Berlin or bust

Some days...

Some days Chronic Fatigue feels like this:

 

 

Other days it feels like this:

 

  

 Many days it feels like this:

And every day it feels like this:

(Oops, that's Campbell's!) 

Very Quiet Blog

Very quiet blogger. 

I appear to be indulging in a 14-day jet-lag induced hibernation. And: Reading the Golden Compass voraciously (in German!). Also: Showing multiple, overlapping out-of-towner around Berlin. Not to mention: Scrounging up freelance work for the months to come.

In addition, there's: Bidding adieu to my Croatian literary hot stuff friend, who's zooming off to Siberia for three long weeks (yes, that Siberia). And: Grudgingly removing all flimsy summer dresses from the closet, to be replaced by dark and sturdy winter gear (Brrrrlin). Plus: Getting way too addicted to the time-suck that is Facebook. 

There was also: A haircut. A manicure. A brief shopping spree. 

Oh, and did I mention? I met with the Ex. On a Friday. In the cold. Mauer Park, deserted, by the stone steps.

I was wearing my new, knee-high Frye boots. The dagger fit perfectly. 

My Croatian literary hot-stuff friend showed up later. With the shovel.

We buried his blue Nike jacket and plaid Yankees cap too. Lest any traces be left behind.

That's why she's off to Siberia. And me, to Munich. First flight tomorrow.

If anyone asks, it's: Bayreuth Boy who? 

I take it back

About needing to see the Ex.

Yesterday someone told me of an encounter with him. What he said. How he said it.

Her report was a red-hot branding iron, pressed against my sternum.

I wept, off and on. For hours.

How can I possibly see him. Without bursting into flame?

Quadraplegia, Day 2

It is not the hard drive. It is the motherboard. The friggin' heart and soul of the laptop itself.

I feel legless, armless. I bang my forehead against the keyboard at my local Internet hovel. A sunless hallway, air stained by smoke, and the keys ALL wrong. As German keys insist on being.

I cannot check my emails when I rise. Nor when I retire. Nor the habitual hundred times in between. I cannot SKYPE (no verbal contact with you Amis). I cannot blog (madly) after midnight. Nor texture every at-home hour with iTunes. I cannot download This American Life. Nor Speaking of Faith. Nor Leonard Lopate. I cannot, worst of all, pick at my memoir, juggling this word, serrating that, sliding one sentence up, another one sideways. Nor can I march forward into snow-white pages.

Okay, that last task? Yes. There is such a thing as: fountain pen (lavender ink). And moleskin notebook (college-ruled).

There is such a thing as: Everything happens for a reason. Or at least, the death of a laptop, and the timing of said death, does.

That is what my Serbo-Croatian literary hot stuff friend believes. I don't disagree.

All I've done for five long weeks is shape-shift Chapter Six on-screen. Massage, slice, reorder. A set of scenes that REFUSE a solution. Likely they don't belong at all.

Now? Forced suddenly (unwillingly) free. Nowhere to go but blinking, squinty-eyed into the bright blank glare of Chapter Seven. Do you see how I limp? As if my ankle's still shackled. 

If we are wrong, my friend and I, it hardly matters. Finding a reason for the Sony death, and bewitching it into metaphor, makes you feel better. Which also applies to the men who leave you. And that has to be good enough. Or at least, that's all there is to do.

But let us pause here. For a heartbeat of self-pity. Because:

1. Health busted.
2. Sleep busted.
3. Heart busted.
4. Entire order of the universe busted -- due to BAD news from home.

And now featuring:

5. Laptop (most vital tool I own, more so even than my BabyBliss hairdryer) busted.

The prognosis is bad. The Vaio, purchased as it was in the states, cannot be serviced, nor its motherboard replaced, in Deutschland. Leaving me legless, armless, for quite some time. Also: The warranty ended a year ago. The cost of a new motherboard? Nearly that of a brand-new laptop.

Options: Replace the motherboard on my colicky, sputtery Vaio and risk further breakdowns in a country where it can't be fixed? Purchase a new PC in Germany, where the prices are prohibitve and I don't have the Euros to spare anyways? Buy a new one in the states and hit this snag all over again?

Or...buy a MacBook. In America. For pleasant American prices. With a three-year warranty. Which also counts in Berlin.

Wait. Did I say MacBook? No! I am... I was... I want to be... Eternal PC Devotee. Help!

It's all his fault. He, more enamored of the Apple brand than I am even of my cat. More loyal to it, too. How he cradled that iPhone box. Breath-held, gently lifted the lid. Palmed and fingered each smooth white part. "Even the packaging is flawless," he crooned.

A starry-eyed ad for Apple, he was. A walking rant at Microsoft.

Fiddling with my Vaio, he'd curse: Twelve convoluted steps for a Mac's every one! Blocks against basic user rights! Greed! Corruption! System failures!

He pretty much had a point.

Did you know? Microsoft, too cheap to buy the rights to The World's Best Font (Helvetica), crafted Arial. Oh, tasteless knockoff! Oh, pleather, Stevia, fake Fendi found cheap on Canal Street! Helvetica's letters are wholesome, impeccable, each stroke graceful, each curve solid. Microsoft came and squished and shaved, bullied an entire alphabet off-balance.

For this reason alone I am moved to buy a Mac. And not because the Ex still has my heart.

I swear.

Besides, does Apple still have his?

His iPhone busted as no iPhone's ever s'posed to. A ride in Gauloise-smoking Felix's auto. It slips behind the seat. Or beneath it. Or somewhere. Plastic metal glass in splinters.

