Stark Corner

• The woman in the bikini
  When I was seven I wrote an illustrated story about a psychotic woman who seduces a man, marries him, bears him children and plays the role of the perfect wife. Her obsession with him grew over the years and he thinks he's in heaven until she decided to kill him one day... all for the money. I wrote dialogs and drew detailed scenes and coloured them in. I was so proud of my creation that I should it to my dad...
  Imagine his face turn from eager to horrified as he flipped the pages... and lay the childishly bound book back down in front of me. Then he said, "...don't you ever write stuff like this again." I took the book, got up and left, and tore it to pieces.
  
   
• The potato
  I was with my family when I was eight, visiting a relative one warm afternoon. We were welcomed into the apartment and sat down on a huge black sofa. There were no cushions or pillows. Just black, waterproof fabric. Our host turned on the fan and said that there will be some food and drinks in a few moments.
  I looked around... what a boring living room. And it stank of sweat, feet and unwashed carpets. There was a little girl, maybe 3 years of age, but I didn't know who she was. She was looking at me, smiling, giggling.
  I started to feel uneasy on the sofa and had the feeling that I had to change positions. I let my hands down to the sides so that I could push myself up, shift, and let myself sink again. And then I felt something wet in my right hand. Something oily.
  It was a piece from a fried potato. I looked away to see if anyone noticed what I noticed. No one.
  Then I looked back at the potato, put my hand over it, and squashed it.

• Kindergarten
  I was six... and loving life as a child in preschool. What I also loved was a friend. She was taller than me and loved to give me a piggyback ride. Maybe she was strong or maybe I must've been too skinny. She let me ride on her back every other day and that entertained me... cheered me up... made me laugh. At first I pretended that she was a cat. And then I started to believe that she was a cat and that it was my first pet ever.

• Rice party
  My sister and I just woke up from an afternoon nap. We were at our grandma's place, in her bedroom. I was six and she was four... we woke up, the afternoon sun seeping through the curtains and the door was closed. No sounds coming from outside.
  I looked around the room and saw a big, red container under a dresser. What's a big red container doing there? Can I open it? I had to try.
  And yes, I opened it and it was full of rice. Maybe 20 kilograms, or more. I ran my fingers over it. Smooth. Interesting. Pretty.
  There was a metal can to scoop the rice out with. I took it and began to scoop rice out of the container and onto the floor.
  My sister watched at first and then walked towards me. Wanted to help. I showed her how it's done and before long we had rice all over the bedroom floor. "Yaaaay!!" I cried as I let myself glide over the floor, which now suddenly felt all grainy, slippery and different. We were laughing, throwing rice into the air and letting it rain over us.
  The door swung open and my aunt, who was still living with my grandma at that time, walked in and her mouth dropped open. "MOMMMMM!!!!" she screamed.

• First kiss
  We were on a roadtrip somewhere in Malaysia. My dad's colleague and his family were also on holiday with us and they had a daughter and a son. Didi and Hisham. Didi, Hisham and I were at the back seat of our car going crazy. Hisham, the youngest and being a boy, couldn't stop fidgeting, changing positions, climbing over us, laughing in our faces, shouting in our ears, and all that stuff.
  "Stop it!" said Didi.
  Hisham reacted... He took Didi's face in his hands and pushed her away. Then he took my face in his hands and planted a huge, wet kiss on my nose and laughed hysterically.
  He was practically eating my face.
  I freaked out and beat the shit out of him.

• Drowning
  My (late) dad and I were in a swimming pool at a resort. I didn't want to play in the kiddie pool, I wanted to be with him, in the deeper part where all the adults are.
  He took me with him and told me to wait while he swims across and back again. He then swam away and I admired his skills. It seemed so easy how he was able to just float and move in water.
  I followed him. I wasn't tall enough to keep my head above water, I had to stand on my toes and stretch my neck. I kept walking towards the direction my dad was swimming in.
  
  And then halfway through the ground under my feet disappeared. There was nothing for me to tip-toe on anymore. I went under and tried to scream. I took a deep breath and water went straight into my lungs.. burning like fire in my chest.
  I saw bubbles made by my frantic struggle and the deep blue colour that was distorted and endless. Every second felt like an eternity.
  
  And then I saw my dad's face appear in this endless blue space and he lifted me out of the water so fast and I desperately took the biggest breath I ever took in my life. I was still screaming, coughing, and water gushed out of my mouth and nose. My chest was still burning.
  My dad sat me down at the pool's edge and said, "I told you to wait."
  "Can you teach me how to swim?" I asked, still gasping for breath. "I want to swim."
  
  A few months later my parents enrolled me into swimming class and for the next 5 years I trained, endured and even learned how to rescue a drowning person. I had thought of becoming a lifeguard... but I just hate being in the sun.

I've been carrying my backpack to school all year until I noticed a few days ago that the logo at the back reads "Insane 4ever".

