Falling Back

Fall again, and feeling winterish with the end of daylight savings time. It's misty, not terribly cold the last few days, and cozily pretty in the way this change of season is each year - the darker days making the inside lights so very inviting, yellow leaves almost unbearably busy on the wet pavement, all of it an inkling that the holidays are coming back for their 58th run at me.

I have been out of school for a week and I miss the daily hours of immersion in the language and my social network, such as it was, not to mention the physical activity of the walks and all the stairs I had to climb to get there. I've maintained one friendship from the class (some of the others had to go back home), but I am now really footloose and completely free here and it's a little disorienting. There is so much to do I don't know where to begin.

I was hoping that making a plan for tackling Berlin would ease my anxiety over the "what DID you do with your year in Berlin?" question that sits so inevitably on my horizon, and to that end I have been making a list of the museums and sights I want to see. There are 178 museums here; I don't want to see them all, thank goodness. I will happily miss sports and medieval torture exhibits, nor am I particularly drawn to the spectacle of German politicians debating - in German - at the Reichstag. (The view from the dome I will take in at some point, but probably not until the weather turns again, which could be another 6 months.) The art and history museums are a must, a few of the stately homes and schlosses, even the Thing Museum (Museum der Dinge), but I put my foot down at the idea of the Currywurst Museum. NOTHING about currywurst is worth preserving. But my plan is beginning to come together so the next challenge will be to get out and actually follow it.

My best friend was here for a week. We did a few museums together when I wasn't in class, and had amusing dinners with our two Berlin children, who are now roommates of a sort. I went to the Berlinische Galerie with two school buddies, went to the International Illustrators Forum on my own this weekend, and have had other amusing dinners with friends at interesting cafes. I have been attending to a few domestic details like purchasing a washing machine and more coat hangers. (Imagine! Having to buy coat hangers! I thought they magically multiplied in your closet. Not so.) I read a lot. I write. I take pictures. I go to flea markets and bookstores. I walk the dog to the dog park every day and explore the neighborhood. Today we went farther afield at the park and discovered another whole huge section of it, much prettier than where we've been hanging out, with ponds and log fences, a Japanese bridge and gong, a fountain, even a restaurant and a sculpture garden. We (well, I at any rate; I don't think the dog noticed) had a great Manet moment, looking across the misty pond in the flat light at a woman in a long pink coat walking under a pale blue umbrella.

And still I worry that I am not doing enough now that class is over. I looked into a weekly life drawing session at a gallery that's still marginally in my neighborhood and will go from time to time. It will be a way to meet some more people and speak some German but it's at night, rarely a good time for me to be working as my eyes give out by then, and more importantly my creative energy takes a nosedive.  The thing to do is to let go of the worry. It's like test anxiety, and I could probably spend the energy more profitably pondering the wonder of being in Berlin at all.