Forgive me if I seek the metaphor. Forgive me if I think: My cousin put the iPod idea into his head to begin with, at my birthday party, December 2007. And I'm the one who laid down the dollars (oh, pleasant American prices): Mac store, Union Square, San Francisco. Snuck it through customs, Tegel Airport, right in time for New Year's.

Seven months later, my heart, shattered. Eight months later, the sleek and beveled beauty he would not own were it not for me... 

Well, you get the picture.

Crrrrrrraaaaaaap!

Me, window table, Cafe Sowohlalsauch, Sony Vaio.

Three times in a row I punched the On button. Blue and yellow keyboard lights danced odd flickery dances. The screen? Slept.

I tried again. Soothing three-cord boot-up music sounded. The screen lit up. Hurrah! Promptly faded. So dark, I could not read a thing. I turned it off. And tried again.

The seventh time I pressed the On button: NOTHING. No lights no music no screen. And the eighth. And ninth. And tenth. With battery, without. With power cord, without...

Stone-cold dead. That is what my laptop is.

The Vaio's been colicky and ill-tempered for months. Hot to the touch, blanking out suddenly.

My Serbo-Croation literary hot stuff friend has the same model. And two weeks ago: Exact same problem. Hard drive irretrievable, she was told. Apparently our model contains a drive so poorly situated it cannot NOT overheat. And die. Too soon.

I should be wrecked. Up in arms. Wailing.

I can't seem to manage. A busted heart body home makes a busted hard-drive so much less upsetting.

Also: Last week I re-saved everything on my external hard drive.

Let us be clear: I am not the kind of girl who owns an external hard-drive. I am not the kind of girl who even thinks of it. Supposing I were the kind to think of it, I would put off the buying of it for, oh, seven years.

The only hope for a girl like me is to date a man who says (eyes ripped wide open): "External hard drive!!!" (in German, natch)

No, that's not good enough. The man must bring me, via U-Bahn, all the way to the vast and buzzing techie store on Alexanderplatz. A Saturday, in March. He must, amidst all the whir and neon, locate the correct floor. Find the appropriate aisle. Lift the desired item from the rack. And walk me to the cash register. The paying for it I can do.

Still not enough. Thereafter, he must accompany me back to my sublet. Unpack the item on the dining room table. Plug in the multiple cords that mean nothing to me. And do the downloading. While I hover behind his left shoulder, sort of kind of paying attention.

Today I am calm. Today I have no single chapter of my memoir to mourn. No book outline, no journal entry, no short story, no scanned illo, no tenth resume draft, no old letter, no poem I wrote for my uncle's memorial.

It's all there, in the little black box.

Thus. Let us pause a moment. To thank the Ex.

Yes, Bayreuth Boy, if you are reading this, I mean YOU.

You wouldn't give me your heart. But you gave me that. 

Nothing much could matter more.

He was breathing through the keyhole

He was knocking his brass-knuckled knock.

"Lilan," he called. "Yoo-hoo!"

I ignored him.

When I went out, I saw his footprint on the welcome mat.

He must have lost patience. As men so often do. Yesterday he busted down the door. A single well-aimed kick.

We danced a round in the living room, me and Herr Epstein Barr.

Now I lie flat.

Years ago I invited him in. Years ago, I thought: A man's touch, mere titillation. I did not understand: A single well-aimed kiss, treachery. Years ago, my heart, whole, unjaded. This body still my own.

Now I see. He will come. He will go. He will take you. He will break you. And there is no fighting.

Unsteady earth

I have to find a new apartment and move. Like now.

I have to feed the hungry piggy bank. With freelance work. But how? And where?

I have to bury Him. And beat the Virus. And fall asleep before 4 a.m. One of these friggin' days.

I have to decide: Why. Am I here. In Berlin. At all.

Also: I have to fly to San Francisco. Mom needs me. For reals.

Last Thursday I saw my  holistic healer. I am lost, I said. No solid ground beneath my feet. Nothing in my life not unstable.

She looked at me kindly. She said: It's always most wobbly right before we fly.

Then she handed me two snow-white swan feathers. And sent me on my way.

Eighty-nine Degrees

And I have the chills.

Goosebumps glazed in sweat. Nice.

Mr. Epstein Barr, come a-calling. How I hate him.

So? he says. Lilan dares meet a girl named Juliet late on a Monday night? She dares sip mineral water beside the Spree, on a beach of shipped-in sand, at a club called Kiki Blofeld? She dares take public transport there and back? Hike up platform stairs and down? Transfer from Tram to U-Bahn? I think not.

No matter that Juliet paints 30-foot installations, all muscle and whimsy. No matter that she has a face one wants to frame, cheekbones of an Icelandic princess. And that her father is one of 18 siblings, son of a Mormon in Salt Lake City.

Mr. Epstein Barr does not care.

How shall we off him, this mean old man? How shall we teach him that the sofa is not where I belong? Not now, summer at its keenest, the forging of new friendships vital as breath.

*                 *                  *

Loneliness greets me mornings, bedside. That's my other guest, unwanted, grim as the Reaper. He walks me to the bathroom sink, glowers as I brush and floss, lotion my cheeks and neck. Can it kill you, I wonder each day, loneliness such as this?

I curl black mascara on each lash. I put on a pretty dress. I go out. Red shoes wobble on cobblestones.

My hooded guest clasps my elbow. Think of the Ex, he hisses. Pick the past apart. Why he left. What his words meant. Whether you should have seen it.

With every step, a twist of the mind's kaleidoscope. The pieces of the breakup tumble, re-settle. If I look at it from this angle? From that? Analyze his childhood? My own?

Talk to the Ex, my hooded guest croons. Tell him he's wrong. Tell him he's broken. Expose all the truths he's too blind to see.

