter. Boys whose lungs swell with the clean strong river air sucked in and held inside those dynamic bodies for a few seconds then released in a great whooosh of sound and laughter.

The boys have reclaimed the fairy-lit centre of town. Here among the shuttered exhausted shops boys are scoring goals for Holland. The evening air is rich with their cries... GOALLLL! I watched them from behind a row of shops then crossed to join them. I saw that when a boy kicks a ball he becomes a star - his leg kicks up at right angles to his body and his arms shoot out at the sides (both also in a right angle) level with the horizon. His arms puncture the world around him they take ownership of his environment. He becomes the lord of all he surveys, the master, the victor. He kicks the ball and then spins around on his axis head craning over his shoulders to watch its progress. The ball loops erratically but forcefully towards the metal grille covering the watchmaker's window. The other boy misses the catch (although he jumps as high as the housetops) and then rejoices to hear the ball crash into the grille with a satisfying splatter of sound. Now it is his turn to become Ginola, Bergkamp and Alexander the Great. GOALLLLLLLL!

The solstice has come and gone with Christmas. The sun is migrating with the swallows and will soon be here again its long flight southwards checked for another year. I used to think that the summer was a time for boys but now I know they own the whole year round. They are truly the champions of the world.

kabouter