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The Great Relief: Return to Sanity in the Oval Office!

sunrise behind cityscape

Finally, a couple of days ago, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have been inaugurated, a combination of sense, reason and humanity, so their actual background let us surmise.

There is sun behind the clouds, more than a glimmer of better things and thoughts to come in one of the most powerful nations of the world today.

And now, inside of days, Biden, Harris and their government already started to retrace steps, to get the ‘ocean liner’ that is called the USA back on the route they always called their ultimate goal: freedom, equality and peace for as many as possible. Not just make the rich even richer.

Yes, Biden and Harris will face the history, and they know it too – the country is divided by trenches almost as in war, due to the completely irresponsible and downright bad messages online and offline Biden’s predecessor delivered until a few ‘minutes’ before his step down from office. Also unprecedented, not being present at the inauguration, which would be called extremely ‘bad form’, at least.

Let us beware, the difficult times are not over yet. Watch out for the forces behind people like Trump: their greed should not be underestimated.

Yet, after years of fear and distress for no reason except an apparent madman in the seat of the president of the US, now comes relief, even if by degrees…

Let’s celebrate!

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The Kingfisher, the Nest and the Perspective – Keeping Busy?

two colourful birds on their perch

Commonly, at least in patriarchal society, rumour has it that men are apt, in long relationships, at least, to become more easily unfaithful than women.

For centuries, women were supposed to do everything they could to prevent that. Even were blamed if a divorce seemed inevitable, as a matter of course. To this day, even latently, women are afraid (some more than others, to be sure) they might lose him; feel compelled to ‘behave’ the way he needs it.

This also to some extent, alas, depends on the manner of independent means they possess: if they are dependent on the man for life support, the power balance is surely tilting to his side.

That is partly the reason why women started getting into ‘business’, taking up a profession: be of independent means so you do not have to ‘sell’ your soul and body to a husband.

Yet, over the centuries and to some extent to this day, it seemed more ‘natural’ for a man, looking at some species of animals too, to have more than one female companion/wife.

The kingfisher seems another of those examples that seem to ‘explain away’ why men are just unfaithful by nature, poor sods, and cannot help it, poor guys…

What if – we changed the perspective on this for a minute?
What if – women (female of the species) are far too busy once the young ones have arrived, with tending the nest and feeding them?
What if – being busy makes (independent) females often be more content with less than one male around?
What if – the male of the species just needs ‘to keep busy’, one way or another?
What if – you sat them plump down in the middle of the nest and let them take care of it?

What if – you take this to the human level – and see where it gets us? Try famous Austrian writer Arthur Schnitzler’s story, called “Traumnovelle”.

Perspective is key, most of the time!
This means: there are facts, pure and sometimes simple – and their interpretation.
Very often facts bear interpretation in more direction than one – or two.

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Democracy in Danger – The “Banality of Evil”

lady justice with books on table

Anyone who has followed the court of law sessions against the criminals responsible for war, torture and death of millions in Germany and Israel after the Third Reich of the Nazis had ended in 1945, knows this title:
it is the title of Hannah Arendt’s clear analysis of what can be so shockingly ‘mundane’. The evil that can be part of mankind, in the guise of everyday people with faces of bookkeepers, such as that of Adolf Eichmann.

Donald Trump these days when talking into the cameras seems dreadfully familiar in his ‘banal’ and complete denial of reality – or sense of responsibility for the community at large.

For many months I refused to write about him anymore, to take any official notice in order to reduce any public effect he craves for with such utter disregard of all that is good or beautiful – or human – or right.

His disregard for law and order in their good sense, for equality or goodness, for better chances for all, and in turn his love for public recognition at any price are shameful to watch in a country such as the USA, who for decades, if not centuries claimed to be saviour of democracy and watcher over the application of human rights around the world.

That Trump still dares to stand in public claiming without showing any remorse or shame that he refuses violence, is only true to  the ‘form’ he has shown ever since he started running for office.

In their Pledge of Allegiance among other things, the US have included the phrase “..and justice for all”.
Let justice be served with all the force the legal system has to offer in the US on Donald Trump, now. It is high time for this impeachment.

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Pippi Longstocking – and Female (Human) Authenticity …

-row-light-bulbs-with-one-different-colour

When I was a girl, the Swedish author Astrid Lindgren’s children’s books where especially well-known and widely read. As a girl you would learn from the series ‘Pippi Longstocking’ with fun and independent thought that being a girl would not necessarily mean being soft or weepy or helpless.

