wishful thinking

it would be so nice to travel to a place in europe where germans didnt make all that terrible mess during WW2... but i guess it's impossible, so i will have to get used to the knot in my stomach which is bound to form each time i read through a travel guide.

And there shall be jazz

or at least this is my plan after yesterday's success in improvising with piano and violin together with my cousin. I always wanted to try this but never could work up the confidence (especially not in public) as my very classical music education formed a safe but rather rigid corset to my experiments. And with improvisations... what if in the middle of performing you suddenly loose each other, the harmony, or the idea?!? what a terrifying idea! but - as so often in life, it does take surprisingly little for ending up in entirely new waters. and, consequently, once you end in there you have only two options - to sink or to swim... we opted for the latter and the result was simply fascinating! (probably more so for the two of us performing, as we had never before given it a try... what a mistake! ;) therefore, I have decided to try myself taking some more steps in that direction. if anyone of you has a good recommendation or tip for how to proceed, they would be appreciated very much.

The first steps

for my resocializing at my home are made.. in fact, it seemed to be surprisingly easy as two happy celebrations brought together a lot of people which I hadn't seen in a long time. It was a nice surprise though, that my four years of absence had a noticeable effect on the way the interaction between these people and me. When I left, with most of them (being younger friends of my parents) conversations only consisted in querying me about my where- and whatabouts but never I felt in the position to ask them personal things about themselves. In the end, who was I, being this dwarf that easily could have been their daughter?
Now I feel that my travelling and living abroad and on my own has given me quite some insights and ideas (of course not enough, so I will keep searching) and suddenly it has become possible to dive into the most interesting discussions with these people that have already so much more experience in life. Funnily enough, it even seems possible to tell them something new, so both parts win from the situation. As I was used to be unable to contribute, it is strange but very satisfying to not only draw from but also feed into that well of knowledge ;)