Trans-form-ation

Hitler built these highways. Some of them still rhythmically bumping against the wheels. I´m waving back and forth into sleep and frightened wake ups. Big blocks of asphalt, one after the other, quick, quick, we gotta build those roads before the war begins.

Then it ended and they bombed Dresden to it´s cores. The church of our lady, stomped into the ground.

Former Eastern Germany still looks the same. Some parts of the roads are new, smooth, a lot of them aren´t. I see the sign with my national socialistic patriotic grandfather´s former hometown rush by. Distand memories of childhood days trickle in, I feel nauseated.

My dad´s tears. For the first time in my life I witnessed those precious pearls dwell up in his eyes. Looking at the church of our lady in pieces, people trying to rebuild, my Dad trying to rebuild himself. Me, small, facing my life, facing history, facing the transformation from a father to a person..

He drives like a motherfucker. Fast. The curves press me into my seat and I sweat secretely behind my Californian sunglasses. Marc Jacobs. Oh Lord.

My dad slapping my leg so hard that it burns. "Don´t fall asleep" he says, "you must keep me up through this ride through the night." The Hitler autobahn rhythmically luring us into sleep. The realm of no thought control. The grey. The imminent. The death. No tomorrow.

There is no limit on the Autobahn. The dude in the backseat sports a bigger-than-Hendrix fro but has a very German smile. Nobody ever asked me a question. Well, the only one being "don´t you want to start smoking again´?"
This is the part I might not like. Which I didn´t like about a lot of people in America either. That no one ever seems to be interested how it is on the other side of the world. Ignorant. Arrogant. Defensive. They assume they know. They don´t. Nobody knows.

Nobody knew what it was like. The pain. The war was over. It was in vain. I don´t know why they did it. There was no thought of tomorrow, only rage, only grief, only sorrow.

Because you will never know until you go.
Damnit.
The Euro-Disco sound sounds refreshing in the beginning, fun, I think, this might be fun. After three hours of the same CD rotating for ever in the very much loathed supermarket-volume I feel vomit mixed into my saliva. I can´t fucking take it no more. I look out and see a wild cloudy sky, tractors mowing gras. Ploughing dark brown earth. Whimsy whamsy trees, polluted, sad. But the green gras, it´s lovely.

My dad sent me a newspaper clip to LA. The church of our lady, rebuilt. The phoenix rising from the ashes. He said, now he´ll keep me up through my night. Be alert, it´s dark but the road, it´s ahead. We´ve only got so much light.

I try to concentrate and be okay with the speed. He is one of those motherfuckers who tailgate you until you give in and make space. It´s a dangereous game if you ask me and I am more than happy to leave as soon as he drops me at the main trainstation. The dude with the fro looks at me as I say good bye, with the weirdest look in his eyes. What´s that? I ask bewildered and he says "you got a safety pin ...uh,...there" Then he jumps out as if to hug me good bye but I´m already gone. Strange. He was so arrogant and defensive in our sparse conversations. Might have been a mask, of course.

People with a past. A burden. A mask. A city with a past. A burden. A mask. A city with a future. Maybe. For me. For us. That´s what it is, in the end, right, a mask. Just.

Gosh. What about the uh, safety pin. It´s for my safety, ha, people like you, duh, who can´t help to try and snatch a peak of my cleavage. Thank you very much for the ride. The wall. The indifference. The hidden voyeuristic peaks from behind that mask.
People, so predictable.

Illusions of safety. I will visit that place. Of transformation. Maybe I´ll cry, just for the sake of it. Just to remember, that my Dad is still alive. To feel as if. There is. A meaning. Behind it all.