Juice

So, now I give it a try. A friend of mine sent me the link to Karen Kingston's website: www.spaceclearing.com. She will have a training in the Catskills, pretty close to where we live - and she accepted us as being one of the families who will get a space clearing by her students - for free! Since our house is already 100 years old and probably never has seen something like this, it might be interesting. To those of you who are not familiar with space clearing: it is supposed to get the flow of energy going again. You actually really have to picture old energy being stuck in corners and cluttered areas of your home like dust and spiderwebs. According to Kingston a good vacuuming can also set a lot of energy free - so get your cleaning devices out and start the fun.
The great thing is, that all this actually really works for me and inspired me getting the house clutter free and reasonably clean. I got Karen Kingston's two books 'Clutter Clearing with Feng Shui" and "Creating Sacred Space with Feng Shui". They both are really inspiring and some of the stories are amazing: By clearing out the clutter of certain areas, people were able to gain what they were wishing for, they reestablished their businesses, repaired their relationships, even restarted their lifes. Well, we will see, what will happen here. Our house will be cleaner, that is for sure. Oh, and here is another great site: www.freecycle.com. You can either offer things you do not need any more or find things you need - for free! Try it out, I'll keep you updated about our Feng Shui.

Mamorta Mamorta

Mamorta Mamorta! What almost sounds like Help, Help, Fire, Fire, is the correct name for a funny cute little animal which populate my friend Karloas garden. She caught some of them, with humongous tomatoes in a wire cage. One of them supposedly enjoyed those tomatoes so much, that he kept coming back. Than she sprayed him with some non-toxic color and let him out in the wild again. The idea was to do kind of a tick-count, since these nasty little beasts are quite a problem on her property (but I hope she will tell you the whole story soon). A little while ago they started to avoid getting caught - but they still enjoy the hostility of my friend. And who would not? There is always something for everybody, be it beer or a good talk, jump on the trampoline, or a first ride on a lawn mower. Just simple things can become an adventure under the right circumstances... Well, today, we had planned to swim through the lake in her neighbourhood, which is not such a big thing, like crossing the Hudson River or the Atlantic Ocean, but who knows, maybe next year we go for something bigger, anyway, it is far enough.... So, while my husband watched the kids, we jogged over to the other end. And while I told her about my plans of founding a company, combining writing and connecting and consulting and helping other mothers to get to do what they really want, she told me more about her woodchucks. And since she is a trained biologist and knows amazing things about the world of molecules, insects, plants and animals around us, even her kids don't call little flys just flys but.... (oh Karola, what was that name again?), so she talked about Mamorta, the lonley one, which was the one who used to come back for the tomatoes. But most of these furry friends with the big, big teeth are very social, take care of each other and enjoy having a big network of friends and family. Mamorta Mamorta! What a great name, to start our project!

And by the way, we swam through the lake no problem - plus we survived a CeleBEARation and now have 7 more stuffed furry friends with little red hearts, kissed by our girls, in their polyester bodies.