On the contrary: the song that came with the movies I watched long after reading the books, “I make my world just as it pleases me … ”
(my translation from German) encouraged girls to do what men in patriarchal society have done for centuries, if not thousands of years:
set your goals and try to reach them, your way.

Authenticity in Everyday Life – A Challenge?

I heard a TEDx talk the other day by a Harvard Business School professor, about trust and how to build it. She identifies three pillars for building trust, one of them authenticity.

What she goes on to say and what I agree with in every particular is this:

  • Authenticity means: “Be you.”
  • Easy to do, she adds, when you are with people who are like you.
  • But, “being you” can be a challenge, when you are different in some contexts, she adds, too.
  • It can lead to being tempted to subdue and hold back our own true and individual selves in contexts we seem not to fit into completely.

To me that is a very true and a very important statement. I am at odds with my surroundings to some extent, very often: I am not your average girly woman weeping into the silk handkerchief waiting to be rescued.

I was raised on just this idea: be independent and know that the ‘Cinderella complex’  is not just an invention, it’s there. You can prevent it.

Diversity: by Tolerance

I am an M.A. of literature and philosophy, yet I am passionate as well about technical matters, devices, coding, digital technologies, you name it.

As such I have worked around and with scientists as well as developers who in many respects think and live differently.

I love diversity!

But living it in surroundings with all manner of people who are not always sure how to understand you, when you are so ‘different’ to them, compared – is not always easy.

Men, Women…? – People!

I also think that I am not the only person ever to have felt this way:

The duality and conflict can be hard to bear, at times when there is awareness of it:

    • I may be at odds with my surroundings in some contexts.
    • That does not make me ‘wrong’. Just different.

So, how much adaptability is needed – and how much is good for me?

I’m sure that men are often faced with this conflict in the opposite sense: they are supposed to be always strong, superior and ‘ready’ – even if they don’t feel like that – at all…

And ultimately, not only as men and women but just as human beings in different parts of the world: being at odds can become a new but also fruitful feeling to start realizing who you really are.

The strength to ‘be yourself’ in any surroundings sometimes is hard to find; but worth it.

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The Mirror Image Reversed – Focus on Strengths

theater masks

When Dorian Grey in the novel by Oscar Wilde looks into the mirror after having gone through a magical transfomation, he realizes that his painted picture ages. He does not, anymore.

After years of living the life many young men seem to dream about: racy, full of any kind of drunkenness by any kind of substance and any kind of ‘passion’, he still is a respected member of society, not to say upper class of the time in London. After some time people mildly wonder how he can stay young and fresh-faced, as if he was just twenty, but no one really cares to investigate.

At his death by murder, interestingly, he is found some day in the attic of his own house, in front of that omnious picture: only the story’s readers really know that the ugly, wrinkled, red-nosed, middle-aged drunk and libertine is Dorian Grey. After having died his body reveals all the ugliness of his soul: selfish and superficial.

The story is revealing in more senses than one. For me it is an essential ‘image’ of why and how human beings will some day be ‘visited’ with their own sins. By sins I do not mean what the Christian church called them who crudely threatened and especially in former centuries actually held their power over the majority of men and women that way; by making them afraid to ‘veer from the path of righteousness’ and by making out the church was the only hope of redemption, the ‘mass of men’ were held in dependence and fear.

It is the soul and what humans would find in life if they dare: not to go for the apparently big risks – but go for that which is the real path to love and happiness: live it, live peace, live care for others, neighbourly love and peaceful coexistence. And also know that none of us are angelic, while on earth, so have empathy, and remember that you need empathy and sympathy just as much. As human being.

The bible has another fine saying about this principle, yet: “Be as shrewd as snakes, and as innocent as doves.” Which means that you you should look out for yourself, but allow for any misinterpretations, and give yourself and others a chance. At real happiness.

What really makes the soul thrive and glow, is all the love you can find there, and live as much of it as possible.

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Vienna November 2020 – Now, Again, Forever: Peace!

peace dove drawing

The events in Vienna are dreadful and tragic. My heart goes out to all who are affected!

Let’s take care that in everyday life, each day, we know that such deeds never exist in mid-air, unrelated.

(Neighbourly) love, peace and equality are the basic ingredients of a truly peaceful world, some day, hopefully soon.

