Bahnsteige. -- Deutschland ist ein Gefuehl.

Solang es Bahnsteige gibt und goldglænzende Weizenfelder, solange da auf der Buehne jemand steht neben dem Cello ganz ohne erste Geige, solange es Bushaltestellen gibt, an denen ahnungsvoll gewartet wird, und eine Hand, die in meine passt, als wære sie nur dafuer ausgedacht; solange Flugzeuge ueber den Himmel blinken, einem Sehnsuchtsort entgegen; Solange Finger an beschlagene Scheiben malen und die klirrend kalte Januarluft in meinen Lungen brennt, als waere auch in meinem Herzen Feuer, solange kann man - muss man! - von diesen Menschen singen, die Mærchennamen tragen oder Martin heissen, und die da stehen, auf dem Bahnsteig, und fuer die wir aufstehen auch an Tagen, an denen unser Zug noch lange nicht kommt. Ein Leben, das man nicht verschwenden kann, ist keins. Ein Leben, in dem man nicht einen ganzen Tag verspielen kann mit einer Gitarre und einem Liebeslied fuer jemanden, den man eigentlich gar nicht kennt... was ist das fuer ein Leben?
Die Unordnung tuermt sich in unseren Zimmern, weil Winter ist und wir das Meiste, was wir sind, hier drin sein muessen. Ich raeum samstags auf und am Sonntag sieht es wieder genauso aus. Und ich stell mir vor, bei meinen Schuhen unterm Bett laege auch ein paar von deinen und erzaehlte von schlitternden Schritten, mitgewippten Konzerten, einem Kuechentanz vielleicht. Ich will dir gestehen, dass Sex vielleicht nicht immer Liebe ist, aber so wie dein Koerper im Mondlicht leuchtet, koennte es doch Liebe sein. Doch um Sex soll es gar nicht gehen erstmal. Ich will dir die Schuhe binden und fragen, ob wir heilig sind. Und alle Muenzen, die wir finden, werfen wir in die Luft - denn fuer den Moment ist es egal, ob wir es wirklich fuer einander sind. Allein, dass wir es erwaegen, reicht mir.


Deutschland ist eben auch ein Gefuehl. Ein Zimmer, in dem man etwas verloren hat, das man nicht panisch suchen muss. Denn es kommt ja nichts weg. Es ist diese Ernsthaftigkeit, ohne die Pathos immer Parodie bleiben muss. Du lachst. Entvoelkerte Landstriche, weil wir uns nach der Stadt sehnen. Wir pendeln zwischen Atem und Puls. Weil wir beides brauchen, weil wir letzten Endes vielleicht sogar die Altmark retten koennen, weil wir diese beiden Pole aus Aufstieg und Verfall lieben. Wir tragen Angst in unserem Blick - vielleicht wird es nie wieder so schoen! Deutschland - du lachst! Es ist nicht dein Land. Oder nicht schon immer gewesen. Und ich sitze in Norwegen in der Pampa und sage "wir" und meine weder dich noch mich. Es gehoert mir. Dieses wir. Und meint zwei, die sind wie ich gern waere. Deutschland gehoert mir. Wie dein Mund, wenn du Sonnenbrille traegst. Es ist ein Gefuehl. Als koennte man etwas oder jemanden erreichen. Egal ob man nun zu Fuss geht, oder das naechste Auto aufbricht. Keine Zeit fuers Paradies. Es gibt so viel zu tun.

Never give up trying

I like to establish rules for many things in life. Rules and patterns and default outcomes. Because every single exception is oh so sweet. I indulge in patterns and formulas because I am aware that this life defies them. It surprises us time and again.

Beyond my career, my family planning, my sexuality, my ambition, my fears, my strengths, my dreams... beyond all that-... if we leave all of this aside for a moment, I am still failing at the one thing my parents want for me.

There is a trust issue here that I am just now learning to appreciate.

I know that this is all bits and pieces. I hope to elaborate on it later on.

