Have you ever thought about “love” in tennis? I must admit I haven’t.
And now I have CNN running in the background. A tennis show called “Open Court” is on. And they gave an explanation which made my romantic heart break:
“Love means nothing. It comes from the idea of playing just for the love of it, playing for nothing.”
Love means nothing?????
Last night, I had dinner at my friend’s house. We (Michelle, her daughter Ava (2) and her son Rex (4)) are eating salad and grilled chicken.
At one point, Rex turns to me, holding the greasy chicken leg in front of his face which is totally smeared with brown sauce.
Rex: “Ana, do you have one baby or two?”
Ana: “I don’t have babies”
Rex: “Why?”
Ana: “Because I haven’t found the papa yet”
Michelle: “Rex, will we find a papa for Ana?”
Rex (in a very serious, deep tone): “You need a MAN.”
Little smart ass! (As his mum called him, bitte schön.)
Oh, I am so tired of making excuses!
When I’m thin, I “must take care that I don’t become anorexic”. When I start gaining weight, I’m warned that my “dad’s family tends to be overweight” so I should be careful.
I worked as a manager in telecommunications business and my boyfriend was angry because I was “too concentrated on your career”.
I go to university in my trainers and I’m warned that I should take care “not to become one of those intellectuals who don’t wear make up and only own black clothes.”
Then I hear Alice Schwarzer say “you cannot fight for women’s rights and look girly”. So when I put my beloved dress on I’m scared I look “too much like a doll”.
When I read The Economist and Die Zeit and Spiegel, they say I’m boring. But then I have to feel guilty when once in a while I fetch Gala or Elle.
I have to think about how many men I had sex with. If that number is OK or not. Who cares?
I date a young man and they say “but he’s too young”. When he is muscular, he’s “primitive”. A business man has “not so much in common”. When he is an artist, then he “cannot give me any security”. And then the same people ask me why I’m alone!
When I wear make up, they wonder what I’m hiding. When I war none, they wonder why I don’t take care of myself.
When I show my intelligence I hear that “men don’t like clever women”. When I enjoy shopping with girls they say I “behave like a bimbo”.
When I feel great I hear “you scare men off”. When I feel shit it’s “but men like happy women”.
When I say I practice tai-chi sword, they say “oh you’re the kind of a woman that could kill a man.” When I say I also dance ballet, they ask me if I can do the split. Oh, please!
When I say I want to find the right man and marry him and have kids, they blame me for “clichés”. Because I didn’t yet find the right man and marry and have kids, they wonder “what’s wrong” with me.
When I say I don’t like going to clubs anymore, they say “oh, you got old”. When I had my fringe cut, I was blamed to “look too young”.
They say my breasts are too small, and then they bitch against plastic surgery. They show me porn with all those balloons and wonder why I feel bad because I have none.
When I offer to pay, I feel like a feminist. When I don’t, I feel like a whore.
I was asked in awe “why the hell do you want to do a PhD”? Why not – my both grandfathers had one?
I only see pictures of women with perfect bodies and then they say “but we like women who feel comfortable in their skin.”
When I get excited about politics, they look at me in surprise. Just as they do when I discuss Barangelina’s upcoming divorce.
And now, I have to feel bad about having written all of this. Someone might get something wrong. I’m so sorry.
Three of us eating lunch. Just as we did all those years. Ten or so.
I look at them, I look at the ladies around them and I realise “Hey, they are not girls anymore. We are not girls anymore. We are women.” Our faces are marked. So are our souls.
We used to speak about our latest sex escapades. Now, we speak about the kids, the married lovers and how it feels to get fired.
We used to drink Champagne. When did we switch to lemonade and coffee?
We used to say “Girls, let’s go shopping, I need a new dress for the party on Saturday”. Now we say: “Let’s go shopping, I need a new anti-wrinkle/anti-puffiness cream.”
We used to be loud and laugh and burst with energy. You don’t hear us now. Unless we want you to.
We used to fish condoms or reserve pairs of strings out of our bags and laugh about it loudly. Now it’s a dummy and we smile about it silently.
We used to wear those crazy high-heels. Stylish clothes. Our nails were perfectly done in beautiful colours, always shiny. Now we wear our nails short (but still shiny), our clothes are comfortable, our shoes practical.
But then….
Now, we sit here at peace, like three Buddhas. We are not nervous, hungry, unsatisfied, hysterical, insecure anymore. We are not scared. We know our worth. We’ve learned our lessons. We are fine. And we are aware of it.
My dad complaining against my new bangs (Stirnfransen/siske):
Dad: “I preferred you without bangs. You looked more serious. People look more intelligent when you can see their forehead.” (God woman, you look like a kid now. Grow up finally!)
Me: “Yes, it’s really interesting how people react differently now that I have bangs…” (Yeah dad, but you should see men looking at me since my new hairstyle)
Dad (smiles): ”Yes, men don’t like intelligent women” (Forget it, they’ll keep on running away)
Me, wondering: “Shit, is he reading my mind?”
A strange panic
Of
35
Sounds a lot
But
Without a reason.
This body is beautiful,
Healthy and young.
Many different things have been achieved,
There will be even more.
Enjoyed.
Cried.
Learned.
Created.
Finished.
Wonderful are the people around me,
A net
Made of candy cotton
But
Still strong.
Wonderful is the world
The sun, the sea, the wind,
Animals,
Strawberries and bananas.
Wonderful are the men
Big and strong
Full of desire.
There will be babies and books
And success and fun.
Just fill the heart
With love and happiness.
35 is a lot,
But also little.
35 is simply
Perfect.
