Pinball

After as dreary and dismal a day as yesterday (Christmas) was, today was sunny again and finally the ice is all melted from the sidewalks and streets. I miss the snow, but not its gradual trajectory into frozen death-traps and the inevitable piles of grit. It's particularly treacherous on all the slick granite cobblestones a lot of the paving here comprises. I will hope for more snow this winter; Maggie adores it and I find it so much cheerier than sludge. Besides, it fits my fantasy of winter in Germany.

Watching Maggie in the dog park this evening was like watching a rerun of my own afternoon at the Deutsches Historisches Museum. I finally appreciate what she is up to when she smells bush after bush, digs a little in a mud puddle, wanders over to the fence for a good sniff, moves some sticks around, snuffles under a pile of leaves, and moves on to yet another bush. The bushes all look the same to me, but Maggie knows better.

Today was my first visit to this historical museum. I need some new territory to prowl around and mark as my own, and there is a LOT of acreage at this one. I stayed within the confines of the medieval period, which was all my eyeballs could take in in a two-hour period, and is my favorite, anyway. I snooped happily among the pieces of pottery and woodcut books, avoided the armor for the most part although I was drawn to the paint-encrusted leather battle shields, and bounced like a pinball marble from Cranach portrait to Dürer portrait, back to Cranach, on to a huge carved wedding chest and an Imperial edict of some sort with a fringe of huge wax seals along the bottom. Another Cranach. A gold folding pocket sundial. A Bosch. A Breughel or two. (Some more Baby Jesuses but I didn't have my camera with me.) The place is a wonderland, and beautifully laid out. I will probably have to get a yearlong membership there as well. It would pay for itself in a few short months. Oh, but wait. I don't have a year left here any more. Just 7 months as I will be home by the end of July for my younger daughter's wedding in mid-August. Unless I come back after that for a second year...