In Berlin

It is hot and muggy here in Mitte Berlin. I am staying in a lovely penthouse apartment next to the Spree River and the Berliner Oper or something like that, tagging along with Mathias while he attends a two-week certification course at Humboldt University.

The thing that is leaping out at me is the quality and depth of my dreams so far. Jet lag has been tough and I get really tired and droopy in the middle of the day. Yesterday I napped all day long and had tremendous dreams filled with happiness and love. This morning I dreamed of teenagers being harassed in Verdugo Park by terrible policemen, and then it turned into seeing Charlotte and telling her Mathias didn’t know how to express his love well, and then realizing that Mathias didn’t want to express his love well because he knew that they were not the best match for each other.

I guess I was facing my desire to butt in again.

Katie is at home in Glendale, feeding Bowser and preparing to appear at traffic court the last day of July for a speeding ticket. She waffled about joining us here but ultimately it was not meant to be.

A conflict for me about this trip: I feel that I really should visit a concentration camp since I will be teaching Night this year, but I really do not want to do this. I am so resistant to it. Just being here in Berlin at all is kind of horrible. Mandy, who is here to help Kelsey and Silvio find a venue for their wedding next summer, rode on a hop-on hop-off (ho-ho) bus with me, and we saw the bombed out church, and that was plenty. How do I know that wasn’t one of my dad’s bombs? It well could have been.