Lisbeth & Dresden: 22 & 23

The wedding took place in a rural town outside of Dresden called Lisbeth. The weather smiled on us, and I grabbed some sad bitter water at the train station, on the way to the old-timey bus. A green and white bus that had a massive stick-shift system specially chartered for the occasion. Cows passed us as we rode into the countryside 

The wedding was sweet. I am finding it a bit hard to write about it though: I think weddings are so thoroughly planned, both meticulously orchestrated and intimate affairs, that it's hard to know what to write. There were multiple parts. First we mingled. Instead of alcohol to smooth over the fact that most of us are strangers, were given bingo cards with facts like "has hiked a glacier" (my brother) or "has run a marathon" as a kind of get-to-know each other icebreaker. Then the ceremony itself, 49 people in attendance including the bride and groom, all of us sitting near a grove of birches. Bianca's sister officiated the wedding, and the groom's vows were blown away by the wind so we couldn't hear them. Afterward, he said it's because he spoke from the heart rather than doing a performance. More mingling, this time with sushi, and photos with the hired photographer. Then cakes! About 9 cakes. Yosef and I took half slices and then split those to maximize the experience. 

I slipped away at some point and Bianca's aunt made me a cup of tea while we chatted. She is a live wire that left an impression on a lot of the younger crowd, thinking about what it means to keep up that kind of vitality into later years. This was the first moment I went off script: unplanned tea with the aunt, with allusions to history and politics. Then we funneled back to the dinner buffet (honestly maybe the best meal we had while traveling?) - food, wine, more chatter, a photobooth and dancing. When we rode back on the train back to Dresden, very tired, and me and two other women discussed predicaments of the heart. The second off-script conversation, after all the planned events, and a more intimate moment there too. 

The next day Yosef and I, again, struggled to wake up. We had our breakfast at home, got Vietnamese food at Codo - Yosef got beer, I got dark liquid poured over ice and sweetened condensed milk. Then we met the rest of the wedding attendees for a historic scavenger hunt arrange by Bianca's sister. I managed to eek in a few exchanges with Bianca - the bride and groom are always so busy on their wedding day, all of us vying for their attention.

We reconvened at Eiscafe Venezia for dessert, then some of us broke off. Beer, Little India (food was good here, the owner seemed very committed to making us happy, too) in an artsier part of Dresden. And thus concluded our final full day in Dresden. 

Kefir and Muesli

I will later perhaps try and make sense of my abrupt return here.

Later, too, I will outline in greater detail the actual details of my trip, which spanned Dresden, Prague, and Berlin. 

But right now I am trying to grasp the things that I gained from my vacation: long walks, kefir in the morning, good meals out, art museums, my traveling companion (my brother, a month shy of 25, who requested we spend most of the time speaking Russian, which we did until we got to Berlin), writing, photography, seeing friends I hadn't seen in a decade or so, meeting strangers, coffee, beer, taking in the streets...hoping to hold onto these things and bring them home. 

Kefir was easy to arrange, the muesli slightly less easy but I was able to create an approximation of my own. The American cereal aisle is dessert for breakfast: from unabashedly candy-flavored, to sugar-coated raisins feigning a balanced start to the day. I was able to find something with flakes and granola to mix in with oats, flax, and hemp. Blackberries were more affordable this grocery trip than they usually are, and the nectarines were on sale. I don't think about the cost of fruit when traveling. Red and Black currant was in season and readily available in Europe. It is such a rarity in the US, especially since black current was illegal for almost a century and continues to be highly regulated as a crop. And so, I can recreate the breakfast Yosef and I had every day in Europe. We had carried a bag of muesli we got in Dresden to Prague and then back up to Berlin, eating exactly one bag between the two of us during the whole trip, and drinking through a box of English Breakfast tea. It is hotter in Chicago than it was in Europe, so here I have been brewing a large amount of chai and sticking it in the fridge for iced chai in the morning.

I realize, dear reader, this is a very literal way to try and capture a vacation to extend it into “regular” life. I do believe though, that some of our life is informed by the ways in which we follow day-to-day actions. And there may be something to be learned from observing what one does when plucked from those rhythms which we neglect to otherwise examine. Some of the ways in which we are in life will not be shaken when we travel, no matter what we hope, sure, but I found more affirmations than disappointments.

