You Have to Accept a Low Blow in Order to Survive

... And Stand Up Again. 

Dear You, 

in the exhibition "Third Landscape" by Volker Kreidler they show betwitching photos of the vegetation around Chernobyl.

"Reports of vegetation in the exclusion zone around Chernobyl have been increasing over the last few years. While flora and fauna are apparently returning, paradoxes in the natural gene pool have been observed. Despite the radiation, a self-generating ecosystem with high viability is forming in the area. New, healthy trees are growing and replacing dead forests. Lynx and other rare animal species are settling again."

(See the full quote on this photo):

At home I stirred pensively the girolles/chanterelles in my pan - they were coming from a country where - so they had told us - after Chernobyl the decay period would last for a time with so many zeroes following the 1 that I could neither imagine nor pronounce it...

The human mind and the human heart easily forgets, I mused.
That may be necessary to survive. Sometimes you have to be able to forget (at least: not think about it every day) - otherwise you will go mad.
Of course one can wish and pray that mankind gets more reasonable (though at the moment the world does not look like this - yet: has it ever?).
"The lynx, the wolves, the Przewalski horses, the bison, the moose, the wild boars roam through the area again." 

I might join them - I am a part of nature.

Interesting though:
when I looked closely at a leaf from a "healthy tree" from that area, I saw:
1) it was THERE, the leaf, the tree - and its existence I call a wonder.
2) Yet to believe that it survived without a wound - that would be naive.
You have to accept change   -   you have to change, you have to muster all your strength, you have to get up again, though you are tired - only then you have a chance to survive.
Admittedly: it hurts.

Man, machines, robots, scammers...

Dear You,
actually I only wanted to buy a book on Dutch, but when I walked along the Friedrichstraße I saw that there was an exhibition "Ars Electronica" in the DRIVE Volkswagen house.
You might know that one of my Moomin Valley mottos is:
"But then, noone can have more fun as he creates himself" (my translation from German, which is in my modest opinion more to the point - in English they translate: "But then, everyone has to make what he can out of life." which of course is true too)  
and I went in, Tot straks! (as the Dutch say, and here you might guess what I am learning now :-)
I stayed over one and a half hour inside that exhibition - so fascinating!
Very diverse topics - all about the idea "What if there would be no clear distinction between man and machine?" 
Here you see the penguins which moved according to your movements in front of them - only the young visitors (and Yours Truly) jumped up and down, and one of my results you see below (that silhouette seems to indicate that I must have added a few pounds in Amsterdam...)

Wich I did not! 

Tomorrow more from your half-robot (no, I am not sin soleng!) 

Britta 

A PS especially for Joanne: See?!?    :-)

The Silent Traveller

Hi, Dear You, 
it's me.
(Thanks to Rosemary's comment - wich you can read below - I changed now the beginning of my text, because I evidently quoted a scammer).
I have now visited  Paris and Amsterdam - both oh so lovely! - but did not feel like writing about it (same phenomenon with Venice this year, you rember?)
And so I stopped writing at all. 
I had to do a lot to work on my professional project (the world is small: while doing research I unexpectedly unearthed a blogpost of John Gray - about Hinterland!)
But now I think: I'll just skip Paris and Amsterdam (I am old enough to do as I please).
I'll remain a "Silent Traveller" (which is by the way a phantastic series of older books, written by Chiang Yee) - but will "Rise and Shine" again - on these pages of "Dear You".
See you (hopefully again).
Britta

Beware of the Great Preachers of Nothing!

Dear You,

These three little amber flowers above were the answer to a sympton that I watch Argus-eyed when it occurs: Caution! when books with titles like this attract me:

(There are hundreds of them in bookshops - instead of being minimalistically thrown away they slouch on a bench or table - and as Tom Stephenson in one of his recent blogs ranted: They are utterly daft!)
Why are they - at certain times - singing like Loreley from the height of the bookshelves to me?
Whispering: "Throw everything away - life will be simple then - just do it!"
Maybe because at such a weak moment my life is overflowing with THINGS, like here:

