Berlin or bust

Flying lessons

Four in the morning Friday, I realized: I MUST see the Ex.

This letter that I've been writing in my head every night for the past six weeks? That I have been outlining, revising, proofreading, power-pointing? Translating from English to German and back again?

It is not a letter at all. It is a conversation.

Face him, I thought. Tell him what you believe.

Not because I think I can sway him. Not because I even want to. But because I want him to know. Precisely where I stand.

And I must say it. Or else this spine of mine might forever be soft as taffy.

Yesterday, at Cafe Sowohlalsauch, I reported this to my Serbo-Croatian literary hot stuff friend. "It came to me in the night," I told her. "Immediately I felt strong. And tall." Except that I was lying down. 

"Then you must," she said. 

"Or I will never be free of him."

Across the street, suddenly, a sheet of raindrops, caught in the sunlight. Where we sat: entirely dry.

"It's God!" We laughed. "Sending us a message." And I think we both believed it.

*                     *                      *

Today, at Sowohlalsauch, I made the same report to Dylan. "I want him to harbor no illusions," I said, "of what I think about his reasoning."

"But..." She looked at me so kind, in her pretty pale blue blouse. "Do you really believe he did the wrong thing?"

I paused.

"Because, you can do so much better."  Her eyes were limpid as sky.

I paused again.

She launched into his shortcomings. As any good girlfriend should. She didn't need to.

"You're right," I jumped in.

Funny. How, for the first time, I actually believed it.

The waiter brought Dylan her coffee. My cup was already half-drained. Black, with sweetener.

"You can take my milk," I told him. And handed him my mini-pitcher of foamy white, full.

He balanced it on his tray, stepped away.

"Those eyebrows!" I murmured. A forest. "Those lips!" Cresting waves. 

Dylan chuckled. "You said that milk thing sooo flirtatious."

"Really?" 

*                     *                      *

Dylan has a plan for me. Not involving the waiter. Rather, her roommate. Leonine forehead. Silvering mane. He is an Ossie. You do not realize he is handsome. Until suddenly: My. God! Is that his testosterone that bowled me over?

He needs a girlfriend.

"Doesn't he have issues?"

"I think he is afraid," she said.

I shook my head. I am through with the hesitant. The meek. The undecided. You better chase me, buster. "I'm not doing like I did with the Ex." 

Besides, the waiter's smile is probably all I can handle right now. That and the weekly sightings of Secret Agent Man. Square jaw. Buff as brick. A vigorous gentleman indeed!

He asked me to the movies. In a totally vague, non-committal, platonic-ish sort of way. Which is just right.

That was last week, right around the same time my holistic healer handed me the snow-white swan feathers. The next day I discovered I was one of the few authors reading at the Madonna book release party (an honor!). And the literary agent I'd sent part of my memoir to? She reported being "intrigued" (holy cow!). She wants to see more.

Hmm, I thought, this whole "wobbly before you fly" thing... My healer might have a point.

Then, of course, Mr. Epstein Barr laid me flat.

There goes that.

Still, the air currents sure were nice. While they lasted.

Hardly at all

That's how much I thought of the Ex yesterday.

And I wrote not a single bitter e-mail to him in my mind.

Oh hallelujah. Thank Jesus Mary and Joseph, Allah and Mohammed.

Now I am sitting at Sowohlalsauch, a table away from Secret Agent Man. Who spoke to me for a whole entire hour. I think he likes the sound of his own voice. But whatever.

Life is good.

Single white female seeking...

A wise and craven friend has recently advised that I not look for love. Rather: "You should take this time to seek a vigorous gentleman for yourself." He insisted: "Will do you good. Berlin awaits!"

Ha! You try stirring the blood of the Northern European male. Are they reptiles? Perhaps it's time for a jaunt to Italy. Or even Moabit. Where the mighty Turks roam, appetites unguarded.

Don't repeat this to my mom.

I skyped her this evening. I told her bla bla bla, then: "I'm meeting someone later tonight."

She: sputtery noises, words chewed-in half

Me: Hello?

She: You are just-- It's only-- You will be having a drink--

Me: What?

She: Just a few hours with him? Nothing more--

Me: Mom! Her name is Juliet.

She: Oh!

Me: I mean, come on.

