HOW IT ALL STARTED
January 1, 2025
That was it. I`d move again. As I had done 6 times over the last few years. First from Europe to South Africa, then to the States, then back home to take care of my psychologically ill dad, then to another house still under construction, then to a studio; after my dad died by suicide, to a larger place to have space for my stuff from home, then into a cool old house with a weird landlord who kicked be out after two weeks, a friend housed me for a few days, after that a cool house with 2 roommates. I think I have lost count already. This was 8 times, right? Doesn`t matter. I´d have to move again. My roommates did not turn out as charming and easy going as they seemed in the beginning. Or first major disagreement was, as it is so often, over cleaning. They wanted to hire a cleaning lady. I just wanted to do it myself. They even asked me to look for a cleaner, since I knew the market. Oh dear, why would I let someone else clean my home, when I prefer to do it myself? When the activity of cleaning gave me so much peace? It was not for lack of money or necessity, just for my serenity. The only job I could imagine doing during my mourning period. But how do you explain that to an outdoors matcho and a career focused biologist? I could not talk to them about my dad`s suicide either. Their world was just too happy for mine. That is a lame excuse, I know, but that is how I saw it. I liked her though, when I met her first, she introduced me to her pet, a stick insect. As it crawled onto my hand I fell in love with it. They are gentle creatures, related to grasshoppers, just they don`t hop much. They love to eat blackberry leaves, I offered to collect some occasionally. That is how we became friends: me, the stick insect and my new room mate. Somehow, we never grew beyond that. When I offered to clean, it started an entire ethics debate. She argued, she would feel bad if I cleaned the home. But the other roommate makes you a bed from wood, that is ok? She replied, well, that is something else. In order to find out the differences between the two services I started to read all kinds of philosophical text on cleaning and society. I had a few AHA moments. A few months passed and then the final sentence was said, when I decided to move out. Our biologist had accidentally turned pregnant. When she looked at me as if she had not understood it herself yet and said “I am pregnant” I started to laugh. It was just too comical. I was in the larger room, she would need it. And I was not ready to live in a house with a baby. I value silence. These two don’t go together. So I decided to move out. This decision started my writing, because it was just too much for me. I did not have the energy to move again, esp. because I really liked that house. I did not have the energy to beg them to clean, they would not understand. I just want to get on with my live with the little spare energy I had. So I put the extra room on the market, one of the visitors I remember most, was a woman. She was looking for a shared apartment. She told me her husband had recently died. There was so much anger in her voice. When I asked her if her husband had died by suicide, she said yes. I heard it somehow. Suicide causes such a rollercoaster intensity of emotions, anger one of them. She did not take the room, someone else did and I moved out. The entire situation upset me so much that I had to let off steam by writing short stories about my crazy life. This is how I started to write shomoirs.