Pragmatism and concordancing

I fell in love at the Pantibar. And it could've been Belfast or Berlin even, because geography is so overrated. Maybe if we'd tried a little harder the world would've crumpled under that Glasgow moon a few days later. How foolish it seems now to be scared of the apocalypse! But, alas, the world continued its endless rotation and you found that angst was a theme we carried well. I fell in love at the Pantibar and as a firm believer in plot twists I shrugged off all the warnings, because everybody knows that in the end even a doormat can become a queen, right? And plot twists we had! I quit drinking and smoking because I was so afraid of killing myself directly, when I'd obviously rather kill myself by proxy. Heaven knows I came close. Right now, I am not more damaged than most people at this point and I hope neither are you. After all, we tend to accept the love we think we deserve. So maybe we should reconsider our thoughts on this.
Which is why I am leaning into a pragmatic understanding of the world (which is as ridiculously doomed as it sounds - me! Pragmatic!)... and I have to say it kinda works. It goes well with a certain fatalism I acquired and it surely makes room in nihilism for a hopeless romantic. I discovered that it is in fact really easy to make this love/relationship/romance/fairytale stunt work. Considering that all you need is a minimum of attraction, an initial spark and above all the willingness of both parties to connect all the bits and pieces to a thing. Nothing fancy about it. Which makes it even sadder that people fail time and again in making it happen. After all, it can't be that difficult to deceive ourselves and weave hormonal chemistry and good timing into destiny, right?
Pragmatism basically consists in measuring all your hysterical pathos against that one simple truth: Still breathing, still alive, just another day.
That said, I am not waiting for another plot twist. I am not even hoping for it... but I have to admit it would be tremendous and epic and larger-than-life in Italian and with subtitles. And if it came along I would totally tear myself apart jumping right it, because when your life turns into an opera you stand up and sing.

Now to concordancing. I have been concordancing for a long time now. Without actually knowing it. I learned the vocabulary just a year ago in one of my seminars. I use Google to check for spelling (the option that gets more hits wins) or collocations (though they have tinkered with the "**" function I think... in all their optimizing they made quotation queries less sharp...) and when I think it is really important, or I need more detailed search functions I use on of the linguistic corpora as a concordancer. I like concordancing, because it doesn't tell what to do, but rather gives you the statistics about what the rest of the world does. And if you decide to say things differently then you have it your way.
Sometimes I wish there was something like concordancing for life. Because in our religious egoism we feel so unique (though some small voice in the back of our heads knows we probably aren't) and I think it would be good to simply type in a few words into some concordancer and see: "writing applications after graduation" gets more hits than "not writing applications after graduation" but the difference is not a great as expected. Or: "Thinking your life has changed when it hasn't" is not as uncommon as you want to believe - our brain is sneaky like that.
Of course, we would still be clueless about where to go from here, but at least we would be absolutely certain that millions of others are just as confused.

I was seventeen once. Now I am late.

I am a young twenty-five now. As opposed to an old twenty-four. I have a letter composed in my head and it is about where my life might be going right now and about how the future changed fundamentally at some point. But I don't know who to send it to. There is no hope for answer and I would like that one replied to even if it is not in any direct way answerable. The spring, the sunshine, the hormonal tidal waves blow some lines of verse my way. We'll see how that turns out. But the sheer prospect of creating something is delightful. The strangest dream came to me last night. I had twins and an affair with my ex-wife who didn't know about my kids. And they were boys but I gave them girls' names. Strange dreams are my favourite. Always sharpening my vision for how my life could play out very differently than what I set out for. Ex-wife. Children. Transgender. Also, I have found a new aspiration. Which is so unlooked for, that I can't even bother to care about its consumerist nature. I lack aspiration at the moment. That is why I am going to seize this one. A tin bath tub. For bathing on the balcony/in the garden. I just remembered this weekend how we used to do this at my grandma's place. So for now, I have a goal. We'll make it work from there onwards.

An Argument for Sadness und die Frage nach dem Warum

Weil ich heute nicht nur in einer Sprache denken kann und es Worte gibt, die ich im Moment nicht über-setzen mag, wird das hier gewissermaßen ein zweisprachiger Post. Entschuldigung dafür.

Ich glaube, dass ich das mit den Gefühlen früher mal besser verstanden habe. Ich meine jetzt nicht die zwischenmenschlichen Irrungen und Wirrungen, sondern einfach so Tagesstimmungen, Bauchgefühle, grundloses Herzflattern oder schwarze Tage - das, was eben da ist. Ich war begeistert von der Bandbreite an Emotionen, die sich da boten: kleines Glück und Weltuntergangsdrama, leiser Weltschmerz und himmelhochjauchzendes Pfützenspringen, stumpfe Apathie und ewig tickende Rastlosigkeit - es war eine Jagd, ein Sammeln, ein begeistertes in Worte fassen! Jede Facette hatte ihre Berechtigung, ja war überhaupt nur deswegen so großartig, weil es auch all die anderen gab.
I am not sure when my perspective on this changed. But somehow this frenzy about happiness that keeps society on its toes these days weaseled its way into my head. Negative emotions were to be kept at bay now and somedays I couldn't tell, if I was just sad or if I was in fact living with a disease. Actually, I am still not sure about that. I have taken to compartmentalizing and I created a valve to manage all the pain, sorrow, boredom and gloominess this life has to offer. Managing feelings! As if that was even something one could do!
Sometimes I even thought of myself as a sad person. Which is nonsense! I have dark moments and golden days, lonely afternoons and social weekends, blissful runs and nights of self-doubt. I have them. I cry when I watch Grey's Anatomy and I feel unreasonably cheerful when watching a dance movie. This is it. I am entitled to my misery. And I am entitled to my joy as well. My enthusiasm for planning get-aways and new beginnings is as valid as my unwillingness to face the world on some days. Don't let anybody belittle your pain. It is yours. And maybe this is one of the greatest wonders that I have discovered so far: That you can feel like this, like your whole world is crushed into a million pieces - yet, you live. You still live and eventually, unexpectedly and rush of warm air will have you smiling again. You just need to hold on a little longer.
Ich bin also für Gefühle in technicolor. Mit allem.

