Molens

This is "de Trouwe Wachter" (The Faithful Watchman), the molen where my great-grandmother was born. The first time we met the Verbiest family there it was a weekend where they were just hanging out and their friend Bart was there doing some painting. They weren't expecting visitors, but let us just join in for a couple of hours. Because of the family association, but especially because of the warm reception of the Verbiest's, I've come to think of this as "our mill". I've often dreamed of just hanging around on a Saturday, scraping, painting, or whatever needs to be done - real, everyday, normal stuff that helps to preserve a family heirloom.

Jan Verbiest sent us a DVD from a Dutch TV series "The Story of Dutch Windmills". We finally got a chance to watch it tonight. It's a little tough to see everything you want to see on the screen when you are trying to read the English subtitles, but it's a great set of videos. Watching part of it again, with Dutch subtitles turned on was fun too! Once in awhile I could actually match up what I was hearing with the words on the screen, which is actually helpful for getting a sense of how Dutch is spoken.

It doesn't matter that it's not realistic to think of actually living in the Netherlands, but watching that video makes me wish for it even more. One of the millers mentioned that people come from all over to get the flours they grind because you can't get them anywhere else. It's true - we brought home 3 kilograms of waldkorn flour and wished we could have brought more. It makes the most glorious bread and I'm going to cry when it's gone.

Another of the millers in the video talked about how windmills just grab your heart and won't let go. It's true. Now I want to go learn how to be a miller and make that great flour in the Netherlands.