Many of the things I did differently were less ... self-indulgent? hedonistic? in nature, than one might expect. These terms have baggage – Protestant ethic morality versus Pagan debauchery comes to mind. But here in 2023: when tired at the end of a long week, I am more likely to fall into watching a show or YouTube endlessly, and sometimes believe that if given the opportunity to exist without responsibilities, this is the sad place I would find myself. And perhaps, sometimes, that is true. But not always. What I am thinking of is Pleasure Paradox/Hedonistic Treadmill. (My father texted me on the trip asking if these terms were mainstream – I said I don’t know, and that I am not a good measure of what is mainstream knowledge in psychology.) I was surprised how much I wanted to do things, even the things that are not the most direct path the pleasure. 

Yes of course some combination of vacation-magic and necessity meant eating out for most of our meals, and this is not something I want to or can do otherwise, though about half of these meals were very enjoyable. At the same time, it seems I found more energy to do the work of finding slower burning contentment, which has been evading me lately. I remember last time I was in Berlin I felt inspired to stop eating meat again - I had started eating it again at the end of my first year of college, feeling unable to push back on the chaotic selection at the college dining hall. But I felt inspired again in Berlin - found the energy to pursue this small bit of idealism after a year break. I continue this way still, eating meat about once a year, the rest of the time automatically defaulting to the way I have eaten since I was 14. Two of the most recent carnivorous instances in the past two years were on this vacation, in Prague, when I found myself sprung out of rhythms. I see a lot online about motivation versus discipline, but personally, life would be easier if I had a better practiced thoughtlessness. Good habits have always felt like the slipperiest of eels thrashing out of my grip.

My tomato plants which had started to carry green berries when I flew out are now holding ripe tomatoes. I made my first harvest on Friday, drizzled with balsamic vinegar and mixed in with burrata cheese which I shared with a studio friend before we went to a small gallery near me. Two small rooms, a stream of people going in and out, it was free. Art museums are harder to arrange at home. They are certainly one of the planned indulgences of travel. We bought three-day art tickets in Berlin, and saw art in every city. But at home, as large as the Art Institute in Chicago is - and it is, it is massive - I have many of the rooms memorized by now. Perhaps next time I will return with a sketchbook. Do a better job of tracking down smaller galleries – and so on.  

I read half of Erwin Mortiers Shutterspeed on my flight back, and finished it my first day home, with a slow realization that I must have already read it, possibly all the way through, when I purchased it - I think in 2015 on a trip to NYC. The graphics on the cover are perhaps, then, more memorable than the text itself. Regardless of my enjoyment of the novel, the act of reading was less laborious than it has been of late. 

I have walked at least four miles every day since returning to Chicago but want to learn to run - time saving relative to walking for a couple hours, some flexibility to do it in the morning before it gets too hot after the effects of my jetlag run out. Yesterday it was raining but I still went, after an apartment viewing fell through, to watch the waves of Lake Michigan crash into the rocks and cement steps that make up the lakeshore. I thought: if I take in Chicago as if it is a new city to me, or a city I love, perhaps living here will be easier. I am good at appreciating the alleyways, the graffiti, the light, but sometimes Chicago feels gray and desolate, its industrial roots mean occasional vacant stretches within the city itself, breaking up life. My experience here, too, is broken up by the plague, the often fleeting or superficial social connections of grad school, and my own personal upheavals. I am trying - started to before I left - to have a true Chicago summer. Everybody here says summer is the best time but I dread the sticky heat. It melts my brain and makes me sick. But I still endeavor to steal some of its spirit for myself; swimming in the lake, attending some of the dozens of farmers markets and festivals that spring up, and eating ice cream. Perhaps these are avenues to fall into conversations with strangers and see the city with new eyes. Bring a camera with me, write about it here. 

 Wish me luck.

