One Quick Blog For The Day

Oh my bags are packed......

Just so you all understand why this upcoming visit is so special and awesome.

Charity and I have not met before.

She lives in Chicago, I live in Hamburg. Germany.

We met nearly two years ago to the day on the Diamondville Forum, which is the board of Neil Diamond's Band, and began to chat casually, then she invited me to read her blog (which was awesome, but the stupid girl killed it after she had gotten her wish, namely a new, different President for her country) and linked my theater class homepage to it.

We started to write emails.

Then, at the beginning of 2009, I moved on to twitter, and somehome consequently to facebook.

There is a weird connection here and maybe it needs to be explored at some point...

So a few days before Christmas, I tweeted, "Bought a case of pink champagne for NYE".

This is just one of those whimsical, apropos tweets to keep us in people's minds, right, and has NO deeper sense at all.

Only here, BINGO!

Charity replied, probably just as meaningless, "Wish I could be there!"

Yes, and here begins the true wonder of this thing, because when I said, "Come on over!" she agreed. And got herself a ticket. And is coming over. Today.

So I'm excited and jittery and bursting with joy, but I'm also deeply moved, because it proves how real you all are.

And here is the girlie, last night, on her way to O'Hare. Scared of flying, but doing it.

For me.

Goodbye, and Welcome

This is one of the silk paintings I used to do and sell a few years ago. It serves no purpose but to give this blog some color.

Okay, here goes, a quick and short blog entry, just because.

Just because I want to kick out this total sucker of a year with a bang and tell the new one coming up so quickly a few things while we are in this hiatus between Christmas and New Year's Eve.

2009: You were a real a**hole. Sorry to be rude, but you were.

You let my father faint and fall in a busy street and wake up scared and disoriented in the ER; You gave my mother in law pneumonia and the Noro virus and put the dear old lady in hospital for twelve weeks.

You let my beloved sister in law die, you rotten bastard, at the age of fifty, just one week after her grandchild was born!

You let a dumb young jackass run over my husband while he was crossing a street on a pedestrian walkway with a GREEN light and suffer from his injuries since June.

You gave us THREE major plumbing disasters and a house that was nearly not inhabitable for half a year.

And you made me sick, too, because at some point I could not cope anymore.

Now that you are old and weak, you had to give in, right? We outlasted you in the end.

We took all the misery and pain you tossed at us, and we are still here!

My husband's injuries are healing. Our parents are old but well and healthy, and I'm getting well, too, thanks to the high doses of steroids my physician has now finally prescribed.

Honestly? I had no idea how miserable I had become over the past few months.

Only the sudden feeling of well-being is coming as such a shock right now, like a dense grey fog lifting.

And on this note, goodbye, 2009. You s*cked. Big time.

Welcome, 2010.

You are having an easy start with this family.

We have only this one wish: don't be as bad a bastard as 2009.

Give us the time and space to heal, and if you decide to take one of our elderly family from us, please do it kindly.

Let the hubby have joy at his job as teacher, and let me write and travel, as I have planned.

If you can, please let me see my book published. I know it is good enough to be, all I need is some luck and to meet the right people now.

You are starting out really, really well, I have to say. You are giving me Charity as a starter, and hell, no dish of shrimps and no case of champagne can top that.

Not even a huge bottle of Laphroiag.

Hey, not even a date with Neil D. could do that!!!

So I'm hoping you are meaning well with us.

Thank you. This is all.

The Great Puzzle

You might have noticed (how could you not, after all my blathering about it???) that I'm going to have a visitor over New Year's Eve. That's right, Charity will be coming over.

The weather forecast for her flight day is really bad; they announced storm and snow and ice and all kinds of winter baddies, but since she is flying a German airline, she'll be fine. They are very thorough, safe and humorless.

But that was not what was going through my mind.

Charity will get here safely, even if a little bleary-eyed, and we'll have tons of fun.

The thought that struck me, was, "How come we look forward to people this much?"

Yes, please, how come we enjoy being with people so much, or having guests?

Really, it means upheaval, a change in daily habits, cleaning the house for them (!!!) and cooking special meals, maybe drinking more booze than intended, less sleep and - let's face it - spending more money.

And yet, and yet - I'm nearly dying with joy and anticipation.

But really, why is that?

What makes us WANT to meet people and be friends? Where does the joy come from, when you are introduced to someone new on twitter and hit it off, conversation-wise, like happened to me just now, with @fraukewatson, for instance?

Is it true what it says on those mushy Hallmark cards, is it about sharing and loving and caring?

Or the partying and fun? Or all of those?

Or something more?

Now why does this remind me of the Grinch?

I know it is my job to come up with a fitting answer to those questions now, styling myself a writer and all, but I can't.

Maybe it's a little of all that, and maybe there is some deeper, anthropological reason that I've never heard about, or maybe it is only me.

All I can give you is my personal truth.

There is nothing more fun, or a greater joy, than having friends around.

And there is no greater adventure than sharing moments and experiences with other people.

There is one woman I know, my younger son's former primary school teacher, and she is different. We did not start out too well with each other for our ideas of a good education for the kid clashed somewhat, but we ended up in a sort of friendship because it was just too hard to accept that we would not get along.

She is a very, very nice person, creative, fun, beauty-loving and good to talk to, but she is, principally, also a loner. She likes to do things on her own, like going to the movies, the theater, an art exhibition, shopping, to a restaurant. Taking her dog for a walk.

Told me at one point that she did not need company to enjoy herself, she was fine alone.

This, to me, is a concept that is beyond scary. It is terrifying.

How, I ask you, if you come across something that has a real impact on you, are you going to process that impression, if not by sharing it, in any way at all? It just sits there on your soul and simmers, and there is never any output, nor any reaction, to it?

There is no echo to your feelings, no one to smile at you and nod and say, yes, that is really something, is it not?

Or tell you, laughingly, to your face, how silly and maudlin you are being.

Let's say you are traveling the United States, on your own. And you are standing on the edge of the Grand Canyon. Or in NYC, right in front of the Met, where you always wanted to be.

Or facing Times Square. Pick any place at all that you've ever wanted to see, and then imagine yourself there, alone.

How would that feel?

You'd turn around, your mind and your throat bursting with the need to share, and no one you know there to see the elation in your eyes?

I need my people.

I need them to share my own joy, and I need them to share their joy with me.

Guess there is some truth to those silly Hallmark cards, after all.