When are you going to do these?
My wife brandishes a sack of purple iris things and some other bulbs that she bought recently that i thanked her for buying.
On the weekend, I say, this not being the weekend, but Thursday, although I am home, having skipped work / opted to work from home due to the plausibility of a reaction from my 5th covid shot as an excuse.
It’s always the weekend, she says.
Which is true, I married a philosopher and she is retired now.
However I am drunk (and drunk gardening = risky), because we went to the bank today to negotiate a higher interest rate on my savings account after which we went for a walk along the Danube that ended abruptly at the Alpenverein with wine.
Abrupt and unexpected, but not unwelcome.
You only live once, so.
The problem is, i dunno.
Kid in a candy store problem, I guess.
In this abundant, beautiful world.
When there is so much to love.
Despite everything.
Category Archives: Familie
When are you going to do these?
Posted in Das Gehirn, Familie, Feral Living, ferner liefen, Metamorphosism
Tags: abundance, banking, beauty, drunkenness, gardening, interest, love, wine
Self help
In the middle of the night
in Sweden, in the northern part
northish, anyway,
at midsummer
there are no stars
the light shimmers when you get up
and walk through the woods
to the outhouse
shimmers. it is not
like
what you are used to, shining from
like the sun through
the trees to your eyes.
it breaks and shimmers
in all directions.
at least i am pretty sure,
i didn’t have my glasses on.
we saw two moose
a big one one evening
a little one the next evening
i sat on the porch in a lawn chair
i looked at the lake
and at the trees
eventually i noticed i was not thinking
i was a little surprised
what am i doing when i am not thinking
i am living
so i lived on the porch
for a few days.
would i recommend this?
i don’t recommend anything
anymore
you’ll figure it out
We’ll be fine, dad
They say
when you meet a bear
play dead
If it’s a grizzly bear you
may also climb a tree
because they do not climb
due to their anatomy
but they have a long reach so you
must climb up high,
higher than you would think
and quickly, probably.
others say
raise your arms up
make yourself bigger
yell maybe
or is that mountain lions
if you have bear spray
maybe play dead
then give them a squirt when they get close
others say wear bells on your
clothes so you don’t surprise them
don’t feed them
don’t pet them
and whatever you do don’t piss on their tree
I have never seen a bear in the wild
although once i thought i did
in the fog
but it was just tree stumps
but i was still real scared
and once, and my little sister will confirm this,
when we were picking huckleberries in the hills,
it got foggy, and i told her to walk
in front
on the logic that should we
encounter a bear,
she was quicker than i and
could elude it better.
Bears are on my mind because
they have bears in Sweden,
i have been told,
and my daughter Beta and I are
flying there tomorrow
to spend a week in a dinky
red cabin
in the woods
by a lake
and i for one am really
looking forward to picking
berries in the woods.
and hiking with my kid.
i joked that we were concerned about
spending a week together in a tiny
cabin, but she reminded me
that i had helped her learn
to drive
and we still get along.
and i will walk in front this time
Posted in Das Gehirn, Familie, Metamorphosism
Tags: bears, berries, cabin, daughter, family, father, safety tips, sweden
Zzzt zzzt zzzt
i gave the crows
ok like hang on
i got a new coat.
a friend was in town and it was cold and rainy
so i bought a spring coat
rain coat but not as warm as my winter coat
and a nice fabric so i don’t go
zzzt zzzt zzzt when i walk
you know what i mean
lightweight sort of trenchcoat looking
but no belt (those always get tangled up)
and black
but also no dog kibbles in the pocket
so i bought peanuts this morning
in the shell
for the crows
and the crows were all, every one of them,
like:
man what is this?
peanuts?
people always talk about feeding crows peanuts
in the shell
and i used to feed them peanuts thinking
cracking the shells makes it interesting
gives them
something to do but
they like the Frolic! brand kibble better.
and they all hesitated before taking
a nut
they all looked at me
the way i look at the ceiling at night
when i can’t sleep
or the horizon when i get
into another fight with a loved one
fight or misunderstanding
or screw-up
thinking
i hope i sleep better tomorrow
i hope we get along tomorrow
i hope this builds character
i hope there is kibble again
someday
but on the other hand
on the other hand
to be fair
and without wanting to jinx anything
i have also been very lucky
i have met interesting people
i am doing interesting things
i am doing things so scary i am still scared 2 weeks later
friends visit from out of town (see above)
if only i could sleep
knock on wood
Nature vs. Nurture
Woman: Actually, my psychologist sister told me prematurely grey hair is not genetic, it is a trauma response.
Man, triumphantly: Oh yeah? Then why does everyone in my family have prematurely grey hair?
Posted in Das Gehirn, Familie, Metamorphosism
Tags: epigenetics, genetics, nature, nurture, science, trauma, trauma response
Far of fir
My wife carefully adjusts the draft on the “Schwedenofen”
in our living room,
which is what they call a cast-iron woodstove
with a glass door here, becaus a cat has made
itself comfortable on my chest, and
watching her (my wife) I think, People who
didn’t play with fire as childrn
have a greater fear of being burned.
Some days I wonder about the extent
to which Covid damaged my brain. Some
days it’s not so bad, some days I feel
like my laptop with the wonky “E” on
the keyboard (you hav to go back a lot
and mak sur it typed all th “e”s) and
some days I should just stay in bd.
In fact, sufficient sleep seems to make
a big difference. I got 9 hours last night,
according to my watch, but was still
physically tird because we went on a rather
long hike yesterday, and had a real
hankering for sweets, specifically a
“Punschkrapfn” which is a small rum-
filled one-portion-sized cake with pink
frosting. And as I took my morning
shower I thought of the word “Konditorei”
which is the plac where one might buy
a Punschkrapfen and wondered what the
English word would be (I often wonder this,
this in itself is not weird) but my brain’s
first suggestion this morning was
not “confectionary” or “cake shop” but
“cake pharmacy”
which, let’s admit it, is even
better than “cake shop”, which I
had prferred until then,
but on the other hand worris me a
little.
Anyway afterwards I complained
to my wife that the cake pharmacy
was close on Sundays, th very day
I have time to go there and my
wife, a skeptic like all of us, googled
it and determind that it was in fact
open on Sundays now, which it didn’t use
to be bcause they had been short
staffed and the owner was tired of
working 7-day weeks.
So, happy ending, we got our
Punschkrapfen.
Posted in Das Gehirn, Familie, Metamorphosism
Tags: brain, brain damage, covid, dementia, language, malfunctioning keyboard, translation
Momentarily
I let the cat in
or out, or both
the air was cold outside
and warm inside
and the moon was bright
the door locked with a loud click
because it’s just a little
out of alignment due to
decades of settling
and i thought
god i haven’t written mom in ages
i should tell her how nice
life is and how great
the kids are and
everything that’s going on
this new place with great breakfasts
how well my scones turned out
but she’s dead
i had forgotten momentarily
i opened the door back up
and took another look at the moon