"Hier sitze ich, ich kann nicht anders!"

 

Und schon seit 29 Jahren! Wie schnell die Zeit vergangen ist! Für zwanzig Jahre war mein Motto "Die ganze Welt mein Arbeitsfeld" gewesen. Jetzt ist es "Hier sitze ich, ich kann nicht anders!"

Vielleicht liegt es am Altwerden oder daran daß ich jetzt viel zu viel Kram am Hals habe um alles je wieder einzupacken und wegzuziehen.

Übrigens kannst Du "Riverbend" ganz kurz am Punkt 2:15 sehen, mußst aber aufpassen denn es ist nur so am unteren Rand des Bildes zu sehen. Vielleicht setze ich solch eine 'drone' auf meinen Wunschzettel fürs nächste Weihnachten und mach dann meine eigenen Aufnahmen im nächsten Jahr. Bis dann!

Googlemap Riverbend

 

My personal library

My Ian Grindrod Memorial Library

 

According to Cicero, if you have a library and a garden, you have everything you need. While one might argue that there are some more prosaic needs that must be satisfied before either a library or a garden becomes a top priority, I do appreciate Cicero’s sentiment.

 

And I know I’m not alone with my idea of the library itself: that wild, sprawling and chaotic – or, perhaps, methodical, logical and organised – thing that emerges through the accumulation of books over time.

Part of the value of a personal library lies in the way it can map and help to shape your personal identity and intellectual pathways, changing and growing with you, getting larger all the time while at the same time more selective – a tiny droplet in a seemingly limitless world of books.

Libraries have a habit of growing a bit wild over time but that's all right, too: a library should be a little bit chaotic and contradictory, although it can also become a burden. That’s why it makes sense to periodically give some thought to which books you really want to carry with you through life’s journey. Like a garden, a library will tend to grow richer through strategic pruning, a process which I have not yet arrived at.

Is ONE library enough? OF COURSE NOT! But I leave that for another day!

Googlemap Riverbend

 

Gorillas in the Mist

 

How do I spend a rainy day by the river while Padma is hitting the high notes with the Eurobodalla Country Music and Social Club at the Nelligen Hall? I put the lunch she has prepared for me into the microwave to heat up, then settle back to watch "Gorillas in the Mist" --- and promptly forget to eat my lunch.

 

 

The movie "Gorillas in the Mist" is the inspiring, true story of Dian Fossey whose life ended too soon but whose life's work has endured. In the book by the same title, published two years before her murder in 1985 by unknown assailants, she tells of her thirteen years in the remote African rain forest of Rwanda with the greatest of the great apes.

Do yourself a favour: forget about your lunch and watch this story of an extraordinary woman whose work with Mountain Gorillas in Congo, and subsequently Rwanda, quite possibly saved these beautiful creatures from extinction. Sigourney Weaver is simply superb as Fossey, portraying her hard work and gradual decline into insanity with that touch that only a few actresses possess. Her chemistry with co-star Bryan Brown adds to the feel of the film, but the film's true stars are the gorillas.

 

 

In watching this film, you feel you're witnessing something truly great.

Googlemap Riverbend

 

The treacherous “if only” mind that haunts us all

 

Before Time forecloses all possibilities, as Time always ultimately does, I for just one more time want to break out from this tedium of life-as-it-is, to shake off the shackles that remind me of who I am, to shed the self my friends know me by, and to dissolve my identity in strange new places amongst anonymous strangers.

Losing myself in order to finding myself! The word "lost" comes from the old Norse word los, meaning the disbanding of an army, and this origin suggests soldiers falling out of formation to go home, a truce with the wide world. Many people never disband their armies, never go beyond what they know. These days, even children seldom roam, even in the safest places. Because of their parents' fear of the monstrous things that might happen, the wonderful things that would happen as a matter of course are stripped away from them. My unbridled childhood roaming developed my self-reliance, a sense of adventure, imagination, a will to explore, to be able to get a little lost and then find my way back again.

A very long time ago, close on thirty years now, before I got "settled" (?) here at "Riverbend", I would've bought myself a ticket to a new place long before I even had time to formulate these thoughts, so as to lose myself in new places amongst different people, perhaps even in new countries amongst different races, in order to find myself again.

This wanting and waiting for something in life starts innocently enough - awaiting my birthday (which was never celebrated), the new bicycle (which I never got), awaiting the school year to end, or to begin (which was the situation with me; I told you I was a bit weird, didn't I?); then the waiting for the BIG breaks, the first love, the first job, then the next, bigger, job, always going through life expecting the next moment to contain what this one does not. To complete this life-as-it-could-have-been, I want to break out one more time before I run out of Time.

And so we - it's no longer a simple "I" but a more complicated "we" - have decided to put "Riverbend" on the market next year, buy a small EURO-caravan and a decent-sized car to tow it with, and go TRAVELLING NORTH, just like in David Williamson's play which ends differently from the movie - and more appropriately, I think - with Saul asking Frances, "Do you think you will go back down to your family?", and Frances replying, "No, I think somehow that I'll go travelling further north."

Googlemap Riverbend

 

Mein Leben im Lied

 

Hannes Wader, "Heute hier morgen dort"

 

Heute hier, morgen dort, bin kaum da, muss ich fort Hab mich niemals deswegen beklagt Hab es selbst so gewählt, nie die Jahre gezählt Nie nach Gestern und Morgen gefragt Manchmal träume ich schwer und dann denk ich es wär Zeit zu bleiben und nun was ganz andres zu tun So vergeht Jahr um Jahr und es ist mir längst klar Dass nichts bleibt, dass nichts bleibt, wie es war Dass man mich kaum vermisst, schon nach Tagen vergisst Wenn ich längst wieder anderswo bin Stört und kümmert mich nicht, vielleicht bleibt mein Gesicht Doch dem Ein' oder Andern im Sinn Manchmal träume ich schwer, und dann denk ich es wär Zeit zu bleiben und nun was ganz andres zu tun So vergeht Jahr um Jahr und es ist mir längst klar Dass nichts bleibt, dass nichts bleibt, wie es war Fragt mich einer, warum ich so bin, bleib ich stumm Denn die Antwort darauf fällt mir schwer Denn was neu ist, wird alt, und was gestern noch galt Stimmt schon heut oder morgen nicht mehr Manchmal träume ich schwer und dann denk ich es wär Zeit zu bleiben und nun was ganz andres zu tun So vergeht Jahr um Jahr und es ist mir längst klar Dass nichts bleibt, dass nichts bleibt, wie es war