How come? Me - having written a groundbreaking book on good housekeeping?
(Well - a signpost does not have to run himself, as dear Monsieur J.J. Rousseau said, when he put his five children one after another through a baby flap of an orphanage, then writing the worthy pedagogical  book "Émile ou De l'Education")
No: normally my flat is full of harmony and beauty.
But I had subscribed for the "Berliner Tagesspiegel" - a newspaper which arrives daily, even on Sunday - and I still have to find a way to turn that flow from toil to joy.
What vexes me in books on minimalism: the writer takes photos of all his objects that he discards - letters, things, whatsoever.
Mmm, mmm, mmm - here I protest: he ignores all the sensual, haptic feelings! To look at a flowers on Instagram: haha, poor sod! To look through that silly Card-Board Brille 3D Google Virtual Reality - instead of touching or loving a woman - Geez!
He imprisons all poor things - and senses! - into his posh Macbook!
Not for me, Great Preacher of Nothing, I mumble - and walk to the Bernsteinzimmer, a little shop right beside the KaDeWe. Normally it is crowded with Chinese tourists - they buy amber - as the shopowner tells me - because they believe that amber is good for their health.
Defiantly I buy three (3!!!) little amber flowers - carved out of amber, nothing to be utilised, only beautiful -- something that the GPoN would throw out immediately with a derisive laugh.
I cherish them.
And throw out the heap of old Berliner Tagesspiegel instead - singing a song of the Rolling Stones, that - luckily! - I have kept in my CD-rack: "Who wants yesterdays papers?"
Then I have room again for "Sitting on my Sofa" - a song of the Kinks on a CD I luckily kept in my overflowing CD-rack...
And leaf through a new book, with the alluring title:

 ,

Flowers everywhere - look, Maria Sibylla Merian!

Dear You, 

May does not need me - May just is. 
If you wonder what I'm talking about: each day I stop for a few minutes at my neighbour's garden  - enjoying the results of her toil for free - though I pay abundantly with praise. (Once I thought that I had invented a new profession: The True Praiser. (Lauder) People, I thought, might book me and hear what they are so thirsty for: real, genuine (!) praise of things they have accomplished - things everybody takes for granted, or, worse, does not even notice). Maybe I should create a Start Up?                                Anyone interested out there?
No - May does not need any praise - it is overwhelming HERE with its abundance of roses, iris, elder.
Bathes us  in huge clouds of perfume, showers us with sun shine, dries us with hot air - and the song of the birds come for free. Such a bliss  - and life is beautiful!
As you know I have a deep interest in flowers and plants - as a gardener, botanist and ardent admirer. I take photographs of flowers - which sometimes I like quite well - and sometimes I also paint some, though here you can foolishly hear me mumble: "Not real Art. Nice, yes, but.. artisan craftwork at it's best."
Views not shared completely  by Albrecht Dürer, who retorts: "For truly, art is rooted in nature, and whoever can draw it out, has it". 
Yet often flowers were used by artists as background painting (I "collect" them with my camera - only the flower, not the whole painting).
At the moment a beautiful exhibition on "MARIA SIBYLLA MERIAN and the Tradition of Flower Painting" is shown at the Kupferstichkabinett (Museum of Prints and Drawings) Staatliche Museen zu Berlin.
Maria Sibylla Merian was an highly gifted painter of flowers - and a very remarkable woman.
She died 300 years ago. (!!)
The exhibition starts with a broad overview of floral book illustrations of the 15th century, nature studies from Dürer's time and apothecary books from early 16th century, and wonderful portrayals of flowers by the famous Georg Flegel.
As Sibylla, they all painted insects too - but as the first mosquitos and wasps have already arrived, I am not keen on them.
Yes: flower painting is beautiful, and sometimes Art. And often surprising too: you might have seen Rachel's phantastic little drawings of flowers - especially the poppies got me, done in nail varnish, and I look musingly at "Chili Bean", my voluptious dark red nail varnish - which I seldom use, because Life is too Short to spend time on repairing flaking nail varnish in my active life. There might be a better way to use it?
Anyway:  I bought a season ticket for our Botanical Garden.
Nice to meet you - hope you guess my name! (I'm just sitting on a fence!)

Paris - In a Limited Edition!

Dear You, 

maybe I told you - and maybe not, because I am a cautious woman - that in a time not that far away I will go to Paris.
So I was very happy to find in a Berlin drugstore a "Limited Edition" of -

LAVATORY PAPER! 

