Lydia’s Blog

So, I decided on a guy to give my beloved apartment up to today (wow, nice English). His name is Randy, which is for some reason comforting. He’s my age and from New Jersey. He plays bass in a band and sells hot dogs by day. I figured he’ll really appreciate the neighborhood.

It’s surreal. I realize that I’ve been sort of walking around in a coma for at least the last three weeks or so. Basically since my guests left after the surgery. Or maybe before. I expected my life to just spring back to normal, but it didn’t. And of course it wouldn’t have…I’d quit the Komische Oper, I’m deaf, and summer had descended, and I could no longer rely on Berlin as my home. Sweet, annoying, fabulous, insane, bullshit Berlin. As of three weeks from now, it’ll just be another place to visit. Like Oberlin or Pittsburgh. Like West Hartford. Like New York.

I loved Berlin so much because it gave me so much material. I always had something to bitch about. As Dad used to say, Lyds is only happy when she’s complaining.

And how.

It’s ironic that I gave up the apartment on such a Berliny day in my neighborhood. Today was the Fete de la Musique at Zionskirchplatz, the church with the REALLY loud bells within spitting distance of my front door. I’d heard the music from my aparment, swelling through the courtyard. Really shitty reggae. I had to go out and take a look. After wading through stalls of hemp scarves and organic shoes, I found the soundstage. It was as I’d expected.

Seven white guys. And a sampler CD of old Bob Marley effects. I signed myself up for a free Thai Lotus massage to get over the Trauma (a pudgy Asian man sitting on the backs of my thighs, pounding the fuck out of my shoulderblades. I recommend).

Martin and Nicole came over a bit later to look at my place. Too small and too pink, they thought (nasty, stained pink carpets). We went out to dinner to celebrate.

On the way back, just minutes ago, I heard shitty live rock begin reverberating through the streets (making it impossible for me to watch the Argentina/Netherlands game on a street screen). Sure enough, on the corner in the opposite direction of Zionskirchplatz, a new arts collective was opening up, complete with live band and piles of Germans “dancing” (standing still and bending their knees alternately to the beat). The air was dense with dope, and the white person to dreadlock ratio was higher than I’d seen in a long while. Out in the open.

I stood and watched for two of three minutes, feeling a dizzying, nostalgic regret wash over me. After those few minutes, I felt something harder replacing that original sentiment. That bittersweet bonhommie shrinky-dinked into an odd, cynical menace I find myself turning toward more and more often these days.

I turned around, walked the twelve seconds to my building and walked up to my apartment. The apartment that as of today, isn’t really mine anymore.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 21st, 2006 at 1:57 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.