The problem of getting started

Right now I am reading this book, by Anne Lamott. It is called "bird by bird" and describes the process of creative writing. It all makes total sense, but the problem is: how to get started. Lamott asks her students to write about school lunch or something else trivial and encourages the aspiring writers to just let it flow, because somewhere in all those pages you might find a paragraph which makes it all worth.
My daughter often wants me to make up stories for her. She appreciates anything, and if a story is good, she wants more. So we have a series about the little octopus who wants to do everything at the same time. No wonder, he has 8 arms, why shouldn't he use them, but, of course, he gets tangled up in many, many knots and his mom has to come and save him and from there they work it all out. When I am writing, I am this little octopus. There are so many things which want to come out, that they seem to clutter the flow.
Also I somtimes just come up with the German expression for something I want to say, sometimes it seems to be easier to write in english. It does not really contribute to the flow of writing if you have to look up words and expression. But if you ever have to do so, here is a good online translation service: leo.dict.org. I use it often, when I write for CScout. We describe trends and market developments. And see, this writing is totally different. You do your research and when you know enough about the topic, or at least, you think, you know enough about the topic, you start to write your own version, enhance it with some personal thoughts and some insights you gained and done it is. But when I start to research my own mind and life I do not seem to come to an end. This is not, because of my life is so extraordinary or adventurous or incredible, it is simply, that is hard to focus on a specific point. It starts out with pretzels and ends up at a baker I met once, while I was still writing for a local newspaper in Germany. He was a fairly big, but mostly unhappy young man who had to take over the family business. He hated his job, getting up every morning before sunrise, kneading the dough and forming little rolls and - well - my beloved pretzels - that was the sadest, loneliest, most desperate thing for him to do. It is hard enough to get up every morning, especially if there is nothing to look forward too, and on top of that it was 4 a.m. So, what he did; He locked himself up, supposedly with a bunch of dynamite and than he called the police telling them, that he wants to blow himself up, including all the pretzels, rolls, ovens, and kneading machines. His parents were shocked, the grounds of the bakery were surrounded by policecars, fire trucks, an ambulance. And I walked in. I had too, it is not, that I really like stories like this one. But than people always seem to tell me what they went through and how they feel and why. Usually I just listened. And that was what the baker needed. He talked and talked and while he did, some police officers made sure, he did not really have some explosives and this was that. There was a picture in the newspaper, an article, I can't really recall and hopefully many more pretzels and rolls up until today. Who knows? The weird thing about being a local journalist is, that you dive into a certain situation, an event, into someones mind / you think a little, write a lot and of you go... more stories are waiting, anytime and everywhere. Somehow I also learned, that really everything can be a story, it just depends on the angle you find.
I wonder what Sara hears in the stories I tell her. Maybe it is my love for her which makes her listen so intently. Well, what made me listen to all these strangers over the years? I wanted to hear the truth, I felt, that they needed somebody to listen, i wanted to give them a voice... But for me? I am still in search for my own voice, my writers voice. So, if you read this, well, you know...

Um 8 Uhr im Schlafanzug

I do not know how other mothers are doing that...., but, well, now here I am. It is almost 9 o'clock pm, and I am determined to think and write and try to be creative, wonder how creative one can be after a day of changing diapers, and as the highlight of the day also some pyjama pants while reading good night stories and nursing a baby, wiping finger-paint from every imaginable body part of a 2 year old and and and. Sometimes I feel, I would not only need 8 more hours every day but also 8 more arms or maybe just another human being who cannot only take care of itself but also help with the not quite so simple daily tasks, like pouring boulognese sauce on a plate, not the table. But back to pyjamas. It is 9 p now and I run around in pyjamas since one hour, throwing out the last plastic bag filled with, well an "accident" - and I have to admit, my reaction to this was not really nice. So I threw her up on the changing table, roughly pulled down her paints while elegantly catching her sausage with a baby wipe, making a face of total disgust. Her reaction was simple and true: "Mama, you are bigger." And that put it all back in relation. How can a 2 year old be so smart. her day was the same as mine, okay, without diaper changing, cleaning, cooking, but she also was exhausted and, well, had this little accident while we were reading bedtime stories, and, she is still small, while I am the big grown up, even if I sometimes do not want to be that. But than, I just had to laugh, it is simple like that. And than even Sara offered her help - but by than I was fine with this last load of ... today.

Nutellabrezen und was ich sonst noch vermisse

Nun lebe ich seit 8 Jahren in New York - und noch immer habe ich keine anständigen Brezen hier gefunden. Wir haben alles ausprobiert: Eine Bäckerein in Kingston (Name folgt, sobald ich mich erinnere), tiefgefrorene Aufback-Brezen und natürlich selber backen - aber vielleicht war die Hefe nicht ganz richtig. Ausser meinen bayerischen Freunden versteht niemand so richtig, weshalb mir die Brezen so abgehen. Und selbst meine eigenen Kinder, die in Deutschland von Opa immer mit einer Tüte Brezen vom Flughafen abgeholt werden, ist meine Brezen-Sehnsucht eher Wurst. Sie begnügen sich mit essen diesen kleinen, harten Salzbrezen, die sie dick mit Nutella (ja, das gibt es mittlerweile in fast jedem US Supermarkt) bestreichen. Schrecklich... aber jeder hat eben so seine Vorlieben. Und darum soll es gehen in diesem Blog, um alles, was ich gerne tue und was ich lieber lasse. Und was von diesen beiden Möglichkeiten für einen, meinen eigenen, Blog zutrifft - und ob ich eine Leidenschaft finde, über die ich nicht mehr aufhören kann zu schreiben, eine Leidenschaft wie Nutellabrezen. Und sollte jemand einen Brezen-Tipp haben - nur her damit!