Extra dedicated to PARIS! 

Oh là là! 

But was my utterance correct? Am I prepared? 

In genuine concern the loo paper roll asks me, again and again:"Parlez-vous Francais?"  

"Mais oui, mon chéri; bien sur, mon chéri; come tu veux, mon chéri!" 
This last sample of my perfect French is a quote of my friend Christine, who told me of a Lady - I anonymise the nationality intentiously, but it starts with an "R" - who desperately wanted to marry a rich Frenchman.
And she found one.
And the three sentences above are all she ever utters - and, SISTERS: there are quite a lot of men - and not only in France -  (dear male readers excepted, of course)-  who agree instantly that this is all French or whatsoever you need to know!

Hello, It's Me... (Britta, not Adele)

Dear You,

what you see above is - in my eyes - a little wonder.
This geranium - which a professional would call pelargonium, I know that, but using the "common word" is my way of trying to convince you that I really try to give up being perfect :-)  - well, this little "twig" of the geranium on my balcony broke off when I decided to give it more space, meaning: I took the plant out of its little pot and into a window box.
More earth to spread its little roots, more space to unfold its little leaves, more freedom.
In Germany we have a saying: "Where wood is chopped, splinters must fall"
So here I had that "splinter" with two little tight white buds in my hand.
And thought: "We'll see". (As you all know I am quite good in finding meaning and detecting symbols everywhere).
And put it into the turquoise-blue bird bath.
And then it happened - and, oh yes, in my eyes it took quite a long time, felt like two years - but suddenly it opened its little petals, unrolled them, seemed to say: "Well, circumstances are not as I  expected them to be - but hark! (I love to strew in a hark in my blog from time to time!) - they are not bad. So: I decide to flower in my circumstances as they are now." 
(At this moment I might have lost The Last Reader, hearing him mumble: What is that woman talking about?) 
Well, here I sit, "in the world of the ten-thousand things", and adjust to the truism that "life is not all neat and tidy".
I have thought very hard about my blogs - about the way I will write them. For me it is easy to talk about the newest exhibition in the marvelous Barberini Museum in Potsdam, but that is not enough for me. Yet also I do not want to write my Dear Diary into the air (or Cloud, or whatsoever, Howling at the Moon, just to sprinkle in a touch of modernity by a new pop-song) - no, I want a mixture of all Dear Life that surrounds me, filling me up to the brim sometimes, and show you what everyone sees, but filtered through my eyes.

Today promises to become the second really summerly day in Berlin - we had 27 degree yesterday, in May!
And yesterday evening I was sitting on my balcony, had lit a pale blue candle, a tiny glass of red wine in my hand, looking into the sky which was just preparing for the night: still pale blue at the horizon, and darker above - when a voice came from the flat above me: "Britta?"
As I am a very, very northern girl, coming from Bremen, I love my privacy - meaning: for me the balcony, which has a roof (!), is like a chamber to me - absolutely private.
And you could only see a hand of mine, from above, not more.
So I stayed silent.
"Britta? Are you alright?" 
No way to hide. Yes, my dear neighbour, I appreciate that you are caring - I really do, and thank you for that! - I can assure you - and  everyone:

"Yes - I am alright."  

Toodle pip! 

Just Jump!

I always liked the motto of Mr. Disraeli: "Never complain, never explain" -
I will take the secod half of it (never was a complainer).
So: think of Agatha Christie's disappearance for a few days (and honestly: what is a month? These days it flashes past like a few days...)

I found a wonderful little sketch in the great book
           "Drawing for the Artistically Undiscovered"
by (beloved) Quentin Blake and John Cassidy (Klutz.com)

It is so useful - not only for drawing,
no: for our whole life!

You are allowed to fill this space (and the page this drawing is printed on is four times larger!) with comments on my absence.
I will read them diligently. (Though I cannot decipher them :-)

And then Í will start to write another post. As if nothing has happened. (Though it has. All is well).

Yes, I decided to jump right in. (Otherwise I might never start again).

