h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Tracy, was her name.
The ónly thing about her I wasn't very fond of. It did ring a bell about my older sisters name. Bad feelings. But her smile made me forget all of that within a few days.
Whenever she opened the door for me, the first thing I always saw was her real, happy smile and her shiny eyes. I could'nt wish a better welcome.
Although they also had an Indonesian way of welcoming visitors; a backdoor of the kitchen that was álways open and I used to take that backdoor route which made me feel just as welcome.

Tracy was - as her brother once told me - a daughter of an Indonesian houskeeper in Germany. He told me that his mother had adopted her when she was four years old. Tracy was just as East-Indian as her new mother, sister and four brothers. If you didn't know it, you could not see it, in any way. They were al very close.

Tracy was to me a real beauty; cheerful, a bit wild, dark and long hair ánd East Indian, which means in Holland; half Indonesian and half European.
I must have met her at a very early age. My age was probably thirteen/fourteen and because she suddenly became a great love to me,it is strange that I even in those days could not remember how we met. Maybe in a snackbar in the so called East-Indian area of our small town. I can't recollect.

Tracy was warm, cheerful, good looking, energetic and behaved sexually liberal and was emotionally more mature than I was. She also had more liberty to do whatever she wanted to do than I had.

Being more mature than your boyfriend counts for all generations at that age and Tracy was "merciful" to me and never misused her advantage.
Her older brother became also a very good friend of mine and in this way I got a strong relationship with her family. It became my East-Indian island of survival and Tracy was my lighthouse and as a result of that I could find this place under all circumstances.

But because she was a loved one in the so-called "East-Indian" sector of our town, my mother had the strong conviction that this way of loving was absolutely nót done. Tracy became "forbidden-love". Well, I could think of many óther really relevant things that should have been forbidden in our ówn household. Countless ones.

The ban was troublesome for me, but my love for her álso got a dramatic and theatrical shine because of it. I became very skilled in making up áll kinds of excuses to leave my home. Invincable.
And almost every evening I left home and walked "the long and winding road that leads to her door" to finally arrive at the home of my beloved Indonesian Prinses and be close to her and get a King-cigarette from her and she enjoyed it just as much.
And every saturday we were together in Amsterdam in a coffeshop (which was n't related in tose days to smoking hash, although we would'nt have avoided it, if it was).
We became unseparable at those saturday-afternoons, but in the evening I was hardly allowed to go downtown. I had to return at ten o'clock. So no chance of ány saturday-nightlife with my best-friend Tracy.



Her mother had the véry strong habbit néver to enter the room of Tracy and that made her room even móre intimate,although she had to share it with her sister Christel. But Christel was often gone and véry loyal to us.
Tracy was most of the times the real life and soul, also at her home, although her oldest brother was ten years older than she was.


Such a safe haven was of course Thé Place for my first sexual experiences.
We devellopped a habit to make love at the end of every schoolweek, although we were not at the same school. At the friday afternoons we lied on her bed with our clothes still on and one time I satisfied hér body with the help of my hands and the other week she did the same with me. That habbit had a longstanding life.
It felt like real friendship and it was.
The fact that I was allowed to touch her body everywhere, ment a lot to me. It gave me the feeling of complete acceptation and I had no higher aims.


In my first attempt to "leave home" I stayed "a whole saturdaynight with Tracy" when she had a party at her house. Finally I could join now saturdaynight-life and in the late hours I shared her bed in the attic-room and I enjoyed her warm, naked body, although I appeared to be unable at that moment to have sexual intercourse with her. She didn't mind; I was with her and that appeared more than enough to her.


Once I even arranged a whole weekend for both of us in Rotterdam. In that city lived an ex-sister-in-law, whom I liked very much. I felt very much at ease there.
I was allowed to spend a weekend there and in secret Tracy joined me.
Finally we could go to a disco together and after midnight we returned to our visitor's room.
"Would I be able to really make love this time?",I thought rather nervously.
And in a conventional way I took the initiative and thanks to heaven a real erection helped me to be "a real friend" for my Tracy.
I whispered the historical words "This is the first time, hey, Tracy!" . And she replied; "is this really your first time?!". "No", I recapitulated, "but this is the first time with yóu!". "Yes, that's true", she whispered and again - heaven thanks - I felt, I'd saved my image..



But not for long..
I had urged my parents to put me at a boarding school in the North of Holland. These kinds of schools are very rare in Holland and this was a so called "study-boarding school" with a former Dutch nazi-officer(W.W.2) at the top.

But I felt, that every option was better than "home".
So I went to say goodby to my friends, including the brother of Tracy. And when he finally would bring me to the station he said; "don't you forget to say goodby to Tracy?"
"Oh yeah, stupid, of course!" I simulated/feigned and went up the stairs to Tracy's room.

I entered her room, while I kept the door handle in my hand, looked at Tracy - who sat at the edge of her bed while staring at the wall before her - and said in a Stoïcal way; "It's all over now, hey, Tracy?"
I didn't really listen to what she replied. Heard vaguely "Yes, oké".
I closed her door and left her home..

We loved each other for two years at that time.
She had become my life, love and lust and I knew it was the same for her.


(Why would ányone in this world wish to stay forever young......?)


And so I started to live my self-choosen scenario of "Polar Coldness" in the North of Holland. It appeared to last no longer than ten months.
Never written to Tracy, or made a phonecall. She did the same.
And in the few weekends that I was at home she didn't seem to exist to me.

Just óne letter from her, or óne telephonecall, óne sound of her happy laughter and my whole Polar-Coldness-Survival-Plan-To-Be-Anywhere-But-At-Home would immediately and totally have collapsed as snow in the sun!! Totally.




After a year I was back where I left; at home, one mile from Tracy.
Soon I became friends with her brother again and one way I dated a new East-Asian girlfriend. Tracy's brother was a pop-photographer and he invited me to accompany him, including my new girlfriend.
All passed by without much passion in me. Until two days later. Tracy's brother told me that Tracy and my new girlfriend quarreled, because both claimed mé as their loverboy.

Greater News couldn't exist for me.
This was the sun, proclaiming the End of Ice Age!
This was rain in the desert...

All doors inside me were thrown wide open and on my bike I ran to Tracy's home, up to her room, kept my breath for a second and said: "Tracy, shall we be friends again?"
Is there any greater joy than asking that question, while already knowing the answer?
She said "Yes" with a big smile at her face and from that moment on we shared our lives as we did before.


She was a lively, colourful, warm and sexy girl and my childhood is unthinkable without her presence. She was my daily bread.
Until city life started, including visits to all kinds of bars, although she remained my beloved Tracy to me.

I did brake the embargo of my parents by doing something véry unusual in our family. I told them I wanted "to talk about it" and by even proposing such an unusual action I knew I had already won this battle.
Fianlly Tracy came to visit my parents and she had dressed herself very decent, asif she was at boarding school herself.
Well, after ten minutes of talking, our love was permitted and because of that our love enjoyed far more territory than before. It felt nice,that my loved one was acknowledged. From that moment on, my elder brothers sometimes told me that they met Tracy in a bar at a saterdaynight. In this way, I could still be close to her. I trusted her completely.

That summer I went with Tracy, her mother and smaller brother to French, where her mother had bought a small farmhouse and I was asked to repair the roof. Being there and doing my job I experienced more and more how "young" I was; more than all the others around me. Getting drunk at a small party is also not a great prove of maturity....


A few months later I suddenly suspected a great disaster. I don't know how I could be suddenly that sensitive at that moment, because my mother used to have very long phonecalls in the dining room every evening with friends, sharing her worries. You could only hear her talk, but could hardly understand it. I must have sensed it in advance.
Walking through the hall, I suddenly stood still, felt frozen and walked slowly to the door and heard my mother speaking; "Yes, my child, I understand" and everything that was still alive in me felt completely alarmed.

That same evening Tracy came to my house to talk to me.
I was armed by a new pack of cigarettes and a sealed soul.
We sat at the dinner table; Tracy and I.
She repeatedly told me; "Alfredo, you don't lísten to me. I've asked you many times to drink less beer, but you do not lísten, Alfredo"
My reply won't have made that much sense. First of all, because I didn't really listen to what she had to say..

Tracy stood up and left the room, said goodby to my parents in the living room and I disappeared to my best friend to stay and sleep there for a few days.(a few years later I heard he was killed by a car accident)


Within six months I suddenly left home for ever; damaged by "home" and a lost love.
A new girlfriend waved at me, when I left by train to a new life of my own.

That night I slept in the street somewhere in a small town, with a suitcase under my head. I slept a very good sleep.
A new life had begun and after a visit to my ex-sister in law in Rotterdam, these coming years would appear to be the most happy in my life.

Seldom I visited my parents at home and in a train for that rare visit, I talked to a completely unknown girl and suddenly she said; "are yóu that boy, that cried so long because of his broken love? "Yes", that must be me", I replied.
I felt surprised aswell as known.

After a few months I left Rotterdam and lived in another town in the east.
I had a small room in a very big house, above a hatshop, and the lanlady was a very unconventional woman(50), just like her husband. Many rooms in her house were let out by her. Almost ten, all young people.
We enjoyed a lot of freedom over there and she and her husband easily joined us in it. Drinking, laughing, even a naked-party now and then. The sixtees, you know(Once we were all thrown out by the real owner.Even the landlady had to go!)


One day I suddenly called Tracy and got her on the phone and invited her to visit me. "Yes, I'd like to do that, the next weekend. Oké?" Of course that was "Oké".
I asked a friend of mine to join me and collect Tracy with his car in her town and so we did.
Cheerful as ever she greeted me and asked him immediately; "can I drive your car?" A beatles-song almost seemed to become reality ("Drive my car"), although I sat in the backside..

That evening became a very social happening, compared to my normal actions.
Close to our home was a bar and most of the renters came in, my landlady and husband, and some of my friends in town. Unexpectedly I felt, that I finally had an equal social life as she had and I liked that too.

After midnight we both slept in my bed, although she appeared to have expected a room for her own. I hadn't thought about it. Had no sexual plans, however.

Almost automaticly I started making love with her and she didn't resist..
Suddenly I stopped my solo action and pushed myself up and looked her straight in her eyes and said; "Tracy.............?" with an intonation that gave her the assumption of a personal story.
Silence..
"Yes, Alfredo, what is it that you want to say"
Silence..
"Oh, forget it", I replied and laid my head to rest against her neck and continued my solo-action. It felt impossible to me finding the right words without the risk of exploding landmines in my soul. Too risky. Most probably the silence did its talking.

Although my love for her mainly had become historical, I would have liked to tell her how grateful I was, because of our friendship and love during all those years and that I would never forget it. It had its marks in my heart.

The next day,sunday ,she left by train to join her brothers in another town because of a carnival.
She urged to "finally go and find a job".
"Yes, I will" I said and waved at her, while her train departed and I visited the bar where I almost lived.
Tracy had somewhere become a girl from "another world" to me and which world was a better one didn't interest me át all..

Until, after a few very turbulent years, another girl crossed my way - different from all the others in those years - álso from "another world".
This time I was moved, just becáuse of that.

A Dutch variant of good-looking, warm, strong, cheerful and strong character.
Although very young,I had the feeling, that she had a secret of Life within herself.
I'll call her Melanie in my memories

18 september 2002, Amsterdam