Blazing Reader,

My son and I are back from a five-day trip to Germany. The final inch of our journey home ended up being a comedy of errors, beginnic with our train pulling into Deurne station (about 7 km from our Dutch village) and...

...the door to our carriage not opening. After a brief stop, the train resumed its journey. So, we ended up in the city of Helmond. At first, this appeared to be a minor detour. We could get on the next train back to Deurne. Except...

...our German ticket's QR code wouldn't open the Dutch gate, allowing us to switch to another platform. Naturally, there was no staff at this 21st-century station to help us out. It appeared we'd be retiring on platform 1, panhandling and living off vending machine stroopwafels. Fortunately...

...we found a big yellow button we could press and talk to staff remotely, show them our ticket over a camera, and have the gate opened. All seemed well but...

...the gate led to an elevator (no stairs), and the button to open the elevator wasn't working. So I summoned all my strength, willpower and growing frustration to pry the doors apart. We rode it down, took a working elevator up to the adjacent platform and caught the next train back to Deurne. Or, at least, so we thought...

Instead of Deurne, we ended up at a completely different station on the fringes of Helmond. I found another button. This one was yellow, not green and marked "SOS". I pressed it and...

...apparently called the Dutch equivalent of 911. They were very understanding, however, and didn't fine me five hundred euros or take away my resident permit.

Next, I sent my wife an email (after connecting my laptop to the city's free wifi). She insisted on coming to pick us up (even though I assured her that if we just hopped on the next train, it would surely bring us to Deurne).

Needless to say, I'm still settling back into life in the Netherlands (which suddenly really feels like home after a week in Germany). As promised (in my Tuesday video from the mountains of Bavaria), I did film another video in Munich reading an excerpt from my forthcoming novel, COVID Disobedience (about Josef, a character in the story who lives in Munich). I still need to fix the mangled subtitles AI generated for the video. So that'll be out tomorrow.

I know you can't wait, and the anticipation must be unbearable.

To help tide you over, you can attend the premiere of a masterclass my wife, Ina Backier, is releasing today at 10 am ET (4 pm CT) called Intimacy Untethered. She's a somatic therapist. In this 45-minute video (which she's been working on for months) she presents little-known explanations for how the subconscious may be sabotaging your personal relationships — whether with a romantic partner, your kids, other family members or your close friends. It's free to attend, nothing for sale, and you can sign up here.

John C.A.Manley

John C. A. Manley is the author of Much Ado About Corona, All The Humans Are Sleeping and other works of philosophical fiction that are "so completely engaging that you find yourself alternately laughing, gasping, hanging on for dear life." Get free samples of his stories by becoming a Blazing Pine Cone email subscriber.