Snow Queen

 

The best part about repeating the play I was in during the summer (Snow Queen) during the winter was this:
- I did, I think, do better this time. I also got a lift from rehearsal in a Tesla.
- Waking up the next morning, Veta asleep to one side of me, Liza asleep and snuggled up against my shoulder to the other, Eloosha not yet up in the room across the hall. And then a multi-course breakfast that turned into lunch while we remained seated.

accepted

I wrote this few weeks ago and waited in hopes of getting a very specific photo but alas – here it is anyway.

A few days ago the accepted students swarmed campus, as they do every April. Last year it was on the 20^th, this time a week earlier.

"Do you have a tattoo?" one asked another

"No" said a girl who looked and sounded like she cared and wanted to come off as if she didn't care "but I want to get one"

"I do" said a third, softer looking one "here"

"oh, that's cute, I wanna get..." and then they were out of my range of hearing. I walked on to change for tennis practice.

I remember coming and being so excited. I got a balloon that said "studio art" on it and the campus was (and still is) beautiful - though now I know that they trim the trees and plant fresh flowers and finally finish up renovations started months ago in time for the horde to look.

I gave a girl and her mother directions (or tried, I'm not sure which parking lot they were looking for and the one they described physically could not exist) and remembered asking for direction and someone telling me "past the chapel" and thinking but all three of those buildings look like chapels. The first one is a chapel, the second is Bard Hall, the oldest building on campus, and the third is a fancy grave I think, still not sure.

The food they gave us was the least impressive of the schools I looked at, and so my Papa's theory started: that Bard wants to push you out the physical realm by giving us shitty food, so that we focus on our intellectual and spiritual development, outside the body (he jests; we drink and smoke to compensate). I thought the girls dressed so pretty and daring. I wanted to read. Dance. Love. I wanted everything though technically I was still considering Umass Amherst and Clark.

Even as I remember these things, it's hard to know how it really was. What is it like to look at this campus with fresh eyes? How do we look to them? At this point I am: the trees, the winter-bleached grass, the cigarette butts, the bandannas tied around mason jars filled with tea or coffee. My face has changed so have my thoughts my dress my heart. I am: the buildings I lived in and the hours I spent, the broken glass by the waterfall, the faces which I have looked at but never spoken to. On Thursdays and Tuesdays, I get off the shuttle and go to the library to make myself tea and get my notebook for class. As I exit on my way to Olin LC, I pass a boy on the stairs with a wide angular pale face and dark hair and a beige backpack. As I walk on the path, I pass another boy who's tanner and with lighter hair, who looks at me intently. I come too early – before the previous class is out – and drink my tea on a couch outside the classroom. I saw one reading the newspaper the other day. I saw the other at the library. We do not know each other but we are a metronome keeping the beat for the orchestral campus.* All this I will carry with me when I leave. I hope my best years are still ahead of me, but I am grateful that I was accepted, I am grateful that I came.

*the saddest part is that I haven't seen either of these boys since I wrote this. devastated.

Pursuing Forsythia

The following is a piece I wrote at this time freshman year, and edited a tiny bit just now. It's quite strange to see where I was emotionally (in a way that I didn't not communicate here) and what I was thinking about. Probably more interesting to me than to anyone else, but somehow it seems appropriate to put it here now that I'm in the last stretch of my undergraduate education.

Removed.

“Clair, I don’t think you’re drunk” says Marie, yawning – her knees bent and feet bouncing her little body up and down before she plops down on Andrew’s bed next to me and sips some more yellow orange juice and rum. I doubt that she should be drinking anymore. Marie is on her computer and on occasion rocks towards me, the frame of her computer nearly bumping into the rim of mine.

I’m sober and thus isolated, uselessly. Isolation does not create the craze that is romanticized as a byproduct of productivity. (Imagine: a thin man locked up in his room for nights on end, composing his final masterpiece. Imagine another: cooped up in the middle of the woods, tapping into his brilliant mind away from the humbug of his fellow human. Not fellows at all!).

It is like a normal night, all of us in one room. But their minds are clouded gray. Isolation does not create independence. I almost wish I was drunk with them, silly (or that they were sober), but I had been writing and then I came, and they were already inebriated. I wish that I didn’t care.