Last Confetti from Venice

Here - to end my report on Venice - a few confetti-like impressions which I especially remember.
(Honestly: you don't really want to see my 720 photos and listen to the description of every church or painting or Guggenheim we visited - at least 13 km walk every day, not included the vaporettos - even after three pictures of the wonderful marble floors that were everywhere you would politely yawn and remember your appointment at eleven, Pooh-bear-way).

because, somehow, they might look all the same to you_ 

I will remember:

- the smell --- water against old buildings, a musky mouldering smell - smell activates the memory of the very first time as a child in Venice
- the glitter on the often surprisingly bright turquoise water, and the very blue sky

- tons and tons of gold - on stucco, on buildings, on paintings
- the beautiful old ladies in their huge furs (it WAS cold), yet wearing thin silk stockings. Venice has a very vivid timeless elegance - both: the (often old) people and this old city do LIVE, thank you very much!

- the almost "fop" elegance of the men - beautiful patterned pencil-case thin cloaks they wore, utterly beautiful shoes (go in rags in Berlin and nobody will care - come as what the Berliner thinks of as "overdressed" - and they will stare).
- the long, long "Lido" where we took a very long walk in bright sunshine along the turquoise sea, crunching shells under our feet - I picking up shells -- just can't resist - which is for the grown-up persons accompaniyng me sometimes a bit trying... shall I keep the bizzare one, the interesting black one or - the pink one? And of course this child woman was utterly convinced to have found a rough piece of jade, which grown-up eyes tried to disenchant into "a piece of old glass formed by the sea" (let them talk... the lump of jade lies on my windowsill now, together with the - of course pink - shell...)
- the Venetian dialect: WONDERFUL! That is the Italian I had wanted to learn! (In Berlin I left after the second Italian course and after having visited Rome -- but now: two days ago I unpacked my Italian school books and will start again - uno, due tre!)
- My unability to laugh with all the other visitors in the Doge's Palace, when we were in the "interrogation" room.

The guide made a little joke, and I, being normally a person who laughs easily, looked at those awfully low cells, the walls breathing out suffering, and icy cold. I looked longingly through the window,

and silently congratulated my brother Casanova, who managed to escape. So close together: utterly horrible conditions - and golden splendour - and how easy it is to fall from the hight of luxurious abundance into this prisonal black, bleak despair.

- If I would live in Venice, I soon would have a problem: not much nature.Two parks, very few trees, a few seagulls. You can give me all the Tintorettos, and the gold, and the theatro Venice: after a few weeks I would heavily cry for a forest, or at least a garden.

- a surprise were the quite low prices in restaurants, and even more in those funny little cafés, were "the typical Italian" hastens in, grabs a tramezzino, washes it down with an espresso - and out he is again - quick, quick!
- And with this beautiful little "discolo" - wind-bag - for only 1 Euro - and so delicious! - I leave you, my Dear You - this should have been more than enough as an appetizer for Venice...

Yours Truly (a humble tourist among others)

You asked for it! (Venice again)

In a comment Rachel wrote: "I was thinking we would have to ask Inspector Brunetti to solve the mystery of the disappearing post for us."

You bet! Il commissario was joy-riding on the Canale Grande, and if you look closely you might detect that in January Venice does not sport so many tourists, and those who come are mostly from China and Japan and master the Art of Canouflage perfectly. . 

Yes: they totally merge in "the real stuff": 

Buy little factories in Italy to be able to use the label... Well - "home-made" seems to be  the new trend :-)  

I could show you now typical photos from typical Venice. In fact: I could use the photos my late fathers had taken when I was just a pre-school child - 

Not changed that much - though: a little colour added nowadays :-) 

No, I will serve you only some snippets from my impressions of Venice.  

First a question that really baffles me: how come, I ask you, that my female friends all rejoyce in visting cemeteries - and ask me to join them - ME, almost a thanatophobic? (I cross myself if I have to walk along a freshly dug empty grave - no, I'm not Catholic, but in this case I am not choosy and grab what might protect me :-) 

So: "Cimitero" it had to be, on my first day in Venice! (Came back hell-bent to "carpe diem" even more). 

Cling to dear life as good as I can - as these spartan and easy to keep Venetian balcony succulents.

Visited the church Madonna dell' Orto - which Jane Hattat (!) personally recommended to me.