I mutter all the way down Ryke Strasse. Planning the inevitable run-in. Words hard. Fiery. Desperate.

I keep thinking these talks will bring me peace. Funny. 

I take myself to Sowohlalsauch. Order bottled water. A decaf. Manage, unexpectedly, to pump out the memoir synopsis I've been putting off for months. I'm giddy with my own productivity. What was it I thought would kill me this morning? How could anything harm me now?

Or: I meet my Serbo-Croatian literary hot-stuff friend at Cafe Gotlob. Her hands tremble. She got an e-mail from the ex. Jesus, I know her pain. Its blood, its pulse point. Precisely. I touch her shoulder. I would cup her heart, twitching like a fallen bird, if I could.

Instead I talk fast, I talk vigorous, I bounce from Paula Fox to my own mother to an American painter named Juliet. Anything. For only in the pauses will she remember, only when I stop to breathe can it ache.

You see. How everything shifts, everything changes. Without even noticing it, I have shaken them off, my hooded guest, my invisible Ex.

They will be back tomorrow. They will be back, even, in a few hours. I will do battle. All over again.

Seething. Knotted.

That is why, I beg you, Mr. Epstein Barr, do not come. Not this month. Two I can wrestle. Three? No.

I don't think so.

Ninety-one Degrees

And there's no such thing as air-conditioning.

I am dying.

My Serbo-Croation literary hot stuff friend and I are quite sure we shall expire on today's fiery pavement. And the men who failed us?

They will be crippled with regret. Forever.

Cool.

Poems I am not allowed to read

...on a hot Saturday afternoon in July.

But so hard not to. For they are Japanese. And very short

I cannot ask you
when, exactly, you plan to leave.
Surely, when you go,
like a single drop of dew,
I will vanish from the world.

--Anonymous

Now the nights grow cold
and cold winds return to howl.
With you gone,
my whole life is torn by winds.
I wonder: Do you sleep alone?

--Anonymous

How long before the missing leaves me? How many more Saturdays: walk into the living room, stop short, a cry ripped from the guts? Hands gripping sofa-back. Because otherwise you might just tip. Over.

It's Carole King who did it. Sometimes I wonder if I'm ever going to make it home again... A CD from friend Maxine. Songs for a busted heart. It's so far and out of sight...

Don't tell me this isn't a death. Don't tell me this hurts less.

He was here. He is gone. I cannot have him back. And whether he was good for me or not: irrelevant.

I will rage until the bitter melts. I will cry until there's no more wet.

And I will love again.

Only now. I cannot yet imagine.

My beautiful Boy.

What the hell am I doing in Berlin?

That was my overriding thought for the duration of the taxi trip from Tegel Airport to Ryke Strasse.

So much for knowing that Berlin is "where I belong."

It was a lot less of a stretch to know that when he-who-I-now-hope-is-wracked-with-pain- daily (yeah-not-very-enlightened-of-me-but-I-just-can't-friggin-help-it) was in the picture.

Today, outside baggage claim, I looked around. There was no one the sight of whom quickens my heart, bubbles my joy to the surface.

I wanted that one person. The one you tell everything to. (Oh my god one passenger collapsed over the Atlantic they called for a doctor in Dutch and the stewardesses sprinted past me I thought he might die but he was okay I had the chicken and the man next to me wore sunglasses for the whole six hours...)

I did solo-battle with my three very heavy black bags (framed art, hammer, wrench, knee-high Frye boots, Phillips screwdriver will do that). I fought my way to the taxi stand.

And you know what?

I was MAD.

Fuming.

Not this again! This "no one to meet the single girl at the airport" life!

I thought: God is a bastard.

I had just spent two hours reading the Tao Te Ching. Which seems not to have helped.

If you realize that all things change,
there is nothing you will try to hold on to.

Also:

If you open yourself to loss,
you are at one with loss
and you can accept it completely.

Oh, shut up.

Fortunately, Dylan came by later. "Let's have dinner!" she said. Saving me from the sinkhole that is my sofa.

She doesn't know what the hell she is doing in Berlin either.

She said, "It is the first time in five years I haven't had a plan."

I said, "Exactly!"

She said, "There is only one thing to do."

I waited, chopsticks poised.

"Wait," she said. "And pray like crazy." She laughed. "I mean, what I'm asking is, What am I supposed to be doing right now?"

"Yes!" I cried.

The Tao says:

Do you have the patience to wait
till your mud settles and the water is clear?
Can you remain unmoving
till the right action arises by itself?

It is helpful to have friends who are as smart as the Tao. The Tao is a good read, but it can't give big hugs. Or join you for Vietnamese down the street. Just when you need it most.

No Exit

Back in New York. And not a moment too soon.

God bless yellow cabs and air-conditioning. Cat calls and roadside marriage proposals. Men who cry "Yanks and Mets suck!" for no particular reason

Also. God bless any city three thousand miles away from heartbreak.

Too bad it doesn't work that way. Too bad he trails me, uninvited, unwelcome.

Berlin's Tegel Airport. Here is where he met me on New Year's. A surprise. That's where he stood, overcoated, winter-pale. Here is where we arrived together from San Francisco. After he'd won over my family. Here is where he was meant to depart for New York next week. Had he not walked away.

Amsterdam Airport. I glance into my new New Yorker. An article on "The Itch." Oh, I think unbidden, he would like to read that. Then It is his hands I see, cracked and chapped, skin peeled back to raw, my own fingers tracing circles on the hot palms, massaging till I break the burn.

I have an aisle seat. 41D. A young couple smooches. I think: Barcelona. Easyjet. Him beside me, at the window. Banging armrests, flinging his seatbelt, a fit of mock panic. "I am flipping out!" I could not stop laughing. I think: Lisbon, Costa Rica, Milano. All the places we planned on. Never got to.