Only very few people can be independent; it is a prerogative of the strong. Yes, I am dependent on society—is that weakness? Is enjoying companionship, preferring companionship—weakness? Is to feel lonely in a group of friends removed by a few glasses of diluted yellowish liquid—weakness?

And does it impede one’s ability to produce?

Leaning, swaying, smiling, giggling, and then dancing: just the two of them, in the middle of the room.

***

Removed.

My face is covered in the thin sheen of sweat, my breath is audible.

Hot air in and out of my lungs.

I feel almost lighter, perversely, melodramatically. My eyes feel lively, darting around.

It’s death I tell myself. Death. Just death? Death (panic).

Easter. I saw it and at first I thought the deer’s head had been ripped off. Then I realized it was its tail, white fluff. Cold, wet, its long neck swung over a rock so I couldn’t see the head at all. I raised my hand urgently, pointing at it and giving a panicked looked at Emily who as scrambling onto the other side of the road: away from it as I walked towards it, its large body cold, wet, four legs jutting out of a large brown gray body. I looked at her walking away and followed. It was raining. I imagine its eyes, rising it from the dead.

I can feel my sweat now that it’s growing cold against my skin. We walked up the path towards the water processing plants, yellow forsythia in full bloom. I remembered that I hid in them one time in middle school, because I didn’t want to walk back home yet. I came up towards it and smelled the bright yellow flowers, grayed by the cloud light and rain, the water dripping onto my face. Emily was standing making a face with large eyes, trying to look vacant and dead. It seemed like one of those moments when one tries to arrange ones facial expression to how it should look, and more effort goes into that than actually feeling. She stood. I stopped smelling the flowers, feeling that perhaps I should also make a dead face. We walked to the dorm. The tree branches let through water droplets, there were deer hoof prints in the gray mud.

On campus there were people; a violinist was practicing above in one of the dorm rooms made of cinderblocks, a boy skateboarding by. I let her go in front of me to open the door to our dorm and didn’t (couldn’t) respond when someone in the common room said hi. Neither of us could. We walked up to our rooms silently. I put down the empty 40 bottle I had fetched out the Hudson and took off my coat and sweater and looked at my face, still covered in the thin sheen of sweat.

Death. Just death? Cathartic because it brings my emotions into perspective—they are nothing in comparison, but are also there, solidly expressed in nature. The tips of my fingers feel lively; I write quickly with a tinge of guilt — perhaps my classification of Emily's facial expression as a simulated version of what it should be is simply bitterness on my part…

A knock.

“Come in”

“Okay”

“Is it locked?”

“Yes.”

“One sec…”

I get up and open the door, Emily gives me tea and I say “come in” again, and wave at the room for her to enter. “That was disturbing” she says. Yes, yes it was. Disturbing. I should feel disturbed, which I do, but mostly with myself by this point. My initial reaction had been wrong, morbid even, like one of those old women who attend stranger’s funerals to wail, in hysterics. But then all I could think to do was write.

We make small talk about work, and then about boys.

“I think you should go after your trombone player” she says. I don’t really want to talk about boys, so I shrug. I don’t really have a trombone player either, but I know who she means. “Seriously though. I saw him talking with a girl the other day. She was not pretty at all” because that’s it, right? Beauty—but I don’t want to pursue this conversation, so I just say “He’s always talking to someone. At chamber singing, behind stage, always. In Czech and in English,” I sipped the tea.

“I really think you should.”

“I don’t really feel like pursuing anyone right now. Or anything, really. Just writing and producing art” I say it straight out. My voice isn’t bitter, but it isn’t bright and yellow either, it isn’t forsythia.

“What time is it?” she says, because she has orchestra rehearsal soon, and we haven’t eaten.

“17, do you want to go quickly to dtr?” after 5, that time of day when nothing has yet been done.

“Yes, let me go put on socks” but we have done something, we have seen a dead deer.