Self-esteem, appreciation for all around us will help to spread what is good.

And voting for all those politicians, who want better things than just power and money at the expense of many, for the benefit of few. In truth and clear-headed knowledge.

Peace!

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Vienna – A Paradise Lost and Won

I live in Vienna, the city of my childhood joy and adult dreams.
I am not your typical dreamer: I know about people and about life, more than most. I have read a great lot; I have thought a lot. I have worked in many jobs during my studies. I studied literature and culture of the US, UK and Persia. I have read about many more. I have an M.A. to my name.

Yet, Vienna, the long and relaxed cultural tradition of mixed heritage, the faint glimmer of a monarchy that ended a century ago but was hundreds of years in place; the older and newer places in the town and city, the gardens and parks, and last but not at all least, the people:

Vienna is the city where you still feel the pace of a more human speed, as I put it earlier, in German: “where you are – elegantly – never in a real hurry.”

Milton called his epic masterpiece ‘Paradise Lost’. It is based on the Christian religion.

Vienna never was a paradise, if you looked closely enough: it has an old-world charm and flair though that is as unique as that of Paris, France, or that of Prague, Czechia.

Artists, musicians and writers lived and died here. Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn, Strauß, father and son, Schubert and Brahms, to name just a very few, composed world-famous musical pieces, concertos and operas people have listened to and loved (or hated…) for centuries.

I worked in the so-called ‘Wienerwald’ for two years, a region that is surrounding Vienna and is a real forest in many places: the air in Vienna and in that forest is of a certain balmy nature you may feel making you almost dizzy, like a glass of champagne.

I am not exaggerating, if you ever get the chance to come here and are the least bit sensitive to that kind of impression, you will know. And it is that one-glass-of-a-good-wine-feeling, such as wines you find around here in abundance too, not a drunken kind of state, at all.

All this is true. As well as the truth about people, who are often very similarly human inside of a region, a culture – or inside and out of ‘business’. Ideas and points of view are similar.
So, Vienna as well is very human. It’s not a paradise in the fairy-tale sense.

It is a paradise in spite of and because of the slightly frayed seams of its dress.

I love it.

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About Blogs, Texts – and Literary Rules

In literary research and in literature, it is one of the first rules: never assume that author and narrator are one and the same. The same is true for other kinds of texts, whichever they are.

A number of my readers may know this well anyway and take it for granted. Still, I’d like to point this out for all who might not know or be aware of this.

When I write here, about philosophical ideas or life, politics or love – you name it – most of what I write about, as all writers of any genre do and know too, originates in thoughts, very extensive reading throughout a lifetime (in my case), research, online and offline – and observation.

Writing about it does not necessarily mean that someone has seen or done something themselves.
To believe that would be gross, in some cases, but presumptuous at least.

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Peeping Toms – and Marys?


The ‘peeping Tom’ for generations has described aptly what I am about to deal with here: the secretly watching male, who’s too dumb for a vivid imagination and too cheap for spending money on the ‘real thing’:
the male (and female?) person who watches others using any kind of device, in the analogue days telescopes to catch at least glimpses of those others in ‘private states’:
any stage of undress, close encounters of the private and loving kind they miss out on themselves so sadly…

It is sometimes sad, sometimes frustrating, when you feel them about – and often just plain ridiculous and proof of very small minds.

They are not using the – especially these days – ample means and opportunities that often are even sold cheap online; not using the human imagination based perhaps on tales or books or even movies to make their own ‘reality’…

Woody Allen let one of his characters put it nicely in his comedy “Bullets over Broadway”: ‘reality is for those who cannot make their own.’

These days I presume, with so-called – in this respect – equality of the sexes around – women might be ‘peeping’ too; but that is a guess.

Just as in former centuries (married) men used to boast about their ‘adventures’, the nice term ‘swaggering’ makes it even clearer; while women were the ‘true gentlemen’, who relished in silence, even though from necessity rather than want…

To this day, the statistics in these matters especially are hard to determine and not easily published. Not all that is loudest is the most of any kind – or right….

The right to privacy is a human right and apart from an invasion into the privacy of those that are watched, it’s a punishable offence…

Still, all those who read this and start thinking: perhaps new ways can be found, anyway: there are those that seem to be the natural counterpart of peeping Toms or Marys: the exhibitionists…

So, inhibited masses, unite!

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