The grey tick gets but no company, while I really hope for a duo. It's not happening. It's January 4th and I got the phone number of a Tania a few hours earlier. A lady on the beach of Tulum, whom I met shortly before in the water. To my disappointment, the WhatsApp doesn't seem to be coming. I decide to send her a text out of some despair. It's hard to imagine, but it could be natural that she doesn't have WhatsApp at all. After all, no profile picture will appear either. Did she give me the wrong number? Tssk.
Half an hour later, I take another look at my phone. Nothing. I still look at the song and compare it to another Mexican song. There is hope at the same time: the song is not right, there is a number missing. Fuckfuckfuck. Did I not enter it correctly? Wait a minute. There was a four in her number! Right? Where's the four now? I know this is my first thought, and you should never doubt it in such a case. Just puzzle. I write down the current song, because it is largely correct. Then I randomly put a four in between; again a primary thought. A profile picture will appear immediately on WhatsApp. Yes. It's her. One attempt and success. A delightful detail prior to that first date. Such a cliché 'yes, then it is meant to be'.

Now, more than 11 months later, I run errands at the cheap department store Costco. We're having a party tonight. It is quite crowded and cluttered here and the audience is fascinating to look at. I think with melancholy of my mother, who in the Efteling always enjoys watching people more than the attractions. Who, in my teenage years, always gave me that eternal wonder is a trait that you should never lose. Observe. Do not judge or condemn, just wonder. Watching that little family walking through the Fairytale Forest. Dad at 11 o'clock in the morning already at the beer, mom who is constantly calling and occasionally scolding at their son, who has fun in hunting pigeons. Their baby now cries incessantly, but there is hardly any attention to that. Daddy squeezes Mommy's buttock. My mother and I will sit on a bench and watch this. We marvel with a smile. The kind of scenes that are not unthinkable in Costco; my mother would love it here. With main attraction Costco, then.

I'm following my mother again. Because it's starting to annoy me here too; I hate shopping in the base. It's getting busier and busier. Warmer and warmer, too. The crying of babies gets on my nerves all of a sudden. The Christmas music goes through the marrow and bone. I want to leave. I've had enough impressions. Got everything, too, so walk to the register. I'll pay, throw all my stuff in bags and walk to the exit. I have to show my receipt to the security. Fuck. Where did I put those? Fuck. The Mexican gives receipts everywhere, so my pockets are now full of paper. But where's Costco's? Behind me soon a kind of row forms. Twenty, thirty people. I'm taking a step aside. That crying again. Here the Christmas music sounds even louder whenever possible. The sweat is breaking me out. I empty my shopping bags and that's where I find the receipt. I'll rejoin in line. Heavily irritated. I do want to.

I'm looking on my phone: two missed calls and a text message. Oh, yeah, I'm out of data, and Tania wants to reach me. I'm reading her text. Above it is one earlier text between us. Mine.
Whistling and dancing, I leave Costco.