***

Removed.

not to be dependent on any person, not even the most beloved-every person is a prison

It seems that isolation is romanticized, that the virtues of writing or painting alone in a room for days straight augmented: that it is only way to go past normal human capacities for productivity, driving oneself to the point of insanity to create. Genius (inspiration, perspiration) is strange, seductive, a person willing to forgo society for creation (isolation)…

I am not alone, lying in the middle of Blithewood at night, a yellow pink light of the road lamps shinning onto a yellow tractor, painting out the yellow tinted leaves against the dark sky. It pushes up against the creamy yellow columns, calm, strong, melting into shadow. Little bugs flying, their transparent gray wings, and another person is with me, typing, sighing at the trouble of work, listening the sound of the waterfall in the distance, its water hushing, hissing, humming. The air is warm and the clouds over the Hudson are gray; the rumble of the cars in the distance, as well as the sounds of people talking, reaches here.

I enjoy the non-silence around me, the yellow lights, and the sound of another person typing by me. But still, something inside me thinks I want…full independence, full non-reliance, an unattainable illusion of strength: this ideal.

The misconception that pure isolation is the perfect form of independence, it plagues…And when independence is attempted by someone who has the right to it, but does not need it, we have proof that this man is probably not only strong, but bold to the point of recklessness

And that (only) this recklessness allows for creation? Only the independent are strong, and that this independence is ultimate, uncompromising?

It is a lie, but I can’t shake it.

she sleeps

There was a dusting of snow today. I was singing Verdi’s Requiem at the time, and now the wind aches against the ears of those outside.

I had ten dreams in two consecutive nights last semester and I wrote them all down.

1) worms from eating seafood coming out of my throat; parasites. This one is clearly influenced by watching the Tin Drum.

2) grandmother dying.  

3) grandfather undead: playing poker with my father and a red-headed mean version of a friend who has played poker in real life.

Last night I was at Hannah’s house. We ate soup and then I decided to treasure hunt in her house. The place has seen many students come through, and many of them have left strange things, beyond the simple furnishings. I found a nice glass jar and three tea pots and a book titled “Is Sex Necessary?” from which we read aloud as we drank tea from a new found teapot, with chocolate and ginger. 

4) a rooster who was harassing me, following me around; literally a cock being a dick.

5) a man who had no reflection and then was a scare crow. When I spoke to him he told me he got into the MIT engineering school, but never had a chance to go because he died. I told him “but you’re aging”; I did not believe spirits could age, and so I knew either I was incorrect, or he was wrong about him being dead.

6) a boy at my college, but he was Georgian instead of Indian. I talked past him to someone else.

Kelsey is coming over in an hour and we will watch The Science of Sleep (2006 USA) upon Zoe’s recommendation. We went to a consignment store that went out of business a few days ago, and now I have two skirts, leggings, a velvet shirt, a a small bag, and a necklace.

7) terrifying physics defying roller coaster with no clear safety measures

8) the dead undertakers traveling through eternity: dead cats

9) a TV series with two female leads. The main character is an uncharismatic and awkward leader, for whom everyone is waiting to fail. And at some point you see her through the eyes of her right-hand woman: Marlin Monroe smoking a cigar.

My housemates have arrived back to our home. I was going to go to NYC again on Wednesday but I felt like I was coming down with something; sleeping for 21 hours over a 48 hour period seems to have successfully mitigated the threat.

10) The merchants. Someone asked “What was here before?” and the merchant said “I don’t know, maybe hot dog stands, we didn’t set anything up” and then I came by and said “before this, Native Americans lived here, but we murdered them”. And then someone tried to destroy my computer data.

soup

After being sick for ten days and feverish for seven health services gave me antibiotics. My friends boycotted movie night, telling me I was too sick to host anything. If only boycotts of vodka and pasta were as effective (and sensible). Instead I watched The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012 USA) alone, drinking tea with clover honey.
Last night Zoë's parents arrived and we made dinner. Jono finally convinced me to watch The Room (2003 USA), allegedly one of the worse movies ever produced.

I had a dream Shimon had been wed when he was four. Three years later, that being now, I was at Yosef's arranged wedding ceremony, held on the rail road tracks cutting through the Hudson River. A thin strip of land surrounded by water, tufts of grass and thin trees growing on it. I did not understand why Yosef was okay with it.