So beautiful! Built in the XIVth century - with Tintorettos, (by father and son) and other famous painters. AND a heavily built white Madonna with child - in the 15th century they found her in a garden (= "Orto") near by and think her to own legendary healing powers (I, though I am very glad to say I'm healthy, thought; Assuming that it is right --- it will not hurt -- See: cemetry and cross above. At this point Elvis has left the building - better: my son would have left this post, because he absolutely hates superstition, while I ... well, well, well).
For you, My Dear Enlighted Reader: skip the madonna if you feel like that - but look at this marvelous church - not many of the lazy tourists find it, because it is up in the north, out of the conventional paths. (Though - that is what all tourists think - the oxymoon of secret insider tips...)
When you go there, you are also near to the Ghetto Novo (Sestiere Cannarigio)

which was founded in 1516 - (the time before the Jews got only a temporary resident permission). The word "Ghetto" comes from here, and they had to wear a yellow sign on their clothes when in Venice. Each night the gates of the Ghetto were locked and guarded - and the inhabitants of the Ghetto had to pay for this (sic). Though to be fair: that was a common practice at that time: the German merchants who lived at the Fondaco dei Tedeschi had to endure the same. 

I see: your eyes are shut, your face looks like a bored mask, only politeness keeps you smiling mysteriously. So I'll shut my mouth (for today, that is). 

 

You Might Have Noticed...

... Dear You,

that I have turned my yesterday's post about Venice back to draft-modus.
I just didn't like it - had that nagging feeling when I went to bed that there was just too much "room for a pony", if you know what I mean - Hyacinth Bucket for sure would have been baffled by those morbid feelings.
I mean: the hotel was wonderful - but then: who cares? (Beside me, when I want to sleep there).
I always have the difficulty after a journey that I do not want to write the 3.000.567th travel-guide about Venice (though my 720 photos would come in handy for that).
So many people have been there, at all times.
Only a few years ago, I have been there. In the foreground my little sister, 3 years younger than I:

If you own a magnifying glass, you might even detect me - as always modest in the background (haha), and as always in action. You see an arm, and you see my mother trying to protect me with her bare hands against all the Paparazzi... 

And that is all I can give you tonight - I am tired and will go to sleep soon -- soon more from the Venice I saw again. 

I'm Back from Venice!

Hi . I'm back! Tomorrow more about a marvelous stay in Venice.

Nature's Solo

Dear You, 

this morning - it was still pitch-dark - I opened the door to my balcony - or so I THOUGHT - must have erred -- it was the door of my FRIDGE, wasn't it?
Cold - colder - coldest! WAHHH!
Shivering I did what I do every morning: took my mug with tea, entered the balcony-fridge, greeted Berlin (this time in a slightly hurried and muffled way) - and retreated instantly.
Recovered around noon, and went courageously into the Charlottenberger Schlosspark (only a few hardliners out there).
Free seats everywhere...

And from a very special balustrade ... 

... a very special ballet ... 

A Fresh Start in 2017

Dear You, 

I hope it's still time to send you my best wishes for

                                            A HAPPY NEW YEAR to you all! 

It was almost a déjà vu: me dashing to Bavaria into the lovely Allgäu again!
This time by train (which takes from Berlin, all included, about 8 hours) - but the telephone call from son&DiL came only a few days before New Year's Eve, and then the tickets for a flight were really expensive.
The call was a surprise: they had just decided to give a little party and asked if I would like to join them.
I did! (Thus fulfilling one of my New Year's resolutions: "If something interesting turns up - take it! Don't tell yourself you are too tired - just leave your comfort zone, keeping in mind that soon you will be able to rest for a very long time." Hahaha.
So: Yes, here I am, New Year! Full of energy! 
And thus I celebrated from the early evening and the first minutes of the newborne year and then till two o'clock in the morning among young people (they vigorously danced till 6 o'clock in the morning) -
wonderful! 

And when I went back, I could enjoy something that one cannot see from an aeroplane: having draped myself on the comfortable seat in the train I watched full of admiration and gratefulness the beautiful landscape of Bavaria, covered in hoarfrost. The Great Painter had been very diligent and meticulous: every pine needle and every humble little blade of grass was covered in white. Noone left out, noone overlooked.
As it should be, and as we all wish for.