My heart has swelled like a balloon with humbleness. That may sound like an oxymoron but it is how I feel. For I wish to extend my sincere thanks for all of the extremely kind compliments, encouragements and support both in recent emails as well as in comments here. There is still a tiny bit of room left on the table for talk of gratitude, isn’t there? I appreciate it more than you know.
I have said it many times before but it is not a straight line to walk in this expat life. It zigs, it zags, it disappears entirely out from under your tapping feet from time to time. Good then to have others, even in the shadows, hovering with a piece of chalk in hand to sketch a few possible forthcoming steps. One, two, cha-cha-cha.
I thought that this article by Pamela Druckerman in the New York Times did a fine job of capturing the con-man charming conflict that can rise up within even the most well-intentioned of folks living over-seas and while it is written specifically from “an American abroad at Thanksgiving” point of view, I have a notion that it might apply to all of we “lost and found” types. You can find it by clicking here.
I was also quite moved today while listening to the exceptional Krista Tippett’s On Being podcast. This particular interview is with Eve Ensler, a playwright and social activist who is most widely known for “The Vagina Monologues,” a piece that has helped bring awareness about violence to women and girls globally. However, the subject of this podcast is “A second wind in life: Eve Ensler on inhabiting the body after cancer” and it is just as ground-breaking in its perspective towards what is also considered a taboo topic in many societies. For anyone struggling with cancer (or their friends and family members), I cannot recommend it highly enough. But they touch on other ideas that make it worth a listen for the rest of us, such as how our past experiences can take up residence in our body and a gorgeous section on the Nature of Love. You can find the podcast by clicking here.
Which brings me back to where I started. For love is all around, n’est ce pas? In all sorts of different forms and sizes so much that we can miss the forest for the trees because we are too busy searching for a Redwood.
“I believe in you.” It is as simple as that and one of my favorite sentiments. I’ll try to remember, then let that balloon go and watch it rise and rise…
Beep-beep.
Have a lovely weekend.
Hi David, you made a good point there. My english is sometimes too limited to get right to the point. So thank you for the reply.
Best wishes,
Silke
Dear "Silke bauer"…..I'm glad to read that I'm not the only one who was (to use your term) "skeptical" during the initial moments/minutes of that interview. Of course, I was fascinated and moved by Ensler's words/thoughts within ten minutes.
By the end of the interview, it occurred to me that I was runing the risk (at this age) of becoming, if not exactly a lazy critic & listener, a complacent one…..letting critical habits take precedence over critical instincts. As I previously wrote, it's EASY to cariacture Ensler.
I'm glad that you, as I did, kept listening and realized that Ensler is saying and writing important things.
—david terry
While listening to the interview with Eve Ensler I got aware of the scepticism I had in the beginning, keeping for myself the position of the self-conscious western woman formed by the gender theories of the nineties as I realized:
This is not at all about it. She is talking about something much more real and there is no theoretic meta-level I need to uncover and I'd better be listening to it without bias, otherwise I'd miss something important.
And that is about how far ignorance and suppression can go. We all need to refocus sometimes and
open up that window from our "train train quotidien" in order to see the essential things of live.
Et dans ce contexte, les conjugaison des verbes français se transforme en quelquechose de très delicieux (;