A friend’s text message of moral support. You cannot but write books when you have friends like this. I love them.
“…in any case you deserve areal man to come into your life! A reformed asshole! He’s out there somewhere! Busy fucking someone else at the moment, but that’s only cause he hasn’t met you yet!!!”
I am wondering if I am just learning what it is to be a journalist or if am I writing for a wrong newspaper?
I wrote an article about Vienna’s “other foreigners”. Vienna is the city of foreigners. Under “foreigners”, people here understand Turks, Serbs, Croats… What is completely ignored, is that Vienna is one of hubs centres of international organisations. 25 such organisations are based in Vienna. This means between 20,000 and 30,000 foreigners in Vienna who belong to this international community. These people are great for their international touch, for being educated and being experts in their field. This is being recognised through their salaries, their status, their privileges – they don’t pay taxes for instance. They are given a lot. Unfortunately, this community is hermetically closed. Invisible. So I finished my article about them (which I started by saying they are invisible) by saying that this is a pity because they could also give a lot back to Vienna – in just giving it more of the “other” or being more visible. Meaning, making Vienna into a truly international city.
And what did the paper do? Simply cut the ending. So basically, I have an article out there just describing this community. Every high-school kid could have written an article like this.
I complained that not only they took the attitude and the main point out of my article, they cut its ending – it ends too abruptly. The explanation was that my ending was too much of a comment.
My question is: what is the use of journalism if it doesn’t raise questions?
And here a quote of the day:
“Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.” Eleanor Roosevelt.
“I never had a boyfriend in my life and I think it has to do with my car.”
“If I had a nice ride, I think it would completely change my life.”
…as just head on MTV’s Pimp my Ride.
Fuck all those Germany’s Models and Pimp My Rides! How about someone finally makes Pimp my Brain, a show in which the audience will learn that it is not a new ride (OK, maybe, if the ride was 186cm tall, full of muscles, extremely cool and VERY blessed by nature) that will completely change your life – but only your fucking new attitude!?
I am becoming seriously allergic to all this brainwashing.
Michael, we love you!
Friday, June 26th, 2009Michael Jackson is dead. This is officially an end of an era. End of what we have known as true superstars. One of the last of the truly great is gone. Welcome the era of products of market research departments.
He was special. He was unbeatable. He was incredibly talented. In so many ways. He was a fantastic singer. He was a dancer like only Fred Astair was. (There are great dancers, but there are God-chosen dancers. Like Shiva – when they move, the world moves with them). He wrote songs that moved us will always move us. He created ground breaking videos which started a new art form. And he had the “it” – the substance, the presence, the aura, the charisma of the chosen person.
But it was the very same talent, and the sensibility that comes with it, that crashed him. When you do things with your heart, because you simply must do them, because you have been chosen to do them, you are a victim of your own destiny. A superstar like Madonna, who has built her fame and her career on hard work and strong will, has that very same rationality to protect her from the burdens of stardom. A star like Michael Jackson, to whom the glory happened because of his talents, because he was “chosen”, has no tools to fight the negative aspects of stardom.
And there are many. People tend to glorify the idea of being a superstar. You have it all: the money, the fame, the power. The stars will tell us it is not that simple, but the envy will not let us understand. Imagine the amount of energy and essence that just one concert in which you give your whole existence to tens of thousands of people will rob. (And then do it for 44 years.) Imagine trying to keep your inner self intact and trying to build a protective shield between you and the people who believe they have the right to own you and know every cell in you. Imagine always staying alert against people who want to steal a piece of your fortune. Imagine the pressure of always being under public eye, of always having to stay on the top, of never making a mistake, never disappointing all those millions of fans. Money and power is good, but you can keep the fame.
And that is exactly the only thing Michael Jackson had left at the end. The worst of the best. Bankrupted, humiliated, and mentally and physically frail, he only had this fame that wouldn’t have abandoned him, no matter what people accused him for and no matter what a freak he had turned into.
Yes, the freakiness. Jacko the Wacko. But the freakiness is just a part of what he was. He wouldn’t have been Michael Jackson, the unbeatable King of Pop, without the freakiness. If you stand on the stage since the age of four, glorified my masses but also mistreated by people who are closest to you; if you never had a childhood, and never had a person that was truly supporting you through all those incredible things happening with your life; and if you could afford it – well, you had to become a freak. Freakiness was his way of helping himself. An illusion of Neverland, his paradise in which he was safe and happy; an illusion of Batman and Superman, who were his best friends; an illusion that he was – and looked like – an ethereal being like Peter Pan. They were his crooks. And we loved him for them.
Yes, we loved the freak in Michael Jackson. Millions of girls of my generation fell in love with him for this childish, Peter Pan-esque flair that turned him into an androgynous and ageless being. When you dreamt of Michael Jackson at the age of 14, it felt safe, because there was nothing sexual about him. He was not a man. He was a boy. An angel, a cartoon hero, a deity. The love for him was not worldly. There was something pure and ethereal in Michael.
Speaking of which… yes, the unavoidable issue of child-molesting allegations. This absolutely does not matter. We know he was different and we know that in this freaky childishness, he must have approached those kids differently than you would expect a normal man of his age. But we also know that people are greedy and we know that those parents let their kids play with a freak. We will never know the truth about what was going on. Maybe it is better that way. Maybe not.
We will miss Michael Jackson. We will miss his energy, his talent, his moves and his movies. We will miss the freak that he was. Because he was the last of the true, God-made freaks. Welcome to the age of plastic stars with mediocre talents and nothing to give. Welcome to the substance-free era.
We better just BEAT IT!
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