Adaptations

Shortly after arriving on this off shore shoal in the North Sea, I wrote a post in which I went on and on about the blessings of a strong middle class and how I had miraculously landed in the bosom of one of its last remaining outposts.

Well, I must have been too tired to keep my eyes open and/or my brain sufficiently nourished when I was writing this or maybe I was simply blinded by all the flashy two- seaters speeding past.

While we may indeed live in a middle class neighborhood, everyone around us is trying to be anything but that. Just everywhere else, the middle class is under such pressure it seems that nobody likes to remain in it, if they can help it. People do everything to move up and out before it implodes and all that’s left will be a couple of bent Volvo hubcaps.

And by that I mean virtually anything. At times it borders on the obscene, especially with parents and their children. From day one in a child’s life all energy is spent on positioning her or him for the big run up the ladder.

Local magazines abound in advertisement for elite preschools, extra-curricular this and that, and distinguished ‘independent’ (i.e., private schools) including training sessions on how to get into one of them. And sadly, parents buy into all this (not just the magazines).

They virtually inhale what they hear, see, or read and with it also the smelly old school us-against-them mentality.

I am not much of a flag swinging socialist but this here has the metallic smell of New Age Darwinism. Funny enough, Darwin said that it’s not the strongest or the smartest who will make the cut “but the ones who are most adaptable.”

So, maybe it’s time to relax and wait until the last one drops dead. It’s too bad for the kids, though. But maybe they’ll learn to adapt as well. The question is...to what.

No such thing?

I remember the sensation of surprise and disbelief when my otherwise quite capable English teacher returned to me one of my papers with the remark, “There is no such thing as self-deception!”

In one respect she was, of course, right since the word ‘self-deception’ does not exist in English, but that wasn’t her point.

I had translated the German concept of a so-called ‘life-lie’ (Lebenslüge), as ‘self-deception’ in an effort to describe the human tendency to protect one’s peace of mind in the face of adversity.

My teacher insisted, however, that the word self-deception was illogical because it implies a subject and an object in the same person.

Maybe I would have faired better had I proffered more sophisticated terminology like “delusional disorder” borrowed from the abundant chest of treasures of the human psyche. But I wasn’t looking for the extraordinary. In fact, I was trying to describe a very ordinary state of mind.

In post-Nazi Germany one very common ‘Lebenslüge’ was, “I didn’t know that my neighbor was killed by the Nazis, I just took over his store.”

‘Lebenslügen’ can be inconsequential but sometimes they are outright criminal. Either way they are adopted to avoid unpleasant truths. They make one’s life a little easier. They are a common coping mechanism. But like all lies, they usually come back to haunt us in the end.

To this day, I find that English is just a tad bit poorer (and maybe less honest) for its inability to provide or simply adopt a term like ‘Lebenslüge’.

A person can be self-delusional or she can be in denial but neither expression captures the subtle as well as sinister state of mind implied in the German word ‘Lebenslüge’.

But then, language always changes and so do cultures. ‘Schadenfreude’, a German term describing an equally unattractive human quality (i.e., the rejoicing in someone else’s misfortune), has made it into English almost unscathed.

‘Lebenslüge’ should be a close runner-up. After all, just take a look around, it’s everywhere in this best of all possible worlds.

Have you noticed...?

It takes some people a lifetime to get to know themselves, most need longer.

That'll do

Let’s be honest. We all thrive on positive feedback. A little slap on the back, an encouraging smile, two thumbs up, anything will do to enliven our minds, to quicken our tread, and to render us just a bit more willing.

It is as simple as it is cheap. The need for reassurance is alive and well in us. Like morning sickness it’s not something that ever goes away although we think we have it under control.

In some unhealthy way it probably tabs right into our fear of rejection and imminent abandonment and likely death. And that’s what makes it just as powerful.

Life here in London provides a realistic insight into the power of that ever-lasting craving. People here seem to be mad with ambition. And while some actually get some monetary return for their breathless strive most of the chaps, mates, and blokes, and laddies who make their way into their little back room offices every day do so on little more than the hope that someone (preferably the front room gray back) at the end of a long day might stretch their pinched lips into a smile that says it all: “Well done.”

I hope nobody who actually has the power to bribe with a smile will be reading these lines. In fact, I am quite sure they won’t. But believe me, accolades are far more manipulative than scorn or disinterest. They are the cheap way to assure compliancy.

That’ll do, pig.

bird

now that i have landed
on this tree
its leaves seem to tremble
the boughs are hanging limp
and the trunk is but a twiggy leg

it will be up to me
to find beauty in its subtle curves
and fill the air with bursting strength
to fight the north wind and the heat
and call myself lucky
that i have landed

The Rope's End

Last night I felt like I had reached the other side of death, and I must have looked like it too!!

Zoë gave me that inquisitive two second glance that let me know that she knew. Then she took it one step further by asking about that end of the rope that I keep referring to when the day goes past seven thirty:

“Mom, do you actually get a new rope every day?”