Und da wäre noch etwas. Die Frage nach dem Warum. Vielleicht stecke ich in einer quarter-life-crisis. Vielleicht bin ich auch nur einen Schritt weiter auf dem Weg zu Zen. Everything from my mind to my body tells me that there is no purpose to this life. Maybe not for anyone, but certainly not for me. Die Antwort auf die beliebte Frage lautet also: Darum. Isso. And my daily battle for the past months has been trying to get impervious to the implications behind this. Ich versuche, dem etwas abzugewinnen. Es nimmt einem ja eine gewisse Verantwortung von den Schultern, wenn man keinem höheren Zweck verpflichtet ist. Nevertheless, this purest kind of hedonism scares me. I have to make myself believe, that I am reason enough to go on living. No world to save. No lives to alter. I am here merely by accident. Nie zuvor war mir so bewusst, warum Religion ein so populäres Konzept ist. Deshalb auch die quest for happiness. Und eine Suche nach Zielen, die nichts weiter sind, als eine Beschäftigungstherapie bis die Atemzüge - die vermutlich nicht mal gezählt sind! - aufgebraucht, bis die Herzschläge abgeleistet sind. Nihilism is not for tender people. I am not sure where to go from here. Uncovering the folly in all our being? Or giving in to it, pretending that there was a greater meaning behind the running of the world... Die Frage ist nicht länger Warum. Nur noch Wie.

I am on a voyage of discovery

in my room. Leafing through texts from the past two years.

"We're better than this. More than a room in an ivory tower. We stretched our heartstrings and wove them to kites just in time for the autumnal thunderstorms. I'm waiting for lightning to strike us and burn us down to the bone, because so far our story is written in the colour of phoenix's ashes."

--

"Das Schlimmste ist nicht das Warten, nicht das nicht-erzählen-können und nicht das Ende in Sichtweite. Das Schlimmste ist meine Verachtung für mich selbst, die hämische Stimme im Hinterkopf, wenn ich mich für Augenblicke von außen sehe: "Bist du immer noch hier? Und wartest? Worauf? - Du weißt es doch besser.", und ich weiß es besser, natürlich. Und bleibe. Schleife meinen Stolz ab, weil er der Preis ist für diese zu kurzen Wochen. Für jeden Satz, den ich mit >vielleicht< beginne, für Zugfahrpläne nach Süden, die mir niemals nützen werden, für das letzte bisschen Hoffnung. Es ist ein hoher Preis. Aber du bist mir teuer. Und was ist ein Leben, für das man sich nicht ganz gibt? Für welches nächste Kapitel sollte ich mich zurückhalten, wofür den Stolz mitnehmen, wenn es dann nicht einmal eine Geschichte gibt, die man nicht erzählen kann?
Also nehme ich das Messer und schneide großeStücke ab von mir. Ich lege sie dir unbesorgt in die Hand - tritt unbekümmert darauf - ich wachse nach wie ein Seestern. Anders zwar als vorher, aber irgendwann wieder ganz, wieder heil. Denn wer nicht zu hoffen wagt, behält vielleicht Recht, aber unversehrt bleibt auch der nicht. Dafür ist dieses Leben nicht gemacht. Darum schleife ich meinen Stolz ab und tausche ihn ein für ein paar weiße Nächte, denn die sind selten und der Preis vielleicht hoch aber doch nicht zu hoch."

--

"Wenn uns der Glaube verlässt
und nur die Welt hält uns fest,
das Geld hat uns im Griff,
wir zwei ein schwankendes Schiff

Wenn unser Blick nicht mehr reicht
und nur noch hart ist statt weich,
aus allen Träumen erwacht
und nur noch Tage und Nacht

Dann gib uns nicht auf,
halt weiter fest an mir,
gib mich nicht auf,
denn wer solls sonst schaffen -
wer, wenn nicht wir?

Wenn unser Herz stetig schlägt
und alles Tosen sich legt,
die Nächte nicht mehr so weiß
und Feuer nicht mehr so heiß

Wenn unser Schweigen kein Raum ist
und du nichts hörst, weil du taub bist,
wenn wir uns leise entfernen,
um uns nur Staub, keine Sterne

Dann gib uns nicht auf,
halt weiter fest an mir,
und ich geh dich nicht auf,
denn wer solls sonst schaffen -
wer, wenn nicht wir?"