She: I thought-- I couldn't tell from that blog post-- I worried--

Me: Tongue in cheek, Mom, tongue in cheek.

She (laughs): It seems I am missing both.

For the record, friends, I might talk a big game. But at the end of the day, I am so much more Carrie than Samantha. If only I had the Manolo Blahniks to prove it.

None of which means anything to my TV-allergic mother. Please, will someone on your side of the Atlantic kindly explain it? Oh, and while you're at it, gently slip in the reminder that I'm thirty-six years and seven months old. Thanks!

The Tao says...

Express yourself completely,
then keep quiet.
Be like the forces of nature:
when it blows, there is only wind;
when it rains, there is only rain;
when the clouds pass, the sun shines through.

Which is why, two hours after gripping sofa's back, I can rush to meet Dylan at Cafe Sowohlalsauch. Not even realizing that the last time I was here, it was me and him.

I carry a tall red umbrella. Ten minutes of downpour before I walked out the door. Now it's back to dry sharp sun.

Still, both Dylan and I are sunk a little low. I have bad news to report from home. She bemoans her own inertia. I sip tomato juice. She rolls a cigarette. Then we tell each other scandalous tales. This always lifts the spirits. One lover on 83rd and Amsterdam,  the other on 84th, both within a day. And the Danish girls, doing things better left undone, in a hostel dorm room.

We eye the man beside us. Bench-presser's build, hair shorn uncharacteristically close for Berlin.

"He is beautiful," says Dylan in English.

"In a Frat-boy way," I offer.

He leans over. "Excuse me." Startling us with flawless British. "Do you mind if I put this here?" His bread basket, our table space. To give him room for his laptop.

Dylan says sure. I say no. Eyelashes bobbing. I can't help it.

He balances basket at table's very edge. We set our own bread basket beside it. "So it doesn't get lonely," says Dylan. Though we worry: Our loaf is so much bigger. Will his feel inadequate?

Somehow this is hilarious.

Later we learn: He is German. (No! we insist, You are English!) He is a federal agent. (Are you undercover? Dylan wants to know.)

Sadly, no. German feds go plain-clothes. His job, he assures us, is "very bureaucratic."

"Are you both authors?" he asks.

"Writers," we correct him -- but there is my Madonna book, on the table. "Author now, I guess." I laugh.

Why are we here, he queries. And before you know it, we've discussed Fullbrights and the CIA, Britta filters, the problems with translation. Also: the hairdo-decimating hardness of Berlin water.

Finally we girls rise to go. "Come with me to AktivMarkt?" I ask Dylan. "They have FantaZero!"

"Ooh! Yes!"

The Fed pulls a face. "Soda! Why soda?"

"It's a treat!" says Dylan.

"Sometimes you need your chemicals," I chime.

He is appalled. But smiling. "You are so American."

And we girls trip away, hormones popping.

"Guess where I am going Every Day?" I crow. "Guess what's my new writing cafe?"

Dylan cracks up.

Then I announce: "So, I am going to fall in love again in 2009." Her eyebrows climb. "But before then, I will take three lovers."

Now I crack up. Because I know the sound God makes when we humans make our plans. It goes something like this:

Ha ha ha.

Still, it's nice to dream. Nice to forget. And nice to get all wiggly in the stomach just from ribbing a brawny federal agent on a hot Saturday afternoon in July.

I mean, how Tao can you get?

What if everything is exactly as it's supposed to be?

What if he was supposed to cross my path for nine short months?

What if I was supposed to love him?

What if he was supposed to leave me?

What if I am supposed to feel this grief, this shock, this red-hot aching of the chest cavity?

Maybe my love was more a gift to myself even than to him.

Maybe his leaving was a favor that I didn't know I needed.

Maybe from the ashes in which I stand, the charred remains of the future I'd imagined, there will grow a seed, and from the seed will sprout a bud, and from the bud will bloom a peony.

Bright pink and full-bodied. Satin-petaled, unfurling.

And one day I'll find I'm ten times the woman I ever thought I'd be.

Maybe.

Love & Rockets (& Lufthansa)

Outside my bedroom window the flakes are falling thick and fast. The roof is quilted white. The first snow to stick since I moved to Berlin.

