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I haven’t been blogging much lately. Every time I sat down at my desk with the intention to write a post, our now nine-month-old Vader laid down at my feet and looked at me with his puppy eyes. Perfect dog owners don’t grow on trees, they are carefully trained by their dogs -and I knew I had to spend more time with him.
Six humans trapped by happenstance
In bleak and bitter cold.
Each one possessed a stick of wood
Or so the story’s told
About ten, fifteen years ago, at a BBQ with lots of food and some alcohol, a friend of mine asked me if I would date -or sleep with a black man. I didn’t hesitate, answered quickly -and without thinking- “No, I would not date a black man or sleep with a black man.”
“I guess that means you are a racist,” he said and I didn’t know what to respond. My brain didn’t comprehend -neither did I. I had stepped into a trap and now I was stuck.
The episode of “A Million little things” two weeks ago, shows a black gathering with family and friends. There is laughter, people pick at each other, the way we all do when we have a good time. A young teenage boy joins them, his face is earnest. When asked what is going on, he turns his phone around, and shows the rest of he people a video he just saw online.
The more people I get to know, the more I love being by myself. The more I am by myself, the more questions I have. People have changed and I haven’t changed with them. I am stuck in a past that is long gone, and I find myself wondering where that leaves me.
“Just jump up and down in front of my window,” I joked and pointed at my office window on the side of our house when Tommy complained that I hadn’t answered the door once again. “Jumping in front of a white woman’s window. I would get arrested,” he explained laughing, and I thought he was joking.
I wanted to put into word what I felt, but I couldn’t. Perhaps I was the only one who believed like it. Turns out I wasn’t! 1988 a woman wrote down what I have been thinking and feeling all along.
I can’t help but smile when I think about all the Holiday geese who found their way into our kitchen. Roasted goose with potato dumplings and homemade red cabbage. A feast of the past, today a treat I rarely prepare anymore. It’s not worth the effort I have decided, but the smile on my face tells me otherwise.
I was born 4,500 miles away in a small village in the Alps. One foot one the Italian side, the other on the Austrian side my Grandma always joked. I met Gastarbeiter/Migrant workers), who were guest/gast in our country, invited by our government. Most of them came from the former Yugoslavia, a few Turkish men followed the invitation as well.
“I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes.
Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You’re doing things you’ve never done before, and more importantly, you’re Doing Something.