--

I have about 10kg of paper documenting this rollercoaster ride of bliss and misery. It could be arranged as an exhibition, an introspection giving new life to the same old story. Astonishing, really, how my mind can't seem to stop putting everything into words, trying to hide, to conceal, to celebrate, to enlarge or to diminish... How much of your life can you throw away?

Maybe it is like walking down a corridor. A corridor that seems endless. Doors on both sides. A fluffy carpet beneath your feet and fancy looking lamps above your head. The corridor is not broad enough to walk anywhere else than exactly in the middle of it. And so you do. You go on and on. And if you ever want to get anywhere, you have to decide, not only how far to go, but also which door to open. They all look the same with their golden handles and thei dark wood complexion. You pass the lights, the doors, the years maybe. Left or right? This one or the next? You wish they would carry numbers, so you could choose you favourite. But they all look the same. Undistinguishable, neither inviting nor decidedly off-putting. And you walk. Hoping somebody will come out of one of these doors. Pull you in maybe. So one day you can climb stairs and run along beaches, instead of walking the line.

2013

Es ist 2013 seit ein paar Stunden. Man müsste dieses Jahr vielleicht neu und ganz anders beginnen. Es müsste einen Bruch geben, der das Alte klar vom Neuen trennt. Aber wir bleiben. Das Feuerwerk war nicht unser Startschuss und nur das Chaos in der Küche erinnert an den feuchtfröhlichen Abschied von 2012. Wir haben die Hände hochgerissen und uns gefragt, was das für ein Jahr war. Echt war es. Ein Jahr voller privater Realpolitik. Mit technicolor Höhenflügen und dem Grau, dem Schwarz, dem Dunkel auch. Man müsste dieses Jahr vielleicht neu und ganz anders beginnen. So wie jeden Tag.
Unsere Herzen sind nicht glattpoliert. Auch wir sind echt. Ganz echt. Und extra.

Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come

I want to tell you about my christmas... kinda.

I didn't really feel the christmas spirit this year, what with being home for no December weekend at all, no church service all December, no shoe polishing for St. Nicholas (well, I tried but lack sufficient tools), no guitar playing on Christmas Eve to look forward to (my brother celebrated with the family of his girlfriend for the first time)... so it didn't strike me as too outlandish, when I met with some old school friends on the 23rd and one of them told me, she and her family were not celebrating Christmas this year: "No presents, no Christmas, just a family dinner - so looking forward to it!", that's how she put it. And I understood. The humdrum shopping every year, the hectic pre-Christmas life, the sometimes forced family gatherings... it can be deterring...

I know Christmas is a cultural thing and while it my not be an exclusively christian thing anymore, it is in (formerly) christian societies where it really flourishes. And so if some people think it absolutely ridiculous to sing cheesy songs about a baby they do not believe in or observe the blending of secular follies and christian tradition with bewilderment, I will not persuade them to embrace christmas. Just like no one will make me embrace Yom Kippur. So that's that.
But at some point this Christmas Eve it struck me that those who had celebrated Christmas all their lives - by choice, may I add - and now decided to just let it slide, could not have celebrated it the way my family does, the way I do. Yes, we get each other presents. And no it isn't our main concern in the weeks leading up to Christmas. Yes, we go all out with the cooking for Christmas. And no it isn't just a chore, it is a family activity, an opportunity for extravaganza and joking and creating something together. Yes, we have a tight schedule on Christmas Eve starting at 7 in the morning and my last church service starting at 11 pm. But no, it is not just a hubbub we have to get through. Half past seven is the set dinner time and every step leading up to it, is what brings Christmas to life, is necessary to set this day apart from all the others. My little brother is terribly nervous, my mother is preoccupied with the sermons and the rest of us coordinate the normal everyday necessities with the Christmas preparations: Cooking something for lunch, arranging the presents in the living room, preparing dinner, hoovering the whole flat once more, learning poems and songs by heart, attending the two church services always ready to extinguish fire should one break out with all the candles... Yes, we have extended family over for Christmas. And no, we are not pretending to be and example of harmonious family life. We keep it in a time range everyone can stomach, so we all can make it through feeling good. We play the new games we got for Christmas, this year we'll go to the opera, we eat together, we talk, we depart.
Yes, we do all of these things. But neither of them is our priority. We are home. We relish in the fact that even my grandma still knows all the songs and poems and stories by heart. We are stressed out and sometimes hot headed, but we come back to this evening with a tenderness and a quiet that is worth all of it.

"Bist du der eigenen Rätsel müd?
Es kommt, der alles kennt und sieht..."

Wishlist

Alright, people. I think I've been milking the heavy stuff for quite some time now. And now the point has come to touch on some other topics. As you all know, Christmas is approaching. And in case you are not totally counting on being saved by some apocalypse, I am sure you will spend some time thinking about presents and wishes and the economic rush hour that is Christmas time.
If your friends are avid believers in the end of the world, I am sure they will appreciate you packing a survival backpack for them. Which may include tequila (highly recommended), duct tape, chewing gum (MacGyver was never without it), a torch, water filtration kit, basic medication and some of these.
If that doesn't work... I am sorry. You're on your own then. Which can be really tricky especially because Christmas seems to be one of those times when you cannot remember for the life of you all the things you always wanted to have... Which is the original reason for this blogpost. I just remembered what I wanted. And I will post it here, so I can read it later:

comic underwear. No kidding. I always wanted some. If you don't understand what I mean, look here or here.

I will get back to you with more crude wishes later. And in the meantime I encourage you to think about your own. Write them down. Tell people. Otherwise you might get one of those survival backpacks... just saying ;) 

Truth is...

if sex had any healing power, we'd've cured cancer. And AIDS. But for now my best bet is on that other life when the both of us will be cats.

For this life though, I will make a wish:

I wish you'll find someone who makes you ache with love. Who challenges you and treasures your heart. Someone you can carry over shaky grounds and paint the most vivid dreams for. I wish that they will appreciate the compliments that you are so apt at paying. And that they can be enriched by your refreshing openness as much as you will be by experiencing such certainty. I wish you can build a life that is not so unfamiliar that it scares you, but so extraordinary you hadn't dared hoping for it. I wish that you will grow stronger and wiser and more beautiful with every hurdle in your way. And you shall cherish this world and every step you take in it, your heartbeat and the love it emanates, the countless possibilities and your own unmistakable path. I wish you a happy life.

And for myself, I wish to not become a ghost on some imaginary platform. That would mean a lot already.

Fingers crossed for you

People are falling apart out there. They are hurting themselves and cutting and transferring all their bruises from the inside to the outside. People who are trying to numb themselves with pain. I know that. Hell, I've been there. The toughest decision is not to take it out on yourself. And you have to make it day in, day out. The pain will not go away immediately. It will linger. It will almost tear you apart. But once you've found a valve for it - one that is not diminishing yourself, because let's face it: we cannot feast on ourselves and expect to not fade away - once you've found a valve, you will experience the pain and the dark going through you. Still scary, still nightmareish horror. But you will grow. You will be able to let go of the sorrow and let the good linger. Everyday a bit longer.
You cannot cut yourself down, like the rest of the world does. Reach out for yourself, be good to yourself. You only have that one body, that one soul. Your dreams and hopes and talents and weaknesses and fears and strengths - you need to hold on to them. Stop the cutting, the purging, the starving, stop beating yourself up. Show mercy. You can do it. Bit by bit. Step by step.

Time to clean up

I have the unsettling feeling that I am not at all done with this year yet. Still tomorrow will be the last day of 2011. I am on the brink of staying home in Leipzig. But I know I shouldn't. I think my sanity is strained enough as it is. So, what is it with this year? It seems to be pushing me around all the time. I am not afraid to say it was one of the best years, yet I am sure I'm gonna pay for it with more than just my soul. And on the top of all the intensity I want to throw it all to the wind now. I want to give up - months too late -, not because I am unhappy, just to get it over with. To clean up for the new year. It won't be that easy though. I will take every single bit of this mess with me, I will push on with nothing than the vague idea of being rechargeable. This world and its concepts of time and space will wear me out and I will throw myself to the dogs again and again, I will struggle with fate, I will triumph over the apathy of this world. I will lie awake night after night going to war with myself. There is no way of brushing this aside and clean up to give the new year a fresh start.

2012. So what if the apocalypse would strike in december? What would we want to do this last year?
Maybe it is more than ever the invitation to live for today rather than for tomorrow. So that's it. 2012 will be a year of 366 todays. No tomorrow. Not ever again.

Und plötzlich will man heiraten...

Es fällt mir gerade wieder ein, weil N. vor mir sitzt, das Staatsexamen in der Tasche und trotzdem noch hier. Und ich muss daran denken, wie Kristin und ich gelacht haben, letztes Jahr um diese Zeit. Gelacht darüber, dass sie sich so Hals über Kopf in eine neue Beziehung stürzt, ganz kurz vorm Examen, dass sie vom Heiraten spricht und von Nudistencamps. Wir haben nicht daran geglaubt, dass sies macht, haben leicht den Kopf geschüttelt und "Prüfungsstress" gemurmelt.
Und jetzt sitzt sie hier, mit Doppelnamen und Ring am Finger und füllt die Anträge für ihre Doktorarbeit aus. Glücklich wirkt sie. Zuhause in diesem Leben, auch wenn sie nicht weiß, wie sie diese Arbeit jetzt schreiben soll, wie das alles geht und wie sie die Fristen einhalten kann. Trotzdem. Manchmal ist das also so. Dass man jemanden trifft und sich plötzlich sicher ist. So sicher, dass man heiraten will, obwohl man sich das nie vorstellen konnte.

Man darf das Glück nicht zwingen. Oder erzwingen?

Na ja, ihr kennt den Spruch ja selbst. Ein neuer Tag, ein neues Mantra, ein neues Stoßgebet mit immer gleicher Stoßrichtung. Ich habe gestern, als mir mein Herz so weh tat, einen Buchladen betreten mit dem festen Entschluss ein Buch zu finden, das ich lesen und dazu nicken kann, das beschreibt wie es gestern in mir aussah. Ich verbrachte mehr als zwei Stunden in diesem Geschäft. Ich las einen Roman von Gioconda Belli an, suchte nach den Tagebüchern von Erich Mühsam und Brigitte Reimann, bemerkte zum ersten Mal bewusst, dass die erste Hälfte von "Adler und Engel" in Leipzig spielt, stand lange vor einem Buch dessen Cover und Titel mich überzeugten, das aber durch seine eingeschweißte Jungfräulichkeit nicht offenbaren konnte, ob der Inhalt schritthalten kann - und schließlich kaufte ich ein Buch. Keinen neuentdeckten Schatz, sondern eines, das ich bereits seit über einem Jahr aus dem Augenwinkel betrachte und das bisher immer zu sagen schien: "Später. Warte noch ein bisschen. Ich komme auf dich zu. Es kommt der Tag, da bin ich dein Buch, bin ich vielleicht deine Geschichte." - keine Ahnung, ob gestern dieser Tag war. Aber ich habe es mitgenommen. Heute habe ich ein paar Seiten darin gelesen, bis ein Begriff über die Seiten huschte, der mich so vieles denken ließ. Intertextualität ist - gekonnt eingesetzt - ein Fest für den Leser, ein plötzliches Aufhorchen - die Erinnerung an ein anderes Leben, ein anderes Buch - Welten berühren sich leicht - und dann der Drang, schnell etwas nachzuschlagen, noch einmal nachzulesen, wie es dort war, in der anderen Welt.
Da musste ich das Buch zur Seite legen. Auf Seite 25, schwappt einw andere Geschichte, ein anderes Leben, ein anderes Ich herüber und ich strecke meine Arme aus und lasse das Buch aus den Händen gleiten - geht nicht. Es ist nicht das erste Buch, das ich teilen möchte, aber es ist das erste, das ich nicht alleine lesen mag. Es duldet nicht das zeitversetzte Klicken der Standleitung zwischen Jetzt und Gleich. Mir kommt in den Sinn, dass man im Englischen "to be on the same page" sagt, wenn man aus dem selben Fenster auf die Welt blickt und plötzlich ahne ich, was es bedeutet. Das Buch liegt also vorerst hier so rum auf dem Wohnzimmertisch und wartet. Wartet immer noch. Will vielleicht sagen, dass gestern nicht der Tag war. Ich weiß es nicht. Aber vielleicht habe ich gestern doch - ohne es wirklich zu merken - ein Buch gefunden, das beschreibt, wie das ist. Wenige Zeilen nämlich bevor mich der intertextuelle Brückenschlag ausknockte, beginnt ein Kapitel so: "Weil das Leben so sinnlos ist<<, sagt Mia, >>und man es trotzdem irgendwie aushalten muss, bekomme ich manchmal Lust, Kupferrohre beliebig miteinander zu verschweißen.". So ist es. Es könnte auch etwas anderes sein. Aber der Grund. Der stimmt.

That won't work for a while now...

I don't know, if you knew it, but from time to time when I'm in an okay but bored mood I browse the internet for gay-offensive groups, persons, statements. As someone who has never been so much as joked about for being gay, it gives me a reality check and prepares me for things that'll hopefully never come. Accidentally I came across something like that today and realized that I might not be in an okay mood after all. I already feel sorry for whoever will stereotype homosexual around me the next few days. It seems to be sore spot at the moment. As if that part of me had been challenged, as if things being like they are were an equality issue. When I know they aren't. Still. I have close the thread, breathed deeply and made a mental note to really think about this once the essay is handed in. Seems like my feet have momentarily lost ground.

If I knew...

If I knew how to take you, I would have done it a long time ago, if I knew how to quell your fears, you'd be the bravest of them all. If I knew how to reach you while we're galaxies apart, I would paint your walls with the fibres of my heart. If I knew your eyes were open, I'd have tried to catch fire to light up all your nights and share with you my orange sky. Had I known that this would come, I'd never have walked this far, but here I'm standing on the edge: a little burnt, a little scarred. And if I knew how to do it, if I knew how it worked, I'd give everything I've come for, I would try to find the words. If I knew there was hope - but then it wouldn't be hope of course. It would be knowledge, would be certainty, not improvised and unrehearsed. If I knew anything at all - what would be the point? We're living in times of signs and wonders, we're believing, 'cause this is the point.

Im Wahnsinn

"Am Ende werde ich aufgeben. Am Ende werde ich sagen: Nun gut, und kein Zeugnis von mir und kein anderes Herz. Am Ende werde ich aufwachen müssen und den Wahnsinn verlieren. Am Ende wirst du nicht mehr da sein."

Was die Menschen nicht wissen, ist, was passiert, wenn man den Wahnsinn verliert. Ich hänge fest zwischen Prinzipien und Gefühlen und bin in allem, was ich tue, immer beides: vernünftig und wahnsinnig. Dir muss ich das nicht mehr erzählen, du siehst es doch fast jeden Tag, du hörst ja beide Stimmen, nie nur eine. Jeder Schritt - in welche Richtung auch immer - ist ein Kampf, eine Diskussion, die immerfort in meinem Hinterkopf läuft. Die Frage ist nicht, was ich will. Denn ich will beides: Dich haben und dich freilassen, auf dich warten und dich aufgeben, einen Schritt näher 'rangehen und einen Schritt zurücktreten. Ich will beides.
Dabei ist alles mal wieder nur ein zeitliches Problem. In meinem Kopf ist alles jetzt und weigert sich, in Sequenzen geordnet zu werden. Noch ein Nachteil, wenn es kein Morgen gibt: Die Ordnung geht verloren und Heute wird Müllhalde für eine Menge von Dingen und Ereignissen, die ganz klar 24h sprengt. Ich lasse es geschehen. Im Wahnsinn ist es nicht schlecht: Alles ist wichtig, der Zufall entscheidet, was begonnen wird, was verloren geht - alles ist da. Wartet am Rand des Bewusstseins und muss mühsam zurückgedrängt werden, um ein bisschen gedanklichen Freiraum zu schaffen. Es gibt nichts hypothetisches, keine Experimente - alles ist ernst und echt und lebenswichtig - manchmal lebensgefährlich.
Wahnsinn ist gut, weil Wahnsinn bedeutet, dass ich noch an kausale Zusammenhänge glaube. Den Wahnsinn verlieren, hieße, sich nicht mehr zu wehren gegen das Fehlen von Ursache und Wirkung. Etwas, das erst eines der beiden Herzen in meiner Brust begriffen hat: Es ist, wie es ist. Wir können nichts dafür. Wir haben uns nichts verdient, nicht den Zorn höherer Mächte auf uns gezogen, sind nicht im Karma-Dispo und unser Gute-Taten-Konto ist nicht wertlos, aber unnütz. Es ist, wie es ist. Nimm hin, erdulde, ergib dich! Alles andere wäre Windmühlenkampf. Das eigene Geschick lässt sich nicht überlisten und nicht bestechen - es ist, wie es ist.
Es wäre so einfach! Wäre da nicht das andere Herz mit seiner Überzeugung, dass Sich-Ergeben Sterben heißt. Natürlich, es hat Filme gesehen, Lieder gehört, Gedichte und Romane gelesen - es ist vertraut mit den Motiven, den Figuren und Wendungen. Und wenn man nur festhält, aushält, es irgendwie auf die Heldenposition schafft, dann bekommt alles einen Tauschwert - nichts ist umsonst! Der Lauf der Dinge ist zu beeinflussen: Haltung, Intentionen, Schmerz - alles zahlt sich aus. Verdienen, erringen, herumreißen - mehr sein als eine Spielfigur auf einem unüberschaubaren Brett.
Dumm nur, dass keines Recht hat. Dumm nur, dass ich beiden nicht glauben kann. Denn der Wahnsinn ist beides: Von der Vergeblichkeit des eigenen Wollens wissen, ohne aufhören zu können; von der Notwendigkeit ausdauernden Hoffens überzeugt sein, ohne es fertig zu bringen.

Am Ende werde ich aufgeben. Oder dich kaputt schlagen. Es ist sozusagen ein philosophisches Problem.

walking home

You know, it might not be a bad thing, that I'm walking home alone tonight. - How come? Are you fed up with people now? After you managed two weeks of togetherness? - It's just that... I feel that I need to think things through. - What things? - I cannot talk about them right now. I have to debate them with myself at first... I don't even know what to say at this point. - Is this about this falling in love thing? Do you need to figure that out? - Oh, about that... I think I will never really figure that out. And I really don't need to figure it out now. I'm in the good place. It's not like my heart beats faster when I see you... ok, I'm lying here, it does beat faster. But not in a creepy kind of way. I try to catch myself early. I'm not acting on it. Because I'm in the happy place, the point where I just hope, that you are happy, because it would be a shame if you weren't. - ... - Alright, that was a little bit too much, I get it. It's just that you are this person that makes me feel really good. And I want to keep you, I want to not weird you out. So there is no thinking about the falling in love thing. Nothing's gonna change that any time soon.

So what will you be thinking about then on your walk home? - About what we discussed today: Commitment, promises, guarantees, marriage... that kind of things. - You're still thinking about it? I thought, your mind was made up: No promises, no guarantees. - It sounds harsh, when you say it like that. And that's not what I meant. - Well, what did you mean then? You want to commit, but you can't promise that you won't fall in love with other people and you can't even promise to not act on these feelings, so what kind of promises can you make? - Not a lot obviously. But when I love, then this is unconditional. It's not 'I love you as long as you love me back' or 'I love you as long as you're young and beautiful' or 'as long as you're healthy' or 'until I meet someone better', it's not like that. When I love someone and I want to commit to them, then I'm saying 'You are this person. When I'm with you, I'm good. You make these things happen inside of me. And I like that feeling. I always want to feel that way. I always want to feel that way with you. And if there comes a point where this is starting to slip away, I will do everything I can to keep that feeling. I will fight for it. Because I want to love you. I'm not just doing it.' That's the promise I can make. And if that's not enough, I don't know what would be.

That's it for now. That's what this night held in store for me. There's enough love for each and every one of us out there.

How about the trip? It's all here.

The next will be the last...

after the trizillionst episode of Grey's Anatomy this weekend I am full of emotional crap. But more than that: I'm full of the stories I'm trying not to tell, because they only partly belong to me, they are my kind of souvenirs and half-stolen and I don't know... but on wednesday I realized something: I work at this school in Conwy with a storyteller. A gifted storyteller. This woman never fails to pick the right story for the right situation, never fails to deliver the punch line, enhances with gestures, sound effects and funny out of the picture comments - and I am keeping all this to myself. And all to myself. I am not even writing about it for myself alone. But I think it is about to get back on here. Maybe. If this thirst for telling stays.

Since Thursday evening the enemy's been taking over. I could feel its every step. In the early evening I was just tired. Then I read a bit of Schnitzler and decided to call it a night and went to bed, where I lay for hours and hours with first a headache, then a sore throat, then fever - it was adventurous! Lucky me, that I got my Essay for Friday done just a few hours before. I slept through most of friday after that. I called Vera and she printed out my Essay and handed it in and then I sat at home and read and slept and ate and slept and read some more... all that sleeping led to some breathtaking insomnia for the rest of the weekend. At some point on friday night I decided it might be wise to see the signs, stick to reality, speak truth when it hits home and somehow live through this. I am still struggling with it. I don't know exactly what this holds for me. It could be incredibly good. It could be depressing. Sometimes you have to take a plunge.
In all my sleeplessness I watched more than a whole season of Grey's Anatomy, panicked a few times about my "this is the life" decision, went shopping, read Schnitzler and essentially took a weekend off. From it all. And now. Now after I watched the second episode of the fifth season I am going to go out for one of these walks. You know one of these walks, where it doesn't matter where you go and what you see and how the weather is and if you get lost - you just need the feeling you're moving, the feeling the world is still moving. I need that a lot. Like when my friends and me picked on that girl in school bus because she was so pretty and seemingly friends with everyone and we just tried to convince her that she was cross-eyed and when I got home I was so ashamed of myself I had to walk for 8 kilometres to lash out on myself. Or like when I fell in love for the first time since I knew for sure that I was gay and I was really unsure about how to handle it and if I might be to clingy and stop it all together and then she sent an email, a really long email and I only got to read the first few words, where she called me like no one else called me and no one else called me that because I wouldn't let them - and I read the first line and I had to get out and feel this world under my feet and smile like a complete lunatic und just be freakin' happy for me, just me. Or like when I failed my first exam and I wanted to quit it all - Latin, teaching, university, you name it - and I had to make myself walk fast and breath a lot of the late summer's air to convince myself I might be not a failure after all, if I don't let myself be one. That's the thing to do. When all else fails - I walk, I jog, I run. I've been running an awful lot these past few weeks. And I don't want it to be a running away. Because I am not. I just-. Need time to think things out. To put stories together. Stories I probably never tell anyone because I wouldn't know how. Stories that keep me sane. At least I hope they do. Maybe they only keep me out of this great chaos we call life. I don't know that yet. But I decided to rip my chest open, to tell stories or let them go, to try what has to be tried und to bury what is long gone - so I am going for a walk. And when I come back this world still has to be there - waiting for me to mess everything up.