All That Remains

Since declaring 2024 my year of nostalgia, I’d been wrestling with semantics: is it really a homecoming if you never actually go home, or can’t? After all, many of the houses I’d previously inhabited would now be home to someone else, while others would have been repurposed or replaced entirely. Accepting this fact, and not prepared to intrude or trespass to satisfy my own curiosity, I’d resigned myself to simply skirting memory lane, or indeed straß.

A case in point: the school reunion this was all building towards wouldn’t take place at the boarding house—now effectively closed—while several of my past addresses had BFPO postcodes that no longer existed or to which I no longer had access. This was especially true of Brüggen, which had lived almost as many subsequent lives as I had, first as an RAF base, then Army, before being returned to German control and used to house refugees. It’s since been bought by a company looking to create an energy and technology campus on top of the old married quarters.

But as I travelled around North Rhine-Westphalia, in orbit around the cities that once marked the outer reaches of my young universe, passing signs for satellite towns like Monchengladbach, Oberhausen and Venlo, I felt the gravitational pull of the little village at the centre of it all: Elmpt. I was getting closer, too. My next stop was Roermond, less than ten miles away and just over the Dutch border, a town I’d frequented for years and felt a deep affection for. Could I really come all this way and stop just short of going home?

Unlike some of the places I’d recently revisited, I recognised Roermond on arrival. Hamstraat, for years the site of my nearest McDonald’s, felt especially familiar—though the branch in question was sadly closed for a poorly timed renovation. Much else had closed, too—unfortunately never to reopen. The cinema was shuttered, the department store was boarded up and the shop from which I’d bought my very first Pokémon cards lay vacant. The streets weren’t deserted by any means, but it wasn’t exactly bustling either.

It seemed the intervening years had been a bit unkind to Roermond. Vroom & Dreesmann—said department store—had been the town’s beating heart for decades, especially at this time of year, in the months leading up to Carnival and Easter, when it was stocked with extravagant costumes and colourful chocolates. Since V&D closed its stores nationally in 2016, the site had sat empty—a constant and conspicuous reminder of happier and more prosperous times. Always more glamorous within than without, it now resembled a multi-storey car park, an unsightly scar on the otherwise picturesque main square.

I couldn’t help but pin some of the blame on Britain’s withdrawal from RAF Brüggen—or Javelin Barracks as the Army later rebranded it. The base had once boasted a sizeable military and civilian population, and as I walked around Roermond there were noticeably fewer English voices to be heard. In reality, though, the designer outlet that opened as I was preparing to leave had drawn business and investment away from the city centre. It had been an international success, especially on Sundays when shops in Germany were closed, and attracted visitors from even further afield than that—although evidently a pretty self-contained one.

I’d arranged to meet an old school friend by the bandstand, and found myself walking behind her and her son en route. We’d met at primary school on Brüggen, progressed to secondary at JHQ Rheindahlen and spent countless weekends rollerblading around Elmpt together. After leaving, a disruption to my education that lead to me repeating a school year, we reconnected briefly when she started university near to my boarding school—before our paths again diverged, seemingly for good. Even then our childhood escapades seemed like a lifetime ago; by now they felt like ancient history.

We ordered some lunch on the square (the French onion soup again came highly recommended) and by the time we’d finished eating had caught each other up to speed on our time apart, finding we still had more than enough in common. If I’d been left cold by some of the places I’d revisited, cities that had grown beyond recognition and towns that were shadows of their former selves, spending time with an old friend had the opposite effect. The memories—until this point unforthcoming—began to flood back, and as we left the restaurant present-day Roermond felt like a friendlier and more hopeful place; more like the Roermond of old.

I’d been talked into making the short journey to Elmpt after all—there was no longer a direct bus service but the offer of a lift made it too convenient to resist. Having seen Roermond, though, I worried what awaited me in Elmpt—and had been forewarned to prepare for the worst. We crossed the border into Germany and took the old road along the perimeter fence, reaching the camp gates before I’d had time to properly steel myself. Military bases—like any institution—are rarely welcoming places, but they’re generally well kempt and encouraging of community. Now, though, overgrown and unloved, it looked downright inhospitable. My heart sank.

We followed Alter Kirchweg into town, past mutual friends’ houses, the school bus stop and yet more businesses gone bust: the ice cream parlour, the Chinese restaurant, the supermarket. Parking at the kindergarten, we were standing on Grünewaldstraße and staring up at my old house before I could even begin to get my bearings. I immediately felt a lump in my throat and for a moment wished I’d come alone. But then my friend’s son asked me to play in the park opposite and I was soon glad of the distraction. It was overgrown and half its original size, having ceded land to the kindergarten next door, but was otherwise unchanged. As we ran, the park—and the past 20-odd years—disappeared in a blur.

There were sadly other shocks in store that afternoon—the swimming pool was gone, a second park had been built over and the NAAFI had been fenced off, graffitied and forgotten—but before I could dwell on any other disappointments I was happily sipping shandy in my friend’s living room and flicking through her son’s Pokémon card collection. I hadn’t expected to stay into the evening—she’d mentioned she was expecting friends over for Germany’s Next Top Model that night—but it was after seven when we finally set off back to Roermond, time having momentarily lost all importance. What’s two hours between friends? What’s two decades?

Not quite ready to leave, and having not eaten anything since lunchtime, I decided to try to the Oranjerie on my way to the train station. Although the RAF had put us up in a nearby hotel with other departing Forces families—most, like us, posted back to the UK—my parents had wanted their last night to be spent in Roermond and splurged on the penthouse suite of the fanciest hotel in town. To this day, of the many moves made before and since, leaving Germany remains the most painful of all, though my brother’s last morning was traumatic for another reason entirely—a pigeon had got in through the window and painted him where he slept.

It was a longer journey back to Aachen than expected. A fallen tree had blocked the line and all trains to Maastricht had been cancelled, leaving me to find a bus as far as Heerlen instead. But it gave me the time and space I needed to think—about what I’d come for and what I’d be taking away. I’d wished to remember: every street, every second, everything. Now that I was there, however, the details seemed less important and the disappointment at not recognising them less acute. I was forced to accept that much of this week would be forgotten in time, too. That’s just how brains worked. It didn’t mean it hadn’t meant something in the moment.

Besides, I may not remember—but I was remembered. I’d been so preoccupied with what was missing that I’d almost missed what remained. I still had a friend there, and if the last few hours had reminded me of anything it was that, no matter how many years have elapsed or how much seemed to have changed, new memories could mean just as much as old ones. You don’t still have to live somewhere to feel completely and eternally at home. Perhaps it wasn’t to be a year of nostalgia after all. What if 2024 could be a year of renewal instead?