Schmetterlingen

There were butterflies in the hallway today.

It rained everyday last week in Berlin. I held on to my New York warmth for a day or two, but then it got me, this shivering, bone tingling, chill. People here were wondering if it was the end of summer, or the end of the world.

There was no point in even looking at this dissappointing sun and so it was avoided. Like everyone I stayed out all night. Berlin time is essentially New York time, you just slide on over. One gets home at six am, which is midnight back home and then sleeps until two which is eight, normal.

There were rumors all week that summer would come back sometime late Friday. It did. There were so many party opportunities for Saturday it was hard to choose. I went to look for one a DJ friend had organised in Monbijou Park, a little green near Hackesher Markt. They had started playing at noon and had promised to go through the night. The party was held in this swimming park, with a very modern low slung white building and a nice grey plaza. there was green and trees and little candles in paperbags every where. You could see the Ferhnsee Turm between the trees reflecting in the glitter blue of pool. The DJ was playing very cooling summery music. There was a grill and a bar and lots of pretty Berliners. In the distance, down by the river you could hear music and screaming, something wild was going on down there.

I tried to talk to a few people but the atmosphere was too cool, too hip. Finally I went to this one really freaky looking girl covered in tatoos and piercings who nobody else was also talking to. We tried to get the dancing started but nobody joined us. I complained to her that I couldnt find my friends.

"You know, she said, there´s another party going on by the spree, maybe that´s where they are."

I split thinking she might be right. She was. I met Ellen and her friends there on a blanket. There were no bathrooms. There were bottles everywhere. A completely haphazard array of candles. People making out. The wild party. It was free, and all different kinds of people were dancing, dancing very hard by this murky green canal. We made it until dawn, until 5, until 6, until the DJs gave up. This party wasnt getting any smaller, as people left other clubs, it grew and the dancing got harder.

Ellen and I rode bikes home. I slept until two and then fled the city to my friends dacha in Brandenburg. After the train I had to bicycle 24km on bad eastern roads to get there through arbored streets and cobblestone villages. I didnt know the way. I had to ask, but I made it. I went for a swim on a pretty little lake, had a barbecue. Talked, had great inspirations and slept.

The next day we swam again across the lake and back. I made my way to the train, this time on a longer but better route. I rode down the magnificent Karl Marx Allee, the Fernsee Turm again, farther, more silvery, pointing towards the kosmos. I had dinner on Simon Dach Str. In the grimness of the week before it had been empty. Now the cafe tables were full up and down. On a Monday. People were smiling, loosening up, phone numbers were exchanged.

This morning I did the wash. On my way out there were butterflies fluttering in the hallway. Rusty, yellow, black green and brown making it, fufilling it, and then dying on the sunlit windowsills.

Finnally, summer in Berlin

Rene