Creamy, sweet milk foam, soft on my tongue, followed by the dark, hard coffee taste. A chocolate-orange tart slice with some kind of worthy grain base – rich and luxurious. Makes me think of travels in Tallinn with Claire Hollenbaugh, where a French café served chocolate tart and marmalade. Despite my seasoned pudding head, we mainly only managed a shared slice. Too rich, too irresistible.
The leaves and dogs of Kreuzberg, falling and bounding respectively in the sunlight. A bike to ride through the town.
Tempelhof park. A actual old airport with its strips still in place, so you can run or walk or ride the whole length of it, hoping for takeoff.
A smiling soup-eater in the market. I suspect I shall bump into him again.
Place-to-go tips from my sister Sarah. Starts with ice-cream, follows up with chips. The raspberry, peanut and lychee feast that followed. More sunlight. More leaves.
Yesterday, Emily Cuphead’s words: ‘If my brain was a womb…’
The fact that I got to spend fabulous alone time with my soul-sister Heike Reissig at the beginning of the festival. We didn’t manage to meet alone again after that, but that fix was fabulous.
What a welcome from lovely Sandra Inhofer. Sandra is someone I know mostly in the virtual world. I think we’ve met face to face three or four times, with work, years ago now. She’s always inspired me with her acting, directing, writing and producing talents as well as hawk eyes and a great way with words.
I’m grateful for her generosity and hospitality – inviting me to stay from Monday to Saturday is really something, and I feel really blessed. But what the woman has to say! It looks like we have been on very similar paths over the last few years, and that we have a lot to share. I’m delighted to be bathed in what she’s radiating right now. Full of wise words and openness. How lucky am I?
And Stella, Sandra’s white German Shepherd. I have never touched a softer dog on the fur front. She’s wary at first – you have to earn your stroking rights – but once you’re in, you’re in. She is open-faced and smiley, soft and playful. She is a delight. I am delighting in her. It’s so nice to wake up to a wagging dog with a big, long face.
I had the most appalling haircut today. Ha! Serves me right. I went to the recommended ‘Friseur’ and found them too expensive, so I went next door. The place didn’t bode well. It was slightly grubby and there was a smell of… something. But a very pleasant gentleman came out and said that my haircut would cost €12. That’ll do.
While he was washing my hair, I was getting cold feet. I wasn’t handled with the confidence of an old hand, but with a kind of tentative nonchalance. And then the haircut. The cut itself was okay-ish at first. I tried to kid myself the slight offness of the washing had disappeared. He came a little too close a couple of times, but was ever-friendly and smiling.
And then he came around the front to do the fringe. He shuffled himself so one thigh was between my legs, the other on the other side. My thigh was gripped between his. Not a move I’ve had in a salon recently. But still, there I sat. Then, as he combed my hair, one hand rested itself on my middle, and found my hands clasped (probably more tightly than I realised) over my abdomen. And the hand reached in and down, so he was almost holding my hand.
Why I didn’t speak then, I’m not sure. I kept on smiling. The next round of thigh games were too much, with his genitals pushing into my chest. Strangely, I didn’t feel in the least bit threatened, or even particularly sleazed at, though something wasn’t right. And the next round of hand-holding, he rested the back of his hand clearly on my left breast.
Very politely, and still smiling, I said ‘Now I’m feeling uncomfortable, with the hand’ and looked at it. Oh, sorry, sorry, smiling, sorry. Okay. And off. He finished the amateurish haircut with reasonable grace and a slightly more respectful distance. And when I paid – I gave the man a fucking tip! What? Well, I suppose there were extras.
I left laughing. I’m not sure why. I still didn’t feel threatened, but more curious. What did I need that experience for? Why did it take me so long to speak clearly? It was a game. He knew what he was doing. Was he just testing to see how much I’d allow? I don’t know yet. I might pop in again and ask him.
I was looking for a poem to inspire me for NaNoWriMo, which starts today. I thought the soup-eater might give me one. I wasn’t sure. I asked a lady in a bookshop and she pointed me towards a Nobel-winner from Sweden or Denmark, she wasn’t sure. This is my impression of what the German words meant.
On either side of sin, two towns.
One bathed in darkness and full of enemies.
Lamps burn in the other.
Reflections dance on the dark water between.
Suddenly a deep tuba note rings out.
It is the voice of a friend calling:
‘Go, go to your grave’.
I know that some of my translation is incorrect, but I like it. This could be the inspiration. If you have a favourite poem for me, though, post it here or on facebook. Maybe I’ll let something from a different poem inspire me for each chapter.
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