About

Supporter of:
ACS and its Network Around the World | Doctors without Borders / Medicins Sans Frontieres | Feed-A-Smile, etc.

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Many things, too many to list 🙂

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Country | Classical | Jazz | Blues | and if it has a good beat, all others

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Not much, it all depends on the circumstances

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– Scriven Treasures
– RFL (ACS) Christmas Expo
– Giving the gift of time | Solid discussions | Dancing in both worlds

{P·a·r·a·d·i·s·e} A state of being within your desires, surrounded by the framework of social norms.Here’s the complete, fully updated piece:

I grew up in Germany, spent decades plotting my escape, executed it brilliantly, saw a considerable chunk of the world, and then decided that what I actually wanted was to be back in Europe. Specifically, back where I started. The Germans have a word for everything, but *Lebensironie* will have to do.

I am, in no particular order: an anal-retentive Germanic woman (the redundancy is intentional), someone who runs her household with unapologetic authority and considerable efficiency, a passionate and entirely “arms-wide-open and chuckling” lover of life and most things in it, a good neighbor between the hours of 10am and 8pm (outside those hours, all bets are off), an explorer with a camera who has been called *annoying* by people who simply were not ready to be documented, a Foodie, a sometimes-Blogger, and a self-appointed authority on virtually everything – should anyone be unwise enough to ask.

On the subject of unapologetic authority: I practice what is known in certain well-organized circles Female Led Relationships. For the uninitiated, this means exactly what it sounds like – I lead, my dancing partner follows, and sometimes a person is, but not always, remarkably happy about this arrangement. It is not, as the internet would have you believe, a lifestyle requiring a dungeon, a wardrobe budget, or a working knowledge of medieval knotwork. What it does require is communication, mutual respect, and a clear understanding of my expectations – because compatibility, it turns out, is everything. The right person does not just accept this dynamic; they thrive in it. Everyone else is always directed to apply elsewhere. The added elegance, of course, is that everyone knows whose opinion counts when it is time to make a decision. Mine. The system works beautifully. I recommend it to anyone with the self-awareness to admit they have been living it informally for years anyway.

I will also note, for the record, that my particular brand of authority does not extend to policing the toilet seat. Some battles are beneath a woman of my stature.

Germany is a beautiful country despite its complicated history – much like most countries, if we are being honest, which Germans generally are, sometimes painfully so. Strip away the global fantasy of Lederhosen-clad locals high-stepping through life with a Bierstein in one hand and an anti-foreigner slogan in the other, and what you find is, predictably, people. People who want what most people want everywhere: shelter, health, food, work, community, decent neighbors, and the occasional beer, though perhaps not from a stein the size of a small child.

Germany is also strikingly diverse, which surprises precisely the people who have never been, and nobody who has.

I am a Bavarian by birth – southern, sunny, smugly separated from the rest of the country. My father, a man of strong geographic convictions, asks on every phone call whether I am still in Germany – by which he means: *am I still on the Bavarian side?* Anything north of that invisible but deeply sacred border is, to him, a foreign country wearing Germany’s coat.

I grew up cheerfully ignorant of all of this and set off to explore the world some time back. Then I returned to Europe. The UK, Prague, Germany. My German is fluent but seasoned with years of *elsewhere*, which means most locals assume I am a very dedicated foreigner who learned excellent German but still cannot quite manage the regional dialect. They are not entirely wrong.

I am also, by local standards, several notches too loud, too friendly, and dangerously prone to hugging after leaving the USA. I since stopped that and embraced handshakes, the cultural custom. Hugs? Not a thing anymore. Some people find this charming and tease me mercilessly, most do not care, a few find it inexcusable.

And so here I am: a foreign-sounding German with a patchwork of customs, an inexhaustible supply of opinions, in a highrise apartment in Munich – in the heart of the city, surrounded by green spaces and diverse neighborhoods, steeped in history, everything within walking distance, and more material between 1st Life & Second Life than any one blog can reasonably contain.

Welcome. Pull up a chair. This should be interesting.