CC 2013

1. It occurred to me that I have spent a week of the summer with these people for 8 of the 9 past years. An imperfect track record of change.
2. We watched the meteor shower the first night. There were too many of us for tranquility but the Milky Way stretched out above and I haven’t seen that many stars in ages. (5 years ago I made a wish on a shooting star and it came true. I haven’t made one since).
3. Only four people in my age group were there the full week. Yulka and Valya had internships, Myron joined the army, Sasha was preparing for his wedding, Liza and Kirill had work. (Who will be here next year?)
4. The last night we were presented with three plays: Alice Through the Looking Glass, The Little Prince, Деревья Умирают Стоя (trees die standing).
5. We sang around the campfire late into the night (пять лет назад когда мы пели «выйду я на поле с конем» Даша сказала Илюши «нет, не любишь»).(five years ago we sang a song which contains the words “I love you Russia” to which Dasha said to Eloosha “no, you don’t”).
6. I watched Shimon for most of the week. He was tense from all the people and ran to me at 2am one night, in his underwear and barefoot. Five minutes after we were in our sleeping bags he was dreaming. 
   
7. 
   I feel no real connection to many people there but this is not surprising; the number hovers around 100. I had an interesting conversation with one adult one night when he drank more than usual. Noma and I named another caterpillar this year. Some conversations did not happen. 
8. Yosef had plans to swim everyday so that he could pass the swim test and join the crew team, but it was too cold to stay in the water for long. He passed the test anyway.
9. Made decorations for the plays, swam and attended the poetry club. Did yoga, worked the dinner-shift, and listened in on conversations. Collected firewood in the middle of the night, drank tea & not tea, celebrated birthdays.

Green Light District

After Brooklyn I went to Jersey City. Louisa and Sasha were hosting a party at their apartment:

Gatsby believed in the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us; we believe in orgies.

Come dressed as your favorite literary character and we'll make the cocktail that best suits you. Dancing the night away required, flawed pursuit of the American dream available upon request. There will also be lots of Kanye on the playlist and Sasha will be dressed as the Mad Hatter, which is a fancy way of saying we're spiking all her tea.

I fell asleep at 5am. In the morning, after some not spiked tea, went back to Manhattan and met with Mama's friend Serge. We ate at the Olive Tree Cafe close to NYU, and then went for a walk, starting with Washington Park. We weaved across Houston street a few times, visiting West Village and East Village walked along St. Marks place, through Alphabet city, SoHo and up on the Highline Park before parting.

 

Baxter State Park 2013

Wednesday after my internship I went to Penn Station and took a bus home. The next day my family and I packed and drove up to Baxter State Park, as we have for years. Since we last went, both Sima and Yosef have grown quite a bit, so the tent is getting a bit tight. But the weather was warm and there were plenty of gnats to go round. We swam, hiked, canoed, and sat around the camp fire drinking tea and fishing mosquitoes out of the soup.

Sima kept telling me the following joke -What do vegetarian zombies say? -What? -GRAAAAAAAINS

punk rock prom

Hannah is walking over to watch "A Bit of Fry & Laurie" skits

“at this point it’s just an excuse to hang out” said Shinno, after we spent a couple hours doing work at the Enchanted Café and managed to each read about a page. Tomorrow Bianca is baking carrot cake. Seniors. Thankfully I did just finish reading the Ethics of Ambiguity (Simone de Beauvoir), and can start my essay tomorrow. 

Yesterday Hannah held another reading, themed 'brevity'. Kelsey and I showed up late; everyone was outside. It had just gotten too dark to read, sitting on blankets with books scattered around them in the grass.  After that we headed down to smog for punk rock prom (Kelsey was my date). I like the way the music reverberated through my bones. I liked how the choice was to stand or to mosh. I liked that instead of not being able to hear properly because of my cold, I couldn’t hear properly because of the ringing in my ears. Later, Kelsey and I drank tea and sang to her guitar. 

I had a dream I was in China, working in a little shop. Shinno was working in a little shop across the street. Then I was walking with an architect and we were discussing how the city would work in times of catastrophe, weather a part of the bridge would keep afloat, if it did how many people it would hold, and if it was close enough for people to swim to. Additionally, I was having a hard time walking, as often happens to me in dreams. The explanation for this was that gravity varied depending on the time of day. It was a little after noon, so it was still quite strong.