It is 2 p.m. on January 1 and I am tucked beneath my down comforter, laptop humming on my thighs. Beside me perches a red paper cup. Already drained. Bayreuth Boy braved five flights of stairs and a sky full of flurries to purchase my inaugural caffeine (Americano) of 2008, and his (latte macchiato). Now he sits beside me, Power Book clapped open. Watching YouTube videos on how-to-hack your iPhone. And SKYPing with floppy-limbed Christoph.  

This is today's romance, my friends. Amped up. Plugged in. On line. Side by side.

Floppy-limbed C. wants to know: What are we doing for breakfast today? Do we want to meet up? A rather late breakfast, indeed. Then again, we were celebrating till 5 a.m. And I am jet-lagged. Which makes waking by noon positively heroic.

Somewhere near midnight, I stood on Torstrasse with the Boy and his posse. No Times Square ball-drop. No Dick Clarke countdown.  Nevertheless. We leapt into hugs. "Alles gute!" we cried. And Berlin exploded all around.

For three short days each year, the purchase of fireworks is legal in Germany. For one short night, the lighting of said fireworks is legal, too. The streets are Fourth of July on crack. Actually, Fourth of July on crack before they outlawed all the fun stuff. Fire-spirals spin along gutters. Roman candles blaze rainbows over pavement. Bottle rockets bang skyward, or whiz horizontally, often aimed at cars. Chinese cracker-chains pop like machine gun volley. Clouds of slate-gray sulfur rise. Clogging the throat, burning the eyes. Ambulances howl past. Tending to the already injured.

Twenty minutes of this was exciting. More would have been too much. After all, I did not come to Berlin to choke on street corners. I came here to... Breathe. Of myself. Again. 

Have You Seen This Jay-Z Fan(atic)?

The following suspect escaped BOASD Elite Force's custody as of 17:00 hours, Tuesday, December 11, 2007. He was last seen sprinting barefoot across Potsdamer Platz.

DESCRIPTION

Name: Bayreuth Boy

Age: 25 to 45 (elevated maturity level renders age estimation futile)

Sex: Male  

Height: Six feet (of sexiness)

Weight: Svelte (and sexily proportioned) 

Hair: Blondish-brown (rumpled in a sexy manner)

Race: Franconian (Could there be anything sexier?)

Prone to: Muttering American Gangster lyrics with Oxford accented English. (Germans do NOT speak American.)

Aliases include: Man of the People Friend of the Community; Beard Man; The Graf

Contact BOASD authorities IMMEDIATELY upon sighting of  suspect. DO NOT attempt to overtake him, nor confiscate his iPod, as devastating Bavarian-Gangster Prügelei will result.

Suspect Held for Questioning

This just in:

A third sighting of the missing blogger by Fräulein Ermentraud Hügelmeyer on Thursday, December 6 (Vietnamese take-out containers in hand; Goodfellas DVD poking out of back pocket) prompted the Elite Forces Unit of Berlin's Online Armed Services Division (BOASD) to conduct a raid on Schwedter Strasse on the morning of Monday, December 10.

BOASD reports these findings:

1 mattress, with balled-up comforter (no bedframe)
1 oversized Ikea wardrobe ("Takes up the whole dang flat," complained Elite Forces agent Otto Austerlitz)
3 mugs (sliced ginger root mouldering at their bottoms)
2 empty take-out containers ("bearing scent of Won Ton soup")
1 Mercedes star, hanging by a nail (otherwise, all walls barren)
1 iMac, 1 iBook, 1 iPod ("Jesus, what's with this kid and Apples?" muttered self-professed PC man Austerlitz)
and
1 Bayreuthian individual

No further details of the raid were released. "A matter of national security," stated agent Otto Austerlitz. (Though he did reveal: "SKYPE chat transcripts suggest the missing blogger has temporarily left Berlin.") Fortunately, a neighbor [hereby known as "Helmut"] cowering in the stairwell offered the following observations:

Five BOASD Elite Force agents, outfitted in full Dirty-Bomb Detonation gear, pounded rifle butts against the door. A blondish man, in wife-beater and Nike sweats, opened up. Jay-Z bellowed in the background. Hello brooklyn how you doin... Rubbing pink-rimmed eyes, the individual emitted a dry-throated cough, sneezed, then coughed again.