I had a dream a few nights ago... a really strange dream.
I saw my classmate slit her wrists and bleed.
"What are you doing?" I calmly asked.
She didn't answer.
"That's too much blood, let me help you stop it," I said.
She turned her back on me and said, "Leave me alone."
I took a 6-second moment of stillness. That was not like her.
I stared at the dark, almost black blood seeping out of her corpse-white skin.
And then I woke up.

This was last Wednesday. When I came to school she wasn't there.
I told the others about my dream and they were stunned.
Well....
Until today I can't reach her. None of us could.
I just hope she's alright coz she's been in a lot of stress lately, not only from work but from school and also from the others who sometimes make fun of her because she's overweight and because she admires me in some way... she prefers to sit next to me, be in the same group with me when we have group activities, and sometimes she goes a little bit over the border and does the same things I do... for instance, to the point that she copies from me, gets the same answers I have, gets criticised by the teacher (coz she'd rather copy down stuff instead of trying to figure out stuff herself) and then eventually gets made fun of by the others.

But I... never had a problem with her. I think she's nice and a million times more polite than the other maniacs we see everyday in class.
So... I don't know. It'd be really good though if she shows up for our German paper on Monday.

Update 21.05.2012: Loretta showed up. All is good :)

School organised a football match right after class and it was pretty much chaos in the beginning with last minute planning. I was just a bystander among the others watching them try to get everything in order - who's got cars, who's going to drive 20-25 people so we could get there, who gets to ride with who, and who gets pulled along against their will.
It's amazing.

When they finally got everything under control, some of us still had to wait, including me. I stood in the hallway with my stuff and waited. And then I got hungry so I bought myself some snacks from the vending machine that got emptied out a few days ago because whoever that was supposed to lock it didn't lock it.

Anyway, we all met up at the football field... well, it wasn't really a field. It was just a small boxed-up area in a field with two goal posts. We weren't such a big group anyway.

Some of us played and some of us watched. I watched, but also counted the minutes until I could actually go home. But being home wasn't immediately the best thing ever. I know this feeling of being unable to accept where you are. And no matter where you go, you always want to 'get out of there'... but where else do you go to when you're already home and can't accept being there?

I hated this feeling.

I felt like even after coming home I couldn't sit down and rest. The many things on my to-do-list make so anxious about screwing everything up and being blamed for it.
No rest.
Housework - one thing after the other. This was what my elders raised me into - to prepare for endless chores, to wake up before sunrise, to be a working, moving, undying machine.
Well I cannot.

And this damned sofa...

I sat on it, talked to Michael and cried. Again.
I said why can't I just come home and do nothing? I keep thinking about what to do next. About having enough fresh towels to use, fresh clothes to wear, and about the washing and the cleaning and the hanging and the ironing and the folding.
I have the impression that nothing works in this house without me. And that doesn't help one bit.

Sure, Michael helps too and I'm mega thankful for it each time he does. And I show him too how this and that is being done and he learns. But I also wonder, this is going to take some *real* getting used to. It won't be easy for me, it won't be easy for him.
He was never raised into all this stuff. His mum never showed him how this and that should be done - instead she did everything.

Why do most women just live with this and let future women suffer for it?
Boys shouldn't be raised to think that it's okay to be couch potatoes, to play video games until death do them part, to check out hot chicks, to leave things lying around or to expect everything to drop on their laps or be served on a silver platter!

Women, please also raise your sons with the proper home economics your mothers taught you. There is no shame or problem in that. No man is going to be 'gay' all because he knows how to take care of a household as well as a woman can. He'd be desirable to a great, great, great extent.

This drives me crazy. My parents (and their parents) are into this idea that the woman does it better so she has to keep doing it. But what kind of a dumbass assumption is that? There's a reason why most men can't handle it: it's because they were never taught in the first place. (Who's fault is that again? I hear the voices in my head ask)
And most women like me aren't even asking for too much. We're just asking for a little bit of help. A little support at home. Sharing. Teamwork.

See, I'm not that kind of woman and I hate putting myself into this hyper-motherly role.
Don't my needs need fullfillment too?
It's not like I sit all day at home or anything. I'm busy. I want to live and not work and then do chores the whole day until it's suddenly 10pm and I have to go to bed only to wake up to do the same shit the next day... without having the chance to do what *I* want to do.

I won't be able to sleep again tonight and if I do I'll either have nightmares and wake up with a headache. And I'm supposed to wonder why I get infected by weird illnesses once and awhile... if this keeps going on, my body will give in.

So much light.
It's officially warm in Germany, but not officially summer time yet. But soon.
Leaves are starting to grow, flowers bloom, everything's turning green and blue and golden yellow.
The sun stays a little longer. A little bit longer as the days go by.

And it never fails to ruin my sleeping patterns. This is when it starts again.
I have to keep the light out!

So I went out last Saturday to get some fabric for a quick project - Curtains.

I received a sewing machine a few weeks ago from Micha's mum and put it to use.
I sew these curtains for the bedroom and living room windows, where the sun shines through first thing at 05:00 in the summer mornings.
We wanted the light to stay out and these curtains are now doing a wonderful job.





And since I had some fabric left in the end I also made a set for the bathroom.
Now I have some (darkness) peace while saving a load of money. :)