My cheeks are wet. Mascara's fingerprint. Tears all the way through take-off. For yesterday. For tomorrow.

JFK. I met him here in March. An hour too late. I'd tipped a whole bottle of Diet Dr. Pepper into my purse on the way. We rode in circles on the AirTrain, not realizing our mistake.

State Street. I replace the SIM card in my iPhone. He showed me how. He hacked the damn thing. I wouldn't even have one if it weren't for him. And now, the ring that rang, noon evening night, that rhythm of our days, silenced.

It is not bittersweet. It infuriates.

I want him banished from my brain. Excised from my heart. If he were a limb, I would amputate.

He does not deserve the real estate.

And yet. "Remember everything," said Coley.

That's my job. That's my source. How else: create?

Today I'd trade it in. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, thanks very much. Until the stinging stops.

Berlin Voted: Best City for a Broken Heart 2008

Because everyone has time. Or they make it.

And they live very close by.

The breaking of the heart happened a week ago Wednesday. In my living room. He and I, on the green velour sofa. Cleo on the fuzzy rug, wholly unaware how suddenly my life had changed.

The door shut behind him. A thousand heart-shards at my feet. And I was barefoot. I promptly iPhoned everyone.

Dylan said: Where are you now what are you doing come meet me now I'm right around the corner.

My cousin said: Lunch, tomorrow!

Photographer K. said: Oh, Lilan, I'm so so sorry. Call me tonight!

The French waitress cried out: No!

That night, Germany played Turkey. Dylan saved me a seat at Bar Gagarin. We cheered Germany's win with boisterous Casey and another American whose name I don't recall. I ate a salad with salmon. As always. Afterward, Dylan came over. She and I, on the green velour sofa. It was already eleven.

I told her everything that had been said. In detail.

I showed her the swiveling, knotted threads of my mind. The bending and arcing of my thoughts -- Chinese acrobats in every position, from every angle. None made sense. My vertebrae ached.

Did I drive him away? I wanted to know. Am I the girl who bakes the cake on the second date, picks the white dress on the third? Was my love psycho?

No, said Dylan, resolute. You were NOT Crazy Girl.

Thursday, my cousin arrived at my door at 12:45. In her arms an exploding bouquet: fleshy peonies, small white stargazers. She hugged me hard. Tears in her eyes. 

At Bar Gagarin, we downed hot borscht in the sun.

I've been thinking a lot about it, she said. She offered me her theories.

I took a cab to my holistic doctor's. The assistant hovered Chinese charcoal sticks above my navel. She stuck tiny burning cones beside my ankle bones. She placed her palms beneath my sacrum, my lumbar, my shoulder blades. She worked the spot between my eyebrows with her thumb-pads.

Do you want to stay here? she asked when she was done.

Yes, I peeped. All of me small and weepy. The room was smoky. The window wide open. Acupressure books lined the shelves. I lay on the table and let my mind spin. 

An hour later, the doctor popped in. She knew of what had happened. She bent over me, cupped my chin. "I would have wished something so different for you." I began to cry. She said: "You are just right, Lilan, just right." Because she knew what I was searching for. The thing wrong in ME to give the story sense.

My photographer friend K texted me nightly, at midnight: I'm home now, still awake, if you need to talk.

The French waitress called every noon: How are you, Lilanchen? Are you okay?

Friday my new Serbo-Croation literary hot-stuff friend met me for dinner. Tofu in curried coconut. Her hair was yellow, her face a perfect Valentine. We spoke of energies, of psychoanalysis, of mourning the very men who'd seemed most right.

Sunday Philip came from Hannover. We sat in the too-hot sun at Salotto Coffee Bar. He offered his boy perspective.

Tuesday I lay in my bed for hours after waking. The grief was like a canyon, its walls too sharp to scale. The iPhone rang. It was the French Waitress.

What she said was so much less important than that she said it. Afterward, I could leave my mattress. I could wash my hair. I could walk to the Coffee Bar. I could act like a perfectly normal person on a Tuesday in July.

And I could even almost feel it.

Memory's Breath

You wash your hair. You remember how he loved it. Dark and bold, Italian.

You chop garlic. You remember how it was your job, always, to peel the cloves and crush them, when he did the cooking.

You glance at the wrist of a man who sits beside you. You remember his Casio. Silver. So eighties.

You speak to an Englishman at Bar Gagarin. His eyes are kind. You play the movie forward. Impossible. How can the language of love be anything but German? It is meine liebe kleine Lilan you want to hear. And nothing else.

You take his photos from the wall. You delete him from your Facebook friends. You throw away his contact cleanser. You remove him from your SKYPE.

And it does not matter.

He is everywhere.

Every Day Different

Saturday night I was walking to Dylan's. She had invited me to join her and three young Italian friends in the making of summer rolls. She would provide the rice paper and sprouts, the plum sauce and beef-ginger filling. I was the bearer of fresh mint leaves. Essential ingredient.

The air was summer cool. My feet hit the sidewalk, flat-soled ballerinas. I rounded the corner of Stubbenkammer Strasse. Without warning, I felt suddenly, startlingly strong.

I was hollowed out, but grounded. Wrung dry, but clarion.

I thought, A hurricane could come now, could raze the walls of these buildings, red brick could tumble round my ankles. And I would stay standing.

I thought, So this is what this time will make me -- these relentless months, caged by illness, fatigue's breath in my bones, limbs virus-addled, mind a soup, and then, just as I was lifting my head, just as my blood seemed to quicken, the swift-shock loss of love. My best friend my lover my playmate my anchor my sail my soul, gone to me. For good.