"Bayreuth Boy Beardman Man of the People Friend of the Community?" shouted Elite Agent Austerlitz into the individual's startled face. Imma be your man you could be my lady... A single nod, and the individual was promptly tackled to the floor, dragged across the parquet, and pinned to the sofa. And drive my car and drive me crazy...

So Sayeth Bayreuth Boy

First of all, he did not drive like a lunatic. He would never drive like a lunatic when driving a car that is not his own, nor with me in the passenger seat for the first time. 

Okaaaaaay...

Secondly, he has a stellar sense of humor. Even if a Teuton.

Natch. Would I dare measure the width of his butt otherwise? In inches, at that.

Thirdly, he must actually be Italian. Because half the couple doing all that bacio intenso is he. 

Si, Ragazzo! Certamente!

No Assim(b)ilation Necessary

Last night. Too tired to think to talk to read to write. I climb into bed. Number 6 knitting needles. Skinny white mohair, from the Strickshop on Wörtherstrasse. Cast on. Loops too tight. Unravel 'em. Cast again. Bravo! Second row: Knit two. Purl two. Knit two. Purl two... Wait, how many loops was that? Eins zwei drei vier...

It's not until I reach 21 that I realize I've been counting in German. All along.

This morning. Biking to the Oberholz. A small blue car, corner of Linien and Acker. Passenger window unrolls. I brake. A lady, silver-coiffed, leans from the driver's side. "Can you tell me," she asks, "how I get to Auguststrasse?" Next street over, I explain. "Turn links up here, then links again." She thanks me. Jets away.

I re-mount. She thought I belonged. Even better: I knew the way.

Then again. Friday night. Low-key art opening, hot hot hot spot Heidestrasse. Where I once sought, and failed, to find Bayreuth Boy. This time I am on his arm. Here to meet Yogi D., his best and oldest Kumpel.

Unassembled furniture, Saran-wrapped. Badminton courts, painted half-size onto concrete floor. Wooden posts positioned atop. Nailed to each a decorated drunkard photo, plus matching mathematical triangles, windshield wipers, the like.

The art is by an Englishman in a red plaid shirt. I do not understand. But I do like Yogi D.

He is a sculptor. A vegetarian. A yogi. Gaze steady. Hair dark and wavy. Reaches to the chin. 

Sculptor J. is also in attendance. Another vegetarian. Far less hair, though. He drinks a VitaCola. Koffein Kick! trills the label. The other option: Weizen beer. I refrain from either. "Worried about calories?" teases Sculptor J. "No," I say. "Caffeine." He gets it. On the night in which I did not find Bayreuth Boy, Sculptor J. drank ten Vitas in a row. He bounced till morning. Slept two hours. Woke still whirling.  Later I learn that he is sober. Then I get it.

Day 1

Of working on the memoir. My real job in Berlin, after all.

Meaning a quieter, though not quite slumbering, blog.

Still, I promise to keep 'em coming. There are stories to tell, of four-month-old twins and anti-FDA Wutanfàlle and GDR massages for a mere 16 Euro. Not to mention a vodka-steeped party complete with fox-fur photo shoot, free Ramen noodles, the Gauloise-devouring Felix (one of whose Gauloise, I confess, I devoured), odd inquiries of me ("Excuse me, are you Italian or Bulgarian?"), and very many people younger than I. Including a hot blond Bayreuthian whose hands kept palming the curves my new wrap dress...

Oh, but let's save it for another day.

Ex-Pat Drug Moll Panics in Frankfurt

The L. Glutamine was not to blame. This time I packed pills. And not in my carry-on.

Gate A17. Waiting for connecting flight to Berlin. Nursing my first Cola Zero in five days. I stood amidst a swarm of German business commuters. But the faces I saw:

Rosemary. Constance. Silke. Sally. Josee. Beth. Alison. Heather.

It was impossible that next Saturday, at the appointed hour, I would not trade in hugs on 99th and Broadway (at least seven, maybe fifteen).

That I would not wedge myself between elbows at the Metro Diner. Announce to the waiter: "Cobb salad, please. No onions, no bacon, no corn. Lemon slices on the side. And a mug of hot water." That the waiter would not nod, unfazed, for, after all, he hears it every week (and I smile so sweet when I say it).

That Rosemary and I would not stroll languidly down Broadway, end up on her sofa, watch something Netflixed, something DVRed, order sushi in. That I would not number-9 it home, climb the steps at State and 3rd, hear Cleo mewling at the clunk of my Fryes.

That the New York me was no longer mine.

I pictured the apartment I was returning to. So vast. So devoid of my stuff. And entirely cat-less.

My breath caught. Who do I know in Berlin? What in the world do I do there?

Wow, That Sucked (Flashback, Part II)

Continued from Part I

The last weekend of September, Berlin is overrun by art openings. The famous Art Forum Berlin hosts hundreds of international galleries while spin-off art fairs, like Berliner Liste and Preview at Tempelhof Airport, show cutting-edgier artists.

I, however, had an insider tip. For Katrinka and me, only the hottest of the hot would do: Heidestrasse am Hamburger Bahnhof, opening night. Contributors included Künstlergruppe Artists Anonymous (not that arts anonymous) and a gallery called Haunch of Venison.

We figured: Contemporary Art Fête = Doll-it-up Opp. However: Bitter Weather + Shrunken Wardrobe = Creativity of the Essence.

Thus, Lilan's Outfit = (Katrinka's Sexy Black Dress) / hidden under (Old Black Cardigan + Jeans Jacket + Green Silk Scarf) – anti-sexiness % (Fat Frye Boots).

And Katrinka's Outfit =  (Sexy Diane Von Furstenburg Knock-off) / hidden under (Khaki Trenchcoat) – anti-sexiness % (Black Ankle Boots + Lilan's White Tights + Fingerless Purple Gloves)

But we figured, this is Berlin. So: Alien Outfits = Hot-to-Trot.

Next came: Dark, deserted march from S-Bahn along Heidestrasse. Katrinka, flu-afflicted, hobbling on rubber heels. Me, uncertain, turning into gas stations and furniture-store lots ("There's a light! That must be it!).

Finally, we saw people. A courtyard. A tiny door. We opened it. Ice-walled hallway, blaring bright. We passed into a room. Dim, stickig. We sank into sand, black. Techno pounded. Bare-chested men carried trays. Their shoulders sprouted white furry wings.

We figured: We are here.

Wow, That Sucked (Flashback, Part I)

Let us return to Katrinka's visit. The weekend. I had high hopes. Astrology Zone had predicted big Love for Sagittarius. When the stars talk nice like that, I tend to listen.

I told you about Friday, The Ancient Mariner. I did not tell you about after.

I wanted to catch sight of the cast. Katrinka wasn't feeling well. She stood near the front doors, while I hung back. I wouldn't make her wait long, but one cherub-faced guitarist deserved a glance. The towering piano player wasn't so bad either. Danes, you know.

I lingered near the bar. Bought a CD. Only not to look aimless. The cast trickled into the lobby. I recognized the sax-player. Hair shoe-polish black. Greased part, waves splayed left and right. A voluminous nose.

I sidled up. "Hey," I said. "You were great as The Hermit."

"Why, thanks."

"You must have visited some Baptist churches to get that so right." The Hermit as revivalist preacher—a slight divergence from Colderidge's verse.

"I'm American," he said.

"Not Danish!"

"I did time in Texas."

"No wonder."

"Originally I'm from..." He blathered. I spaced. The Piano Player wandered over.

"But you are Danish?" I asked.

Indeed. "Did you like the show?" He looked down upon me from great heights.

"Loved it!"

Complaints Department

"Tech Geek? That's all I get?" Adam is not pleased. He claims he knew what that router on my living room floor could do. He assumed I already had wireless. This jettisons him far past yut old Dirk in the tech-archy. But, Adam, I am sorry. Steve is 25 years your senior, trades in government secrets, and wears nothing but Polo. He rules the Heavens. You: Junior Tech God. Plus: Maker of  psycho UK chili. "Nice," says Adam bitterly.

"What's with 'well-worn'?" asks David. "Why not go all the way? Haggard. Or, hell, skeletal?" Would Jeremy so mind the adjective I granted his face had not buddy David seized upon it as a means of best friend mockery? "I meant, it was a face that had lived," I try to explain. "Leathery?" David smirks. "No!" I say. "Just, no longer the face of a high school boy." David chortles. Jeremy shrugs, wordless. And me — stricken.

"I prefer to think I am an 'intellectual-cum-slacker,''" says the slacker-cum-intellectual the next time I run into him.

Sigh.

This is the problem with using each person you encounter as blog fodder and simultaneously urging said people to log on in the interest of building readership. Alienation? Swift and certain. Similarly, this need of mine to tear into Berliner behavior, then hand my URL to the very Berliners I'd do well not to offend. Friendless I'd be, no doubt, were the Deutsch not possessed of a good-humored masochistic streak. Borne, I assume, from so dark a national history.

Some, of course, shall never see this blog. My subletter F., poor girl. R O S E M A R I E. As for the rest: Rosa. The Moms. Steve. Now's your chance. All dissatisfactions taken into account.

What's that you say?

Rosa can't yet read (certainly not in English)... Steve is train-bound between Berlin and Brussels... The Moms is lying, bikini'd, on an unwired Florida beach...

No kidding.

Ahem..

A West Villager Weighs In (or, Exhibit A)

"I thought it was me!" moaned K2.

Last Friday, lunch. Schwarzwaldstuben on Tucholskystrasse. The sun beat on our backs. A pile of cheese-baked Spätzle on K2's plate. The best Wienerschnitzel in the world on mine.

"I made a couple dates before I came," said K2. He was wearing a shimmery lilac shirt. Tight black pants. "You know, online sex dates."

I did not know, but I understood.

"So I meet one guy at a bar, and I'm telling you, it's totally platonic. We're talking, like getting-to-know-you talk...like friends." K2 shook his head. I'd met K2 once before, at a party thrown by my friend K1. Guests tested strangely brewed beers (chocolate, anyone?); K2 and I lounged on the floor, debating the virtues of Trader Joe's vs. Whole Foods. This Berlin trip, he told me, had been funded by the money he'd saved shopping at the former.

"I went to this club," he continued. "No one was dancing. Everyone's just standing around the edges. What am I going to do? Jump in the middle and dance by myself?"

"Weird," I concurred.

"The only one who talked to me was a Trannie. Well, Trannies have a thing for me..."

My New Friend

His name is Adam. He comes from England. Every day he sits at wooden table in the non-smoking section of St. Oberholz.

Sometimes he leaves his table. He claps his Vaio shut, jams it under his arm, and heads downstairs. He orders the Spaghetti dish of the day. Or a second Milchkaffee. Then, back up the stairs he climbs, laptop laid flat, dishes and cups balanced on its gray cover.

Wednesday I sat at a wooden table in the non-smoking section, too (funny, the number of Americans you find there). I peered over the balcony. There was Adam at the counter, Vaio gripped tight. He looked up. "Someone told me you could actually open this thing." "No kidding?!" I said. He began to prize his fingers beneath the lid. "It's more than just a tray!" He was delighted. "My God," I said. "What a find! What's that thing worth?"

Adam has good reason to hold his Vaio close. His livelihood is programming. The code he writes pays his rent and U-bahn card. "I'm a tech geek," he confessed, sheepish. "A tech geek," I assured him, "belongs to the highest echelons of friends one can have." He brightened: "...because we are so...?" "Essential to have around!" I finished. He darkened. "Brilliant," he said.

The Third Prophet

I'm so happy! I went to Prolog today and it was good.

No, the teacher was not a handsome male college professor in her mid-40s. She did NOT treat me like something special. I was not The Star. It appears I was too hard on myself in my previous post. It's not ego strokes I needed, but brain stimulation.

Today I did not (re)learn baby words I used to know, but vast Lego-like words I've never even seen (Wiedergutmachungsleistungen,* anyone?). In class we discussed not the first-day rituals of young schoolchildren, but the punishment of juvenile offenders in the German justice system. My homework is to research the Strafmündigkeit (age of criminal responsibility) in the U.S. and present two arguments for, two against. In Deutsch, so help me God.

The class was eight ladies, primarily francophone Swiss chicks. A 25-year-old lawyer sat to my left. Scarlet-haired Alice, lobes multi-hooped, lumbered in late (and promised to sell me her bicycle cheap). I recognized Naomi, a Brit with wavy lips, from the day my parents and I came by (she lives on my street, we discovered; she told me how to cut commute-time from one hour to three-quarters. "And ring my bell anytime!").

An unflappable Spaniard was, happily, my age. She told of asking her roommate for a piece of gum. "Yolanda, why?" he stuttered. "Because I want it!" "No," he said, "you don't." "Yes," she said, "right now!" "No!" She had, it turns out, truncated the correct word "Kaugummi" (literally, chew-rubber), asking for "Gummi" instead (got it?). Then she launched into another story, about telling a friend, "ich komme zu dir" (I'll come to you/your place). A simple error in prepositions ("ich komme bei dir") and her friend quickly protested: "No, Yoland, you don't mean that." "Of course, I do. Ich komme bei dir." "No, really..." (Read: I come due to you. Yes, that kind of come).

Our teacher quickly steered the conversation elsewhere.

I signed up for three weeks of daily three-hour Unterricht. Optional: Monday-night movies, Tuesday-night Stammtisch, Wednesday museum trips, and all-day Saturday outings. This weekend it's off to Leipzig.

It was enough to make me want to hunt down Aliou and get him to sign up.

Speaking of Aliou, I didn't give the boy fair play in that other post. A week ago Tuesday, for two whole hours, he was my friend.

To Quote an Anonymous Source:

"I'm afraid your mom is right about German men. I used to think it was just me. They're not much good at flirting... And then they get all angsty about their low birthrate!"

That's right. Nary a catcall but the ladies are to blame.

Wait a second, I just realized: Both the men my mother married (the best-forgotten Ronnie, #1; and my own keeper of a Pops, #2) are American. Tito's even 50 percent Italian.

And she tries to sell me on Deutschy asexuality?

Good thing I didn't come here for love because —  Excuse me, interruption...

I'm back, and I kid you NOT: A guy perched next to me at St. Oberholz just asked me for my number. Distressed leather jacket. Silver stud above his chin. Writing a philosophy doctorate. Grade A slacker-cum-intellectual. Even smokes the cigarettes to prove it.

Now ask me his nationality. Go ahead.

AMERICAN, baby, don't you know it.

I was jonesing for even just a wink from someone. God bless the U. S. of A.

I Miss Vincenzo

Late nights I look for him on the U5.

Oh, where have you gone, my Sicilian Arctic Monkey man?

The white dog comes to Captain Soda after dark.

He licks my palm.

His owners smoke a hooka pipe.

His name is Tony, they say.

Encounter #1

Late Monday night. U5 to Samariterstrasse.

A posse of Italian alterna-punks boards: Tipsy and delighted with themselves.  An explosion of laughter and curses on a mute German train.

A scrawny fellow — long nose, mop of black curls — sings I know not what. I can't not smile. He catches my eye. "Do you know Arctic Monkeys?" Delicious accented English. Every syllable rolls upward.

"No."

"You must download! Song: 'Flop.' Like — " he tilts forward, catches himself on the silver poles.

"Okay, 'Flop'!" I laugh. "Are they American? The Arctic Monkeys?"

He furrows his brow. His glasses are rimless rectangles. "No..." His friend jumps in: "Sheffield!"

"Ah, Scottish."

We are nearing Samariterstrasse. "Here I must go," he tells me dolefully.

"But me too — this is my stop." And I follow the tumbling boys onto the platform, up the stairs to the street. I walk away.

"Stella!" cries Flop-boy after me.

My Mother Says I Should Have a Baby in Berlin

Just because the Kinder clothes are so darn cute.

She has a point.

All the other ladies are doing it. You should see Prenzlauer Berg — pop-out bellies and old-style prams thrust down cobblestone streets. Toy stores everywhere. Worse than Park Slope. For untold reasons, the neighborhood has the fastest-growing number of children under 3 in Berlin. Compare the fecund birth rate — 2.1 kids per woman — to Germany's steeply declining one: 1.36.*

I can see the appeal. It's a district full of trendy cafes and shops along with plenty of green space. You get the perks of city living plus the kind of play space and Kinder-care the U.S. usually reserves for its suburbs.

Should I get busy? I really really really DO want a baby. Never been a question. Just, um, maybe not this second...?

Also, it would be nice to have a man attached. Not necessary. But.