I don't seem to be too good at this. Just letting go of everything and taking a vacation. Weeks before I left people kept asking me if I was excited and truthfully I had to say no. I just kept on with my regular routine, or not so regular routine, and knew the time to climb on the plane and then be in Germany would eventually come and then go. Now I am here and having a great time, but not exactly on vacation, at least not in my head.
I find that I need to keep working for a few hours each morning. And I have set myself the task of learning some German. I need a routine and things to accomplish or I get anxious and uptight. After my morning at the computer I feel like I have earned the right to hang out, to not think about things, to wander around with my family, to stare at unfamiliar streets, and eat unfamiliar goodies. It would be interesting and salutary to be the kind of person who lets everything go at times. But I am not there yet.
In the meantime, I am really enjoying trying to learn a little German. I have my small notebook that I carry everywhere, and I am busy learning verbs and constructing short sentences, which I try out with family and occasionally in public. "I am ready." "We are ready." "Is Karen ready now?" "I like coffee in the morning." I think I am enjoying this so much because it is proving not to be so difficult. It is as if German is already programmed some place inside my brain, waiting to be let out. I hear people speaking, and I think "If only I knew the words, I would know exactly what they are saying." I mutter overheard phrases to myself, read signs with long words I cannot understand. I feel like I am on the verge of some kind of enlightenment. This is so much easier than Swahili or Kipsigis.
Right now, I am sitting at my neice's desk, looking out a window to a long narrow garden (with only a few crocuses in bloom), and then the Elbe, a narrow slow moving river, that must be quite deep since large boats pass by occasionally, usually going up stream. The only sound, water running in the radiators and my computer.
Interesting how often I find myself cateloging sounds. The other day, sitting in an old cemetary surrounded by trees, grave stones from the 19th century, and a high stone wall, I made a list of the sounds I heard. A rake rasping leaves, another rake clinking against the side of a small orange vehicle, a helicopter overhead, a trolly going by, children's voices, the sound of an ambulance (I sang it and it was two notes a fifth apart), a bird that sounded like a red winged blackbird, another like a duck, and many more I couldn't recognize. Maybe this was a moment of rest after all.
Oh the lovely moment of rest. Some of my best memories are in European graveyards. made me take a breath at my computer.
Posted by: S | March 11, 2011 at 11:20 AM