Bert’s price for my grandfather’s self-portrait was 5.000 guilders, let’s say € 5.000 today. That was an awful lot of money I definitely did not have privately. But who says accountants can’t be creative is wrong, very wrong. My accountant came up with an ‘if you can’t convince them, confuse them’ strategy that was so confusing that it had to be convincing. In the Netherlands the pay of for the tax authorities is ‘we can’t make it more fun but we can make it easier.’ My accountant had proven that it can be easy AND fun. So I paid for grandfather and at the end of the exhibition Bert called me on Thursday to ask me if I was able to collect grandfather the coming Saturday around 16.00 so we could have a toast on the family reunion. “OfCOR’s” I sayd to Bert on the phone and on Saturday Noëlle (our 7 year old daughter) and I went to Bert’s gallery. We walked on the Voorstraat and I told Noëlle we were going to pick up her great-grandfather. She probably thought she had to help because he was so great. (hahaha my first English pun). This is a good sign, me making puns (woordspelingen). It’s a sign of me being in my Element (read the book by Sir Ken Robinson). Anyway after a glass of red wine Bert asked me if I had a blanket to cover grandfather. On my “no” Bert picked up a blanket from the back and solemnly draped great grandfather. It felt strange and special, standing in the doorway with Noëlle’s little feet on the Voorstraat, me still in the gallery and grandfather horizontal in between. I thanked Bert for reuniting me with my grandfather and started singing “Hiho hiho it’s off to work we go” with Noëlle quickly joining her favorite Disney song…..and me not realizing that one day grandfather would help me to redeem the 5.000. But for now I sang along with Noëlle and grandfather “Hiho hiho it’s off to work we go” leaving Bert in the doorway with a big smile on his face. I never saw Bert again.
To be continued.
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