Dear Blog, it's been a while. I've been moving around a lot, between Amsterdam and Germany. I'm writing this in a small café in Berlin. Café Südwind is a sweet cosy place in Berlin Charlottenburg, around the corner from Max, Sabine's brother. It's owned by friends of Max and Konstanze. Kristi and Fabian are kind easygoing people. Kristi is putzing around behind the bar - she is a beautiful woman and a wonderful cook, who bakes her own pies & cakes, they are spectacular! - while husband Fabian is patiently helping their nine year old daughter with her homework. The only other guest is just leaving. The patrons of Südwind live in the same neighborhood, most are regulars who are welcomed by name. This a friendly relaxed spot. It could be home. But it is not home.
Finding A Good Place To Die may really be about finding Home. A new home, because the old home, the home of the parents, is long gone. Home was where I was born, where I lived the first years of my life. Everywhere since, with perhaps one exception during my early twenties, have been temporary shelters. Never home.
Until now. Since I'm away so often, since I'm going to be a granddad, since I've been working with my daughter, since my own father moved to within driving distance, since I have been thinking of moving to another country, I am becoming more aware of Home. Both the home within and of the home outside. I'm more and more aware of a new and unfamiliar sense of family, connectedness, base. Is this the effect of these chaotic times, or is something stirring inside me?
Strange development: I've booked a trip to Vietnam in January, but now the date is approaching I'm reluctant to move. Don't wanna travel. The tropics are not calling me. What's happening, am I getting old, are my bones getting tired? No need for suspicion, yet. I'm watching this movement inside me, with wonder. Quietly. Still.