Wise, I thought, the trials of my body would make me. Deep, I thought, the flailing of this heart. But strong? That I had not anticipated.

It felt pretty good.

Today I sat before my laptop at Cafe MaiBach. My intention: write a synopsis of the memoir to pitch it to an agent. I was blinking at the screen. There was just No Way. I was the razed buildings. I was the red brick, crumbled and riven. The cry was in my lungs. I gulped down the still water, paid the waitress, hurried into the sun.

I thought, I will lie in the park, I will stare at the clouds, this will calm me.

I found a bench beneath the trees. The sky was pretty blue. The clouds were puffy. The wind was strong, the leaves brushed and jostled -- the shush-shush-shush of soft bodies.

I heard. I saw. I felt. And it did not matter. I was in battle. My mind flinging itself at what my heart can't comprehend. One conversation after another. With him.

The sun vanished, the breeze chilled my skin. I left. Stopped at the bank. Bought cat food.

By the time I reached my flat, the grief had me bunched up, doubled over. Inside out and upside down, dangling by my ankles.

I did not feel strong. Not even a little.

I thought, I can never leave the sofa. I called my mother. "I'm having a" --my voice broke-- "hard day."

Oh, Schatz, she said, I know, I know. I wish I could be there. I wish I could change it.

I said, Life is asking too much of me. I just can't do it.

I cried very hard. I cried very long. I cried until there was no more crying. Until the next hour seemed like it might be livable. Even the next two.

My mother said, Your father, he crossed my path just as my other love was dying, just as I thought there could never be another. What happened to me gives me such hope. I know you can't imagine it now, but...

Also she said, Your heart was big, Schatz. And that is always good.

All Berlin is sad. Not just me.

The Germans made it all the way to the Finale. Along with the Spaniards.

Tonight they played.

My poet friend Dylan and I sat on folding chairs at Bar Gagarin. The game unfolded on the outdoor TV.  Beside us, an Englishman who spoke no German. I ate a salad with salmon.

The Spanish scored early on. The Germans couldn't seem to manage. Every pass they kicked went straight to Spanish cleats.

"No!" we shouted. And: "C'mon!" And: "What was that?" And: "Just one goal, please."

We held out hope till the 93rd minute.

"They really could do it," said Dylan. 

"Tell them that," said the Englishman.

The whistle blew. The boys in white and black clustered, faces ashen.The boys in yellow and red marched their silver Europa Cup around the field.

They sang "We Are the Champions."

Which struck me as excessive.

But they played the better game. That I'll grant them. And Spain hasn't won for 24 years. So if someone was gonna beat Germany, I'm glad they're it.

Berlin is quiet. The bars already empty. The TVs now silenced.

We return to our homes. We return to our beds. Somber. And waiting. For the day the men we believe in live up to our dreams.

If God doesn't give us more than we can handle

Then I am an ox.

I am an elephant.

I am a ten-ton steel girder with kryptonite bolts.

My faith is shattered

I had given it to the Dutch. They were my boys. 

Tonight, in the quarter-finals, they lost to the Russians. The youngest, least experienced of all teams. Three to One.

They played without juice. They played without joy.

The Russians move onto the half-finals. The Dutch are OUT. All together.

Unfathomable. Devastating.

The Gouda-Man weeps. Me too.

Beware the little white pony

If your name is Lilan, that is. Five minutes on its slippery slopey back will knock you flat on your own back within two days.

Or maybe blame Mr. Epstein Barr. Sunday he saw you having fun. So Tuesday he handcuffed you to the sofa. And threw away the key.

Or maybe the little white pony, a former Stasi agent, tipped off Mr. Epstein Barr, a former a high-ranking communist official, both of whom oppose the influx of American ex-pats into formerly East Berlin neighborhoods. Thus the current conspiracy.

Bad, pony, bad!

And she's lying flat

Shit.

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Awareness Day

That would be today.

Seemed worthwhile to mention it.

Would be nicer, actually, not to be aware of it. Nor is there any reason for you to get aware. But should you wanna, or should you, god forbid, need to, CFIDS is a good place to start.

And for the rest of you, three fun facts:

1. Cher has it. Which makes that headdress so much more impressive.

2. Keith Jarrett has it too. Which probably means more to my jazz-smart brother than to me.

3. Laura Hillebrand, author of Seabiscuit, is another. Have you read the essay she wrote for The New Yorker, A Sudden Illness?

So scary. So good. Please do.

Unpleasant, Unbelievable

Sick. Again.

Unpleasant, Unnecessary

Walking over cobblestones in high-heeled peep-toe pumps. In the rain. After dark.

But damn did they look hot.

I Am Not Just Being Lazy

I swear to God.

I try to rouse myself, I try to say, c'mon, let's get you up and at 'em: Clean the clutter off your desk. Knock next door, ask the neighbor if you can do your laundry. Walk to the post office, mail that check. Swing by the health food store, pick up some soy yogurt.

All I manage, however, is to keep lying here, imagining myself doing all the wonderful exciting chores normal people get to do.

Today, finally, I dragged myself outside. I ordered a decaf at the cafe on the corner. I sat for two hours tinkering with my first three memoir chapters through bleary eyes.

I felt shivery and hollow and half-alive. But half is better than none. Good for me! I thought.

My Vaio battery blinked yellow for low. So I clapped it shut and hauled myself to the grocery store across the street. The fun part was buying green food again, after four white-rice-only days.  Still. I walked those aisles with all the charisma of a moldering log. Then I lugged two bagfuls, at my glacial pace, up four flights home.

Harmless enough, you say.

Ha.

