🍁 The Story of My October

First times and tiny lessons

Hallo fellow learn-it-all 👋 Greetings from Middelburg in the Netherlands. It’s election day to those that are Dutch readers. Quite a different democracy than in the US with voting directly for individual candidates in a two-party system. While in the Netherlands, people vote for political parties in a 21 multi-party system. The top parties then compromise and form a coalition government together. It’s currently neck and neck between two polar opposite parties.

Anywho, this week I am sharing a recap on my month. This is the first time in five years of sharing these that I’m publishing it before the month is even over. It’s a bit premature thing to do but whatever. Here’s Smoes my most recent cat-coworker and she gave me permission to do so.

Now, let’s dive into letter 286 from a learn-it-all. Enjoy!

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❓Question to think about

What’s notable about October?

🖊️Writing and Reflecting

It was the month of first times, I…

• reached 700 readers here on Substack (!) after 286 weeks of weekly publishing (Hi, you’re one of them, thank you 😊).

• I launched my audiobook preorder (eleven early supporters, thank you!) and hired an audio engineer.

  I’m Launching My Audiobook!

• designed my own postcards using my film photos and ordered international stamps online

• incorporated my Dutch company, Docet Co., inspired by my Dutch family’s Latin motto Dies Diem Docet: “the day teaches the day”

• dog-sat a 50-kilo Bernese mountain dog named Nala and walked her three times a day

• chicken-sat six hens, enjoyed their orange-yolked eggs for breakfast each morning, and lost one on my watch (found later with feathers ruffled and decapitated in a bush 🥺💀)

• almost killed a pothos plant by loving it too much (note to self: less water, more patience)

• Read a scripture passage at a mennonite protestant mass. (That was scary!)

• finally activated my OV-chipkaart and became a proper train-tap person with a discount for the train during off-peak hours

• went to Mezrab for storytelling night and the Dutch grandmother tale left me teary and inspired

• tried bouldering for the first time (my shoulders hated me for a week)

• finished a Zen course at Zen Centrum Amsterdam

• Had a lot of fun talking about writing and a new friend Pablo Musumeci joined the Substack Writing Second Sunday Circle (link)

• learned what a Labubu is, and watched my first episode of South Park (apparently I do live under a rock)

• celebrated Leiden’s Dri Oktober (third of October holiday) with minimal sleep, dutch songs to sing at sunrise, powdered sugar everywhere, bellies full of oliebollen, riding side-saddle on my uncle’s bike.

• had so much fun facilitating four weekly writing circles!

• hula-hooped as a warm-up before yoga most mornings to stretch my right hip

• attended my first full month of fiction-writing classes in person every Tuesday night

• What else I wrote about this month:

  • shared the piece that scared me most On Five-Year Plans

    What’s the Five Year Plan?

  • about the experience of the first 100 days in Holland

    100 days in Holland

  • my annual long walk for nine hours. For three years it was in Hawai‘i, but this time through Amsterdam’s parks: nine hours, 28 kilometers, and a whole lot of noticing

    My Medicine to Overthinking is Movement

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🧭 Little Lessons & Realizations

• “Snail mail” isn’t a global phrase.

• I don’t want to be a paid writer. I want to write and let my other skills support that devotion. I have turned off the setting to pay for this Substack.

• My business exists to build bridges, not walls.

• Too much water can drown both a plant and a plan.

• Sometimes, slowing down onto what’s important is progress. For me that has meant signing up for Tether from Carly Valancy and reaching out to someone intentionally each day.

• I want to show up to my journal to handwrite and also to the keyboard each morning to write at least 1000 words. I don’t want AI to atrophy my noggin.

• Banana bread temperatures of the type of oven matter a lot. I need to still figure that out again so I can cook a loaf all the way through.

• I’m back addicted to caffeine. I get migraines without it. Alas I’m sad, but it here’s a season.

🪞Things I Consumed (& what they taught me)

🎧 📖 On Writing by Stephen King – the daily ritual of writing at least 1000 a day matters more than the muse.

🖥️ how much money i make on substack by Alex Dobrenko` reminded me that full-time writing is a calling, not a sustainable easy career.

📝 Henrik Karlsson note about an ideal life style for a writer in modern society

🎬 Before Sunrise – the art of being fully present with a stranger.

🎬 Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy – on love, loss, and keeping connections alive for with birthday life letters she and her children attach to balloons to commemorate and keep the connection alive with their passed father

🔗 Dose of Society – proof that storytelling still builds meaning in our digital world.

📺 South Park — my first and probably last episode. Some rocks are nice to live under.

🔍 Words I looked up this Month

amenable · technophile · fanzine · higgledy-piggledy · pied-à-terre · inane · pleiades · knackered · quibble · sashay · DRM · IOI · anabolic · occupational health psychology

🪶 Tiny Moments That Mattered

• Hugging trees and collecting ginkgo leaves

• Cycling the Schoorl dunes and feeling like I’m in a fairy forest

• Seeing mushrooms and gasping, “oh, you’re beautiful”

• Standing on a train platform holding in my pee and still feeling grateful for being here

• Eating an old Dutch grandma’s recipe’s apple pie recipe and talking about writing dreams

• Hearing my story at an attempt to write as a male narrator’s voice about a boy vulnerable moment of a wet dream read aloud in my writing class (mortifying and oddly freeing)

🎧 Listening

Amsterdam by Gregory Alan Isakov

🌟Quote to inspire

“If you have good thoughts, they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.” —Roald Dahl

📸Photos of the Month

🤳Some Selfies

🙏Shoutouts

• To Eveline and Jan for hosting me at their home in Middelburg (along with Kona, Scotty, Smoos, and Pukie of course)

• To Arne and Delia for subletting me their home and plant babies in Amsterdam Oost

• To Hester and Herman for opening their home to me in exchange for watching their doggy and chickens

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I am grateful you chose to fill part of your day here.

If something in this letter resonated, press the ❤️ , leave a comment, reply to this email, or reach me at vermetJL@gmail.com. I love hearing from you.

Keep on learning 😁

Tot snel 🌺 🌺

Toodles :)

P.S.

#1 - I coach writers. I guide them to find their voice, build a writing rhythm, and have fun hitting “publish.” Let’s chat.

#2 - You’re invited. If a friend forwarded you this, welcome. Sign up here to get the next letter.

#3 - I wrote a book. Letters to My Life is my favorite way to share my writing with you (and it keeps your screen-time stats down). Grab your copy here.

#4 - Here’s what you missed. Last week I wrote about my attempt at answering What’s the Five Year Plan?