Abandoned roads - Jos Lammers

and devotion. Or hand it over, as everybody who entered
the ashram had to do with all his money and other belongings.
I tucked it under my shirt, mumbled that I still had
to do something and left the once grand but now kind of
crummy mansion at the Sarphatistraat that housed the
ashram to go back into town.
My brother lived nearby, just behind Frederiksplein.
“Can this stay with you for now” I asked when I
reached his floor.
“Why is that” he asked.
“No why’s. Just like that. Keep it for me.”
He shrugged. “Okay, just put it in the cupboard.”
Grimm’s Fairytales, the Tales of Hans Christian
Andersen and four volumes of 1001 night stories were
already there. Brought over after the big clean up of my
room, since I couldn’t donate them with the rest of my
stuff to the Salvation Army. I leafed a bit through the
drawings of Anton Pieck in one of the 1001 night volumes.
My brother had already written his name in the front, I
saw.
“I didn’t say take it”, I said and pointed at the letters at
the bottom of page two.
“Oh, well. I thought you didn’t want them anymore. It
was all nonsense, wasn’t it”
“Yeah, I’m gonna live there.”
“Where At this guru place”
I nodded.
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