anniversaries, labyrinths, and sun

Here I am cooking out with friends and doing a German beer commercial...

The church last week for the golden wedding anniversary...

And the car for the couple - 50 years of bliss...

And I have also found time to enjoy "my" lake and get some sun....

Here comes a long-overdue bog post. I have been very active lately – in a healthy and responsible sense, of course. Sebastian, my roommate, is in Cologne for an internship with the American football team there, so I have a “storm-free” (German saying) apartment, but I don’t like life alone, so I get more active. Many things have been on the burners. With an April more like July, I have decked the balconies out for Summer with flowers and plants. Then I have been to two discos (you say “clubs” in the states) – one called the TV Club – a student disco which features low prices – 1.50 Euros for a half liter beer, and 3 Euros cover charge – not bad, and the DJ was good that night. Then a few weeks later a friend invited me to go with him to the Buddha Art Gallery – an upscale disco in the city center. This was a special disco night; it was a quarterly Leipzig Gay Night – a disco evening especially – but not exclusively – for gays. The crowd was mostly gay – mostly males with some lesbians and a good sprinkling of some impressive transvestites moving through the crowd. And there were also a number of hetero couples enjoying dancing too. My friend came upon VIP tickets for free for us, so we had access to VIP areas and we got a free cocktail also. Pretty neat, huh?!

In consideration of some of my Texan readers, a short excursion is fitting here. This was a surprisingly positive experience in a jam-packed big disco – four floors with several dance floors, disco balls, strobe lights, fog machines, the works, all like a labyrinth. But more importantly, we must remember that in Europe – in Germany – the Nazi regime tried to annihilate not only Jews, but also Gypsies, the handicapped, the elderly, and otherwise “un-useful” people, and homosexuals belonged to this list. As a result, society here deals with racial and gender orientation issues from a very different historical perspective. So efforts to open up to any groups marginalized historically or otherwise are often more focused and intense here than in some other places, since the air is still thick with the burdens of the past over here. So, whatever your personal convictions might be, a society cannot allow itself to ignore, marginalize, or discriminate against groups that have been the object of wholesale genocide or annihilation attempts. Such a society has no right to claim membership in a culture that would claim to be Christian.

But back to my life. This past weekend I was at a golden wedding anniversary in Brandenburg, so I sang a solo at a church service, and we ate and ate – lunch, coffee and cake – lots of really fine cakes!! Then we had supper, and then talked and talked. Then I spent the rest of the weekend visiting friends in Pirna and then a friend in Leipzig.

Next weekend I am away again for a Jugendweihe – the East Germany equivalent of confirmation for those of no faith. So, more eating, drinking, and talking is on the way, and even some disco dancing. Then, on Pentecost weekend, I am visiting Sebastian in Cologne. I have never been to Cologne, so I ma really looking forward to this time with him. And I miss Sebastian. He is one of the best and most loyal friends of my life, so it will be nice to see him again.

After that I will be back home for a while, and we will be in June. Let the summer come…