A man I know called while I stood in the kitchen. He encouraged me to see a band that's playing the Bang-Bang Club Sunday night. It was a single innocent comment and I proceeded to bawl breathlessly for twenty minutes straight. It was a full-scale meltdown, and he, poor Franconian, bore the brunt.

So you see why I do not leave my bed. On foot, I am a Code Orange day.

The good people of this world have enough to handle without me elevating the threat level every step I take.

God Bless Ira Glass

Today I listened to four hours of This American Life back to back. While on my back. In my pajamas. Palms cupping my tummy.

I have fallen victim to the Norovirus, which is currently razing the city of Berlin. An epidemic, they say.

The Norovirus involves kneecaps that grow very cold and very sore from kneeling on the bathroom's tiled floor in the middle of the night. Also: spew with a force comparable only to scenes from Alien.

The Norovirus is not pleasant. However, it is relatively short-lived. Which makes it preferable to the Epstein-Barr virus, a diagnosis I received last week as one apparent explanation for three weeks' worth of "fatigue" since Barcelona as well as many past weeks' worth of way too much time spent: On my back. In my pajamas. Palms limp at my sides.

Fortunately, I love these pajamas. The butt is all threadbare and saggy. They've got a button-fly crotch. The elastic doesn't pinch anywhere. They used to belong to my brother. I bought them off him at a yard sale years ago. I think he still regrets it.

A pair like these, plus WNYC podcasts: All you need to survive five years of chronic illness.

Oh, and also, people who don't lose patience with you for not getting better.

That kind of matters.

Still Sick

Not kidding.

GRRRR.

Ugh.

I am sick. Sickaroni. Sickorama. Sickalingadingdong.

I should not be surprised. Barcelona involved a lot of walking. A lot more than a toxified body like mine can handle. The Boy and I were hiking them Gaudi hills and scoping them Gaudi towers and perusing them Gaudi homes from sun-up to sundown.

Well, okay, we rarely made it out of the hotel before noon. But still.

So here I lie. Podcasting This American Life. Downloading Cat Power mp3s. Re-watching Motorcycle Diaries (that's Che Guevara dubbed, my friends, in German). And waiting for the Boy to make a delivery of unsweetened soy milk, canned white beans, and a little Franconian lovin'.

I sure can use it. The soy milk, that is.

Before You All Go Thinking...

My life in Berlin is all whiz-bang fireworks and airport smooches (with a few O'Keefe orchids thrown in), let me explain:

1. All my friends are gone. My cousin's in Brazil. The French Waitress is in Paris. Celia went to Switzerland. Dylan to L.A. Isabel's in New Mexico. And Philip, Munich. I have one single playmate.* I think you know his name.

2. The jet lag is killing me. Nausea. Insomnia. Exhaustion. Mild depression.

3. Outside it is so cold I want to cry.

4. Inside it is so cold I want to cry. I am sitting next to the heater wearing: tights, wool pants, wool knee socks, Frye boots, a wool turtleneck, my fattest overcoat. Plus my new hand-knit Alpaca scarf, wound around my throat three times.

Either there is something wrong with the heat, or this is what it means to live in an Altbau (circa 1890), and Berliners are simply tougher than I. Then again, my one single playmate thinks it's intolerable too. His apartment is a fourth the size of mine. With half the charm. But that's where we end up. Lapping up the warmth.

Steps shall be taken: The neighbor's advice shall be solicited. The house manager's expertise requested. A hot water bottle shall be purchased ('cuz my one single playmate told me so).

Now, please excuse me as I crawl beneath the covers to eat my dinner.

Yum.

*What about all them peeps on New Year's Eve? you ask. Technically Bayreuth Boy's peeps, they are. I dare not yet claim Yogi D. Floppy-limbed C. Gauloise-smoking Felix Sculptor J. Crisse Steffi for me and mine.

Germany vs. America, Round One

Last night, over Crazy Orange Chicken, Bayreuth Boy wanted to know the point of the Primaries.

A popular means of nominating the party candidate, I explained. Not that I was exactly sure who voted in these Primaries. Had I ever done so? Was I even allowed?

What, the Boy wanted to know, did the Primaries have to do with the Electoral College?

Nothing, I said. With great certainty.

But how exactly did the Electoral College work? he persisted.

Um, I said.

According to a news report he'd seen the night before, U.S. presidential elections were "an indirect voting process incomprehensible to the country's own populace."

Well, I said, there is a popular vote. And an electoral vote, too. At the same time. Only the second one counts.

The Boy raised his eyebrows.

I'm not defending it, I insisted, and stole some Crazy Orange Chicken sauce off his plate.

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. 

I'm Dreaming of a Black Suitcase....

Oh how joyous the return of the missing blogger should have been. And yet. It could not be. For the no-longer-missing blogger's suitcase promptly went missing the minute she was found.

The suitcase did not appear on the SFO baggage carousel. Nor was there any record of it in Lufthansa's computer tracking system.

Multiple phone calls to multiple baggage-claim hotlines at multiple airports on multiple days at multiple times yielded multiple instances of non-information. When grilled about the suitcase's current location and possible date of delivery, Lufthansa agent Hildegard von Bingen grew huffy. "Eight thousand suitcases have been misplaced in the past two days. Flights are overbooked. Cargo holds have not an inch to spare. What do you want from me!?"

Thus:

The blogger wore blue jeans (extra-wide flair) and Frye boots (weather-beaten) to the annual German-American Bastel gathering in Sebastopol on December 23.

The blogger wore blue jeans and Frye boots to the Heiligabend celebration hosted by the incomparable Mom of blogger in Cow Hollow on December 24.

The blogger wore blue jeans and Frye boots on Christmas Day itself.

