…dy felt like sending me a postcard through the mail. I just love postcards. Occasionally I send them to myself. Weeks later I came home and opened my postbox at the door of my new sublet apartment with its old-fashioned sign, “Briefe und Zeitungen,” letters and newspapers. This torrent fell out. As we get closer to Christmas I want to remind myself and us all that this world is made up of seven billion diverse humans, and that by and large, humans…
…my question. Well, he said at last, you can’t go wrong with a little bit. Ein bisschen. It’s not a posy or a “little flower” (“Blümchen”, I had said). Ein Stück, a piece… yes…. you can always buy a piece of parsley. Peter Pepper. I took the parcel of fish and stowed it with the parsley in my bag. Thanks, I said. He handed over my change. “And now, you get ‘a little bit’ of money back, too,” he said, using the familiar form of “you”, which gave me…
…staircase leading into the house she as visiting. She glanced at us. “Sind Sie noch ein Paar Minuten da?” The child was sleeping and the stairs were steep: she clearly didn’t want to have to rouse him carry him, lock everything. Oh, yes, I said: we are waiting for the camera guy, we’ll be here a few more minutes, “wir passen auf Ihr Kind auf.” We will look after your child. Oh, thank you, she said, and bounded up the stairs – actually bounded – wi…
…“To truly understand something is to be liberated from it.” This fascinating film held me riveted. It’s completely reinvigorated my view of the everyday life I lead and its purpose. I’m so glad I stumbled on it. Hooray, humanity, I love you and I will serve. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fbvquHSPJU…
…is the assault on our planet’s liveability, sidelined by these posturings of hatred. Read widely. Think deeply. Speak out. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xt7CxXh5nQw…
…two dogs blurring themselves into a wreath on the cobbles, their owners doe-sie-doeing from above. It was dark when I put my phone back in my bag and walked uphill past the man who was still standing by his bench, with his beer, gazing up into the trees. He had on a leather hat with a feather to its brim and standing by him was a trussed wheelbarrow loaded with his things. I had gathered all my groceries in two hands and clutched them to my chest…
…to breathe, where the light shines for reading.” “A writer to change your thinking, your writing and your dreams.” ~ Melissa Lucashenko take a look inside Ebook download in the following formats: MOBI (for Kindle) EPUB (for all other devices) PDF (for any device)…
…cess again to his own apartment, and I suppose he was carrying the smashed computer under his arm, but at the time, I didn’t care. Not that I didn’t care: I felt vindicated, I was glad. This was two years ago. We slowly tried to recover, we built on our inimical love, we tried to comfort each other: but it could not work out. That and the baby we had lost and some other griefs had stained us to the marrow so that like a series of transparent micro…
…el excluding, is how it would feel. And yet he thanked each table of twenty-five-year-olds calmly, wishing each in turn “Schönen Tag noch,” a beautiful rest of the day. At the doorway I caught up with him, where he had paused to talk with the German girl sitting in the window. She was reaching for her purse so I waited out of range, not wanting her to think, oh – that other woman is giving something, I needn’t give him then as much. I put my finge…
…her undermines it with, “We weren’t that good at first, but it wasn’t that complicated, either.” Eventually Glass gets work under a proper licensed plumber, an older man who presumably has taken the time and trouble to earn his own certification. Everything works out smoothly for about three years, until one day an artist friend of Glass’s offers him more interesting work at the same price. He immediately dumps the plumber who has spent three year…
…of it. “Kannst du bitte – das nächste Mal – vielleicht daran denken, etwas ein kleines bisschen umweltgesunder zu probieren?” Couldn’t you please, next time, perhaps think of trying something a bit environmentally healthy? I tipped the plastic duck-beaked bottle to show her. “This stuff is complete poison. It goes down the drain and comes back out the tap, goes into our rivers. There is a brand called – Frog, I think they sell it here, you might t…
…er… whether maybe this is not quite what he meant? “Ihr koennt das kaufen, und das und das, aber nicht das.” Yes, he said, I’m not convinced that God minds what I sell, either. I used to sing in a tiny madrigal ensemble which performed in an old cathedral and we would have to sit through the services as they droned on in what, to me, might as well have been Latin. Choristers brought puzzle books and read poetry. Every Sunday after the service ever…
…h family’s door to the nearby street, and in Indonesia where we lived in a compound, surrounded by high fences topped with broken glass, I struggle to ignore the constant stampede of human traffic that passes within a few feet of me where I sit at my desk or curl on the couch. That is mostly families who live here, plus the thundering party animals upstairs. Occasionally delivery men, wrong numbers, post. This was new: the street door downstairs s…
…he said, he all of a sudden just got so tired. He said in German, Ich will einfach nach Hause. I just wanna go home. And the leader told his gang: let him go home. Let him come home. It’s been two and a half months and my throat thickens with sick tears every time I think of him and how we’ve parted. It’s so abrupt, sometimes my heart itself still feels quivering, like a guitar string dying into silence. That he will not give our sweet love a chan…
…“Sie waren beide hier,” I explained, “als ich rausgegangen bin. Und es scheint meinetwegen zu sein, als ob es eigentlich eine sehr sehr lange Zigarettenpause war.” You were both here when I went out. From my point of view it is tempting to assume this was a very very long cigarette break. They looked uncertain. Were they being criticised, by a stranger? Then one man smiled. “So viele Zigaretten können wir gar nicht rauchen,” he said. We can’t smo…
…ding breasts commissioned by his wife; and when the music stopped like pass-the-parcel I would be unwrapped, slowly I hoped and perhaps even lovingly, I would be discovered, I’d be naked, I would be safe. It didn’t happen that way. Not in any way at all. I can’t always say it. The R word. I say “there’s a word? that rhymes with… cassette tape?” I say, “attacked.” If I need to be sure to be absolutely clear I’ll say, “When I say attacked: I mean in…
…leaned across her and opened the window. I said – something. “Misbrauchen Sie sie nicht!”, don’t mistreat her, something far too formal and grammatically scrambled. Reaching across her the man shoved the passenger door open on me sharply, trying to push me off balance. I skipped out of his reach, wondering: now, would he get out. There were people everywhere. Or would he – yes, he just turned back to her and they turned to each other and I could…
…counter. I said to him, “Excuse me. Do you sell yoghurt?” She said to me, “Sie haben eine so schöne Stimme, eine richtig wunderschöne Stimme. Bitte singen Sie weiter.” But I was too self-conscious to keep singing under this barrage of compliments. We talked about the dog and his jolly helpfulness & how tidily & sweetly she kept her shop and then as I was leaving, she called after me, “Keep singing! Always keep singing!” ~ beginning of my second mo…
…cs either. In this workshop we had to sit in partners and explain to each other something using a made-up language, or any sounds: “the last film you saw,” decided the convenor, 70. My mind flooded with The Great Beauty. I described it to my companion in a torrent of what doesn’t exist. Now, it does. The room was filled with people’s sounds and the great flooding windows stood open. Afterwards she said to me her dark eyes glittering with tears “I…
…ng in the wind. We took refuge with our new Queensland number plates in an underground coffee shop with sweet, chirping songs playing softly and the hum of a rather old fridge. “How’s your day been?” asked the barista and I said, cheerfully, “Windy!” He said, “Oh, I know. It’s worst up at the cross-street there, a kind of a wind canyon, and I have to go against it to get here, turn up with tears in my eyes.” “That’s so harsh!” I said, exulting. Yo…