I
started this blog a year and a half after I moved here as a forum to present my
musings about life in Germany from the perspective of an American. It became
apparent after a while that such a tenor, as embodied by my former choice in
title, limited the range of topics I could, within the framework of my thematic
choice, reasonably delve into. It has been a while since I last posted anything,
almost a year to be exact. “I just got too busy,” is an easy alibi, but it’s
not that cut and dry.
The truth is that at some point in the recent past I
stopped observing my life through this prism of a foreigner and have
become comfortable here. Although I cannot say in confidence that my
fluency and accuracy are on the same level, my language skills have improved enough. I
can hold my own in conversation, but I am well aware of the fact that my speech
is still lousy with incorrect articles, improper use of verbs, or nouns, prepositions
and adjectives for that matter, and peppered with clumsy yet still
comprehensible (or so I tell myself) constructions. Yet none of that bothers me
anymore.
That being said, I have not completely lost my
Californian core. Take for instance this gorgeous summer weather we have been
enjoying recently. As someone who comes from a place with nearly year-round
sunshine, June and July have been kind of rough times to live here. Last year I
only retrieved the summer clothes out of the basement for my trip home.
In the past, I heard from people that there used to be proper summers with
plenty of warm and sunny days. The first two years I lived here such days were
few and far between, or so it felt to me by comparison. When there were sunny days everyone
would enjoy them, and all you would hear on the streets is “Oh, how lovely is
this weather?” The evening news would start with the anchor saying “Germany
is blooming,” with b roll of kids playing in fountains or splashing in public
pools, dogs panting, smiling groups in sunny beer gardens and of course the obligatory
eating-an-ice-cream-in-the-shade shot. But these days, while treasured by all, seemed
fleeting. By the time you got comfortable with the summer weather, clouds rolled
in and you were back to the status quo.
This year has been different. We’ve
enjoyed a couple weeks now of consistently legitimate summer temperatures. I
get the distinct impression, however, that not everyone is as delighted with
this sunny spell. The fact that there had been no rain for a week didn’t bother
me at all, but when I was at the salon I could hear another patron lamenting
the dryness and uncomfortable heat, and the stylist echoing her opinion even
reassuring her that the forecast predicted rain in the coming days. Or on a
walk in the countryside with a friend and her dog, as we pass another resident
the first words out of his mouth are “It is too hot, right?”
I like the heat. In fact, I think some Germans tend
to play a bit fast and loose with the word “die Hitze,” (the heat). While 30°C (86° F) is balmy, I am
not in any way distressed by it. I’m used to much hotter summer days, and where
I’m from those temperatures have yet to arrive-they’ll surprise you in August
or September when even some Californians begin to tire of the summer sun.
Though it has to be said, the heat here is somehow different. Geography
undoubtedly plays a role (latitude?), but that’s not the point. It’s examples like this, moments where I feel somehow
different from everyone around me, which once seemed ever-present but over time
have become as infrequent as warm and sunny days.
This isn’t to say I don’t still
have such thoughts, or plan to deny indulging myself by writing about them, but
there are other yarns to be spun.