These happened to be the same blue jeans and Frye boots that the blogger wore sixteen hours straight on her journey from Berlin to Munich to San Francisco December 22. The jeans were in need of washing before the plane took off. They were paired with a JCrew sweater, the scent of whose armpit seams is best left unimagined.

Fortunately, the aforementioned attire did not prevent the missing blogger from bastelling a most charming pink-haired Hampelmann (captured in the much-anticipated "Hampelmann in the Ghetto" short film, due in theaters February 10); nor from participating in a rousing Kling Gloeckchen sing-along to the accompaniment of her brother's Conga drum. Furthermore, the blogger's outfit, though a resounding Christmas Eve fashion faux pas (consider, in contrast, the burgundy silks and black velvets of her cousin A.), proved no hindrance to the blogger's lighting of candles on the incomparable Mom of blogger's tree. Much to the blogger's dismay, her brother was able, with a single match, to light five candles for her every three. This appears to have nothing to do with the blogger's ripe-smelling clothes. Rather, it is her shoddy hand-eye coordination that is to blame. (Just try telling her that.)

The blogger's missing suitcase did, however, preclude her from:

We Regret to Inform You

That the writer of this blog has been temporarily kidnapped.

No ransom note has been posted.

Suspects include:
victim's own Sony Vaio;
The Holy Madonna herself;
notorious Skate Punk Mac Fanatic Orchid Thief Bayreuth Boy (a.k.a., The Graf).

Please report any shifty activities by said individuals in comments field below.

Sincerely,
Berlin's Online Armed Services Division

It's 4:38 p.m.

Outside my window: sky a shade less than black.

This happens every day.

How can night fall so soon? HOW?

For Anyone Who Might Be Complaining About the Weather Anywhere Other Than Here

Right now it is 2 degrees Celsius in Berlin. Otherwise known as 36 degrees Fahrenheit.

Not that I can feel it, being as I am bound to my bed. But still.

If I went outside, I bet you: The smell of snow.

Beware Yoga

Tuesday, noon. City Yoga, Oranienbürger Strasse. Not a 31.6-kilometer bike ride, I figured. Just yoga. And a one-hour class at that.

By 3 o'clock, my mind had gone hollow. There were e-mails to write, finances to put in order. My eyes would not focus. I was asked questions by a phone operator. The answers were simple. My memory could not find them.

By 5 o'clock, the chills had set in. My body began to weep, quietly. Always the sign. Nevertheless. I left the house. I waited for Bayreuth Boy in front of Zionskirche. I was so mad I began to cry, quietly. I cursed God. The Boy zoomed up on his Trek. He kissed me and I wanted to fall inside his mouth. I wanted the soft hot wet to be everything and this stupid blurry sick to be what isn't real.

We walked through darkened Prenzlauer Berg. He said: "No one here knows you. Yell all you want." I said Fuck Fucking Fucked up ten times. Fortunately he did not seem to mind. "Do you need to pummel someone?" he asked. "I can grab a stranger and hold him down."

Instead I shook my fist into the night. "I am done with this test!" I spat. "What lesson is there left? Patience? I've learned it, dammit!" That made us laugh. Then, however, I snapped at the Boy, about nothing worth snapping, and that was not so funny. Fortunately he forgave me, over Teriyaki chicken and coconut lemongrass soup. Or acted like it.

Today, I slept till 5 p.m. My temples pulse. My hands tremble. I am still mad. It is not Yoga's fault. It is not my fault either. It is Fucking Fucked up Fuck.

I Bought a Bed

So much for traveling light.

Not Dead Yet

But sooooooooooo tired.

Here is the problem with being a blogger who has chronic fatigue. Or whatever it is I have. This is what I do all day:

And really, do you want to read about that?

Sunday

Ächze. Ächze. Ächze.

But at least I have my own apartment to do it in. Chausseestrasse! Hurrah!

Now, excuse me, as I return to Mona Lisa Smiles, in German, 13-inch screen. The movie that takes place at "Vellslee," in case you're wondering.

Today

Moan. Moan. Moan.

No Chance...

Of dragging myself to the airport tomorrow.

The only place my body wants to be is bed. Even last night's dose of Shanghai Surprise proved futile.

Attempting to push the New York flight till next week.

My poor cousin. I'm the guest who never left.

Testing 1 2 3 Testing

Dancing till 3 a.m. was okay.

Biking 31.6 kilometers apparently was not.

Today I am all chills and sweats and useless in bed. Praying this proves a quickie so that I can fly to New York on Wednesday.

The good news: I have an apartment! On second viewing, I decided it is the best apartment in Berlin. Just wait till I show you the pictures.

Not to Worry

The Wow, That Sucked post seems to have triggered the concern of multitudes. Mostly of The Parentals. "You sound so raw and angry," wrote my mother after reading Part I. "What happened? Wasn't the wedding in Bochum good?" My father, who not too long ago didn't even know how to hit Send, shot a late-night flattery-rich missive across the globe.

Adam wanted me to know that he'd spotted Super Grover flying overhead (see photo he snapped below). After crash-landing at the Oberholz, the world's best blue monster informed Adam that no matter how down Lilan feels, he believes she will always pick herself up, brush herself off, and succeed. When Adam asked Super G if he was going to attempt to fly back home, he just looked puzzled and said: "Hell yeah!"

I have never known Super G to say "Hell yeah!" However, I am not one to doubt the words of Junior Tech God Psycho Chili Maker. (For the baffled readers amongst you, the import of Super Grover shall be revealed. Another day.)

Super G or no, the weekend with Katrinka is past. The Curse The Hermit laid lifted within days, when a trio of Oberholz patrons (male persuasion) swarmed my table and, like witches circling their cauldron, reversed the spell.

Not that I am currently thriving. Homelessness does not agree with me. All at ends, loose and frayed. Even the sweet squash that my cousin roasted for dinner, and Nikolai's white-blond head on my arm as I read him Richard Scarry, and the green pencil Rosa thrust at me so that I could help her color are not enough to lace me tight again.

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.

Officially Homeless

As of today.

Thursday I spent six hours cleaning the apartment that I do not like. Six. It is painful enough for me to clean an apartment I do like.

Last May, I stayed at the Marriott with BFF Coley. Day 2, she stood surveying our suite. "Lilan," she said. "You are a study in entropy." "What?!" I cast my eyes on the kitchen table: Keys vitamins receipts water bottles takeout menus clumped into some semblance of order. I had been trying so hard. "You spread out," she continued. Not unkindly. "You just can't help it." I protested: "But!" Then laughed.

Some things are best not denied.

Staying in Borsigstrasse, Katrinka took to calling me "Miss Entropy."

"Chaos Theory," offered Adam. As I tripped on flat sidewalk. Swiped my bowl off his sofa. Turned every TV channel to static. I didn't even tell him about the goat yogurt that burst in my backpack. The jar that rolled from the recycling bag, shattering at my feet. The almond butter that clung like Elmer's glue to the kitchen floor.

Regardless, F.'s flat survived. I washed the linens, mopped the Laminat, even re-taped the doggy-style poster to her bedroom door. As for the cooking pot, that stays.

Friday's Plan: Finish packing. Order taxi. Load trunk with belonging. Unload at cousin's flat (Borsigstrasse). Ride S-Bahn to Hauptbahnhof. Take train to Bochum (in Ruhrgebiet): Wedding of mother's best friend's son. A brother to me.

Friday's Reality: Finished packing. Ordered taxi. Removed keys from key chain. Dragged two suitcases, one backpack, one messenger bag, one purse, one plastic bag full of food to front door. Waited. Peered down street. Waited. Checked Handy time. Waited. Called for taxi: Busy. Waited. Ate a cucumber (=lunch). Waited. Called for taxi. Told: None available.

Waited.

Dragged two suitcases, one backpack, one messenger bag, one purse, one plastic bag full of food to corner. Peered down street for empty cabs: None. Waited. Called for taxi. Told: Five minutes. Dragged two suitcases, one backpack, one messenger bag, one purse, one plastic bag full of food back back to apartment door. Waited. Called cousin's voicemail: Not coming. Will leave belongings at F.'s. Suddenly remembered: No keys.

Cursed.

Maybe He Wasn't Listening

The apartment on Linienstrasse went to another.

If God has a better plan, I am waiting to see it.

Ugh.

So much to tell. So little will to tell it.

Katrinka brought with her a bug from London. Now it is mine.

Even the marrow of my bones is tired...

Bad Is Not Relative

Wednesday, 21:30. Kaffee Burger, Torstrasse 60.

Past the bar, in the back. Red-walled entry. Tall man on a stool.

"Vagina Jones is performing tonight?" I ask.

"Ja."

"Two tickets, please. How much is that? Wait, I have a student pass. Does that count for something? "

"Nee." He shakes his head. Sadly. "Five Euros each."

I turn to Katrinka. "Hope it's worth it."

"Oh, yes," says the tall man, now in English. "Star lineup." Then: "You're not German? I wouldn't have known."

"Ooh!" Katrinka nudges me. "Listen to that!"

I am alight in the dark. "If we kept talking, you would." But he's pretty much made my night.

Through the hall, another bar. Six round tables clumped. A band of four or five. Testing testing testing. Too much bass. African-American guy at the mike. Gray dred-nests. Anthony Baggette, practicing his "energized Jazzoetry" (Ex-Berliner, September 2007). Beside him a younger kid, white sweatsuit. Trying to hip-hop. Their pitches clash.

A grimace is caked to my face. I claw Katrinka's thigh. "We can leave anytime," I hiss.

She nods, bright-eyed. It is the look of one trying to make the best of something bad. "See the ammunition belt that guy is wearing?" She means Stevie Ray Vaughn's Doppelgänger. "It's full of harmonicas. Him I'd like to hear."

Why Didn't She Think of This?

I trust F. will thank me profusely for this enhancement to her bathroom decor.

I Swear to God (this is getting old)

I did NOT mean to shatter the big glass bowl with the pre-fab seashells and the fake blue sand all over the hallway carpet. I was being smart, actually. It had occurred to me: Remove broken bowl from bathroom before a third attack. I plucked the seashells from their blue bed, poured the sand into a pot. Placed the five glass shards (from the first two breakages) into what remained of the bowl. Set it temporarily on a low hallway shelf attached to a wardrobe attached to a mirror attached to hooks from which my jackets and scarves hang. I finished flossing my teeth. Applied Sable eyeliner and pink Eye-bright. Mascara'd my brows. Thought: Shall I wear the green silk scarf today? Grabbed it from the hook. And it caught. And flung. Suddenly: a hundred splinters at my feet.

Why the scarf I purchased in Rome six years ago up and murdered F.'s bowl, I do not know. But I wore it anyway. Evil tasseled tips thrown over the shoulder. Tasteful as ever. Not the slightest bit sorry.

The scarf, that is.

Adam Was Standing in My Kitchen

"Let's pretend we are really positive people," he said. "We can only say what we like about your apartment. When we don't like something, we're just mum."

"Cool," I said.

Adam:

Lilan:

Adam:

Lilan:

Adam: This is an excellent cutting knife. Big. Solid.

Lilan: Yes!

Adam:

Lilan: This bowl is good for a dinner salad. The walls are high enough to hold the lettuce in.

Adam: Ah.

Lilan:

Adam: