Countdown To Baby: Falling In Love Made Me Do It!

It’s October 2024: The month I become a mother has arrived. Even writing it is one of those things you plan all your life - maybe - and when it happens it still feels strange. I know in just a few days I will hold my daughter, and it’s the single most beautiful thing I have ever imagined. My biggest hesitation about becoming a mother throughout the years was that I absolutely loved my life, and it seemed foolish to make changes. I lived it alone, never lonely. It made sense to believe this path I was on would make me happy. And, ironically, I was sitting at lunch by myself in a beautiful restaurant, thinking about how amazing life was even without anyone in it besides myself, that I started to talk to a cute guy who would end up making me never be alone again. 

Our first picture together,
don't think we saw this coming.        

Making the baby wasn’t so hard; retrospectively, it felt strangely predetermined. The “crazy part” is that from the moment I started dating Francois, I strongly suspected he would be the father of my children, not my boyfriend - although I wasn’t dead set on having children at all yet. However, the circumstances of our relationship were fairly challenging by nature, and pursuing a family with someone who could easily break your heart wasn’t the easiest task for someone like me who wasn’t super upset about being single in the first place. We also knew that the road to being together in the same city wouldn’t be the most straightforward, so one had to be sure the other was “worth it” fairly quickly. I was - thankfully - forced to make the conscious decision to abandon my solitary safety and allow this man to introduce something into my life I knew very little about: companionship, the true love kind. 

Getting a man like that to love me and feel confident enough to have a baby with me when he had all the choice in the world is possibly my proudest moment in life. He didn’t accidentally make a baby with me and took responsibility, he took the responsibility first and built our family on that. Being able to love him back with everything I have been through is my biggest achievement: I learned to love by doing, nobody taught me. Francois kept moving towards our mutual future while I questioned if accepting love would be another mistake I make. The only mistake I could have ever made was to stay safe, alone and without him - thankfully he refused me this option. Although it took a lot of work for me to not pursue a life reminiscent of my family’s generational trauma, knowing my daughter will be born into a family free from it, with a father who is able to truly love her is a gift much bigger than I knew as a young person myself. 

One night last week, Francois and I were lying on the couch, candles were lit, and we were listening to music and watching YouTube visuals. We make this space sometimes, not distracting ourselves by anything but sound, scent and each other. A Kid Francescoli song came on that brought me into quite some depth of my emotion. I suddenly felt every second of my life so far: I saw myself sitting on the back of a convertible in motion along the coast of Albania hitchhiking with my friends Olta and Miriam, raving on my friend’s shoulders at the Scooter concert and Conor and I lying at a beach in Ibiza looking at the stars drunk on one Euro shots because we were so broke. And then, finally, I saw myself sitting on a bench in a Grotto Bay, South Africa, with a guy I had really just met, watching the sunset and having a feeling that I had found the person who would make this solitary adventure come to an end. And now that guy was sitting next to me on my couch. 

My life was so full of adventure, with nobody to consider but myself - but mostly happy. And this life - at least this kind of life - is now coming to an end. I always imagined it would be challenging to get older, abandon independence to invite someone into the decisions you make every day. Even last year, as Francois and I sat on the same couch debating if what we were doing was a forever thing, I had a hard time accepting life could actually not be solitary. Of course I wanted love, but I just never had it; it’s hard to imagine something you never knew much about. And as I sat there that night listening to Kid Francescoli with the love of my life, with our baby in my belly, I did not feel nostalgia; I did not miss a single moment I had lived. My heart was solely filled with gratitude, nothing but a deep light in my belly that couldn’t believe how lucky I was to have lived independently and still been able to let go of it to open the door to true love, now on the couch next to me and in my belly. As wonderful as it was, nothing could make me want to trade in what I have now.

As a writer, having a profound experience like becoming a mother which is so, so common, you always ask yourself what hasn’t been said about it. I saw the videos, I read the books (not really, but ya know!) and everything always talks about this “change”. To someone who isn’t in it, I gotta be honest, it must sound so dire - it did to me. I never understood why people would want to alter their lives, their bodies, their brain chemistry for the fleeting moment of happiness when the baby says “Mama”. These thoughts stopped when I fell in love with the right man. Imagining making him a parent is what makes me love the child, looking into her little eyes that are hopefully her dad’s, giving this human that only exists because I love her dad and he loves me a happy life, is the most motivating feeling I ever experienced. She is the culmination of her dad and I choosing each other, and making it work in a God damn rough environment. One cannot find more meaning than that…

Talk About Surprises: How I Ended 2023 With A Ring On My Finger!

There were times in 2020 when it felt like we would never have another "normal" year. Looking ahead feels so indulgent now. Standing on top of Lousberg with Lena and Conor, two of my very best friends in life, at midnight January 1, I therefore just thought "come at me, 2023!"; I was empty with expectation,  surrounded by all the love I needed - and thought I'd ever have. I had no idea what to expect: life felt volatile, prone - but too boring to - change. In a way, I was open to a year that would change things but had given up on anticipating it would. Besides, things were good, everything staying the same seemed positive. Within six weeks of that date, I was in love, Lena was pregnant - and now life seems like it will literally never be "the same again". 

    Glad I gave up on love eh?    

2023 will always be the year I started single but ended engaged. One week before meeting my future husband, I had given up! What sounds dramatic didn't really bother me all that much. Patricia and I were having a glass of wine next to my leftover Christmas tree in late January when I became the lady that had to give up on love to find it. "I think, I just don't really believe it anymore", I said when Patricia said, enthusiastically, 2023 would be the year we both meet the lids to our pots (and like usually, mamma was right!). So many years of being open to love - like the real kind - and never finding it just had me believe my idea of what it would be like was wrong. I had dated very nice people, but none of them seemed better than my own company. Skepticism was really the most reasonable choice: I wanted a healthy man that was able to see I am the golden ticket that I am - or nothing! And until Feb 3, I had never met such a man. 

I am not the most romantic person, but even I have to question the intervention of fate when I tell people the story of how I met Francois. It wasn't even supposed to happen. I was planning to stay in Berlin, all cooped up in my house all of February, but decided to spontaneously go see a friend for a wine weekend. Then, when already there, she canceled, and I went alone. I needed lunch, so I googled "restaurant" and just went to the highest rated one (which is what tourists should simply do when they don't know a place, always works!). I left that restaurant with a phone number and texted him on my way out as I noticed I had already dropped the piece of paper he wrote it on (imagine I lost it...). There were so many ways we could have not met. And only one of how we did. 

Looking back at all my years, it's easy to realize now how unhealthy I was for some of them. A confused, unaware younger Sina would have missed that this handsome man looking me deeply in the eyes while talking was really showing me that he was available... emotionally. She would have laughed off his flirting, felt flattered, and went on with her blind life. But not this time: He knew who he was, and he was ready to share it. Without fear, he naively pursued us. Although he's has admitted to not knowing what he was doing, the end product is a little magical: we neither had the chance to, nor did we want to, take is slow and see where it goes. We did marriage bootcamp, stripping down to our soul and seeing if the other was up for it. It was rough - but it worked! Thankfully, two fairly broken paths were able to come together and appear to become a pretty solid unit. 

                        These faces heal me!                        

With love came a lot of healing for me. It brought me perspective on how I wanted to conduct my future - unlike the past: focusing on love, family and personal fulfilment over a career that is not respected by anyone but me. The year started out professionally with my company pursuing a little corporate douchebaggery (aka layoffs) which suddenly had me wondering if I was keeping my job and then, more surprisingly, if I wanted to keep it. In economic hardship, companies do a realignment: they focus less on employees, and suddenly more on cold, bold capitalism. My realignment was a direct response to that: since they didn't care about my development, I didn't care much about trying for that extra 10% (in reality, I tell ya, as soon as I was told my pay raise would be 3% during the tenth consecutive month of 10% inflation, my desire to focus on my career came to a abrupt halt!). 

I might be premature in saying this but I am no longer "becoming", but have reached a state of arrival. Six years ago, I was at my high school reunion and saw my old head teacher, now principal. The first time we met I was 14, he was probably around 30, married to my French teacher. A really nice dude, we had a very good relationship, resulting in a feeling of pride when I told him 10 years after graduation what I had achieved. "Do you ever feel like... you arrived?", he asked me that day. I asked what he meant. "I married my wife after uni, we have a house and we love our jobs, our kids are happy. We are where we need to be," he said. "You are traveling the world, you are doing all these amazing things... but don't you ever feel like you want to come home?". His question made me angry; I thought he had passed judgement on my undoubtedly better life. Mine was so far from being boring. Today, I realize he "arrived" where he wanted to be before me (which is cool, ain't no race!). At the same time, I believe I am more sure than he ever could be that my destination is the right one. 

This year told me the meaning of all these words: "roots", "home", "arrival". It wasn't just a person that did that, it was years of seeking to learn. I finally know who I am, what I want, and what it was all for. It was for this: It was for the anticipation I am feeling right now sitting in my wonderful home I worked on for, basically, my whole life that this coming year I will be dancing to "This Year's Love" at my wedding. The roots of who I truly am, who I truly want to be, are secure in the soil of where I am standing and they are ready to be shared with someone who, hopefully, will find my soil equally rich to build some shit on. I am on the right path and I am no longer scared it's the wrong one. The future makes me excited, not scared. And for once it's not "anything can happen" or "bring it", but "I want this particular thing to happen this year and I will not rest until it does". If, for some reason, next year's note does not start with "it happened", I am probably drunk in a ditch. The way I am not scared of failing is everything I need to know. 

Reflections Of A Girl That Is About To Move In With Her Boyfriend

My first room in the house I grew up in did not change until I was 14 years old and my mom and I left my dad. It was 12m2 and at age 9, I got to pick a new wallpaper, choosing a white one with glitter which remains in that room until this day. I then had a lot of rooms. A lot. The longest time I inhabited a room from the age of 14 was two years. The life I lived came with a lot of moving, sometimes rooms, sometimes countries. After my London landlady stole my shit during an absence - a custom I was used to after myriad landlords from hell in Egypt - I decided buying debt so I could own an apartment was the reasonable choice. At least, if it was filthy, it would be my fault. So coming to Berlin, for the first time in my life, I had more than just a room for my life: I had 62m2 to myself. No furniture still, but good start, eh? The next upgrade is about to happen but since my dad is neither alive nor rich, it's not a house and never will be. But yeah, so, my boyfriend is moving in...

I have shared my life with many a kickass roommates. Tarryn, the ultimate roommate, became my flipping sister during our time in a shared house in Camden during the pandemic. We shared that rundown shithole with three men, all called Neil. Or, well, Neal, and Neel. No joke! Whoever lived with me in Victoria Road in Cambridge has a lifetime invitation to my wedding and technically I did not meet Miriam living with her, but I did eventually. I've been a lucky son of a bitch with the 36 people I shared houses with. Only two rotten eggs, but they weren't even that bad (one starved a cat in our flat but this is how I got my cat). But never have I ever moved in with a man - never mind moved in with them into an apartment I own. What is mine, will be his in 10 days. Crazy thought - good, right? 

It's been a year and a half since someone was here, in this place, for longer than a few hours. I have some plants that I got that month, they were cuttings at the time and are now giving me shade on my tiny balcony. This place is a proper home, it took me months to make one and it's still not done. Everything here is mine and I made most of it, only bought a couch and a TV, the first one in my life, the rest was bought on ebay and restored. Never mind the soft wood floor I sanded with my own bare hands and ruined my back in the process. And now it's not going to be just mine. Or is it? Because it was literally bought with two in mind  - it just took a little longer to get a second person in here. I love this place, so sharing it makes me feel like the only way to love it more. 

I've built a friendship with these four walls and quite a lot of people who live in the same neighborhood. I am a village girl so anyone I cannot walk to cannot be my friend. The fact I will be coming home to my hottest friend sitting on the couch already is new though. There are the obvious thoughts of thinking I will never get to watch Diagnosis:Murder ever again. I am watching every episode for the 60th time right now because I know my boyfriend, or anyone, won't indulge me on that. I see the shower curtain finally becoming a problem because, well, I make do with what is there but I know a beefcake will have his problems. And of course there is the fact I have three pillows but like hugging all of them at various times in the night. Speaking of night, I sleep through it. But when there is another person, the smallest movement will have me on my feet - and once I'm up, I'm up. 

But overall, at 34 years old, it's a welcome lesson - one I think is actually harder to learn WITH age, as I have a lot (!!!) of experience living alone. Never fully alone, but at least the bed was usually empty. Many people, in fact, probably every German, thinks it's too fast with 4 months of dating but, well, what can I tell them, I have even less experience taking it slow than I have with moving in together. None, to be exact. I move fast and I like it. Sharing my life with that guy after such a short time, by Christmas I will probably have a good idea if we are going to do this forever. I know, very un-German of me. Don't tell anyone, but we are also monogamous, silly us. Unsurprisingly, I have a long list of German exes (the total counts zero, ZERO!). Time for another lesson, but fast please, I am busy living an amazing life and time is literally all I need for that. 

What I already know is that this will change my life drastically, but thankfully I like change. I understand that nothing good comes from being idle. There is no way to upgrade my rooms without actually allowing someone else to be part of it. The years of flatsharing came to an end, and I remember my first full night in my own apartment, knowing I would be alone in these four walls during a pandemic, scared me. And now? Pah! It's been awesome, completely freaking awesome. The amount of times I have sat on my couch with a glass of wine, looking at my Christmas tree or the jungle of plants I am nursing, knowing I made this all happen for myself, remembering the luck I had going from the glitter wall paper to one bedroom with a balcony, have had a profound impact on my happiness. And now I get to share that with another. Luck is a funny thing... 

"Making A Scandal": I Think I'm Too Nice

I cannot believe that I am a person that learns how to be myself through pop music but last week, it happened: Shakira and Miley Cyrus of all people gave me a "shattering glass" moment (thanks, Robin Scherbatsky): I am terrible at breakups. Have I actually really ever broken up with anyone? It's a fair question given I still talk to all of my exes. Maybe it's the patriarchy teaching me to be "nice" in ladylike fashion but maybe it's just me never being mad at anyone... hold on, that just didn't sound right. I hear this too: everyone gets mad sometimes! So, well, something is up here. Maybe the reason I am friends with all of my exes is not the effect of "them being really nice guys" but me never getting the lessons Shakira and Miley got. Let me explain...

I was the person that felt like the worst you could do to a guy that hurt you was the silent treatment, show them you "don't care". The revenge bone isn't a strong one in my body. And then, even worse, I just wasn't angry, even when one of them cheated then lied about it for a year, one fucked his friend's sister in our bed during a break and one casually slipped some heroin. And while I whole-heartedly do not give a shit, it somehow feels unnatural to just be silent if someone mistreated you. My attitude was that the fact they were no longer dating me was bad enough; I still liked them as people. That part is very hard to turn off when you regarded someone in a positive light for a long time; it FEELS like they are still good people. But I am no longer sure they were. 

When my ex told me he cheated on me, it took three days for me to scream at him. I screamed in his face "you cheated on me!" during an argument, and I honestly think he probably was relieved to hear it. He knew he blew it. My reaction of, well, not reacting to the news had given him the feeling he still had a shot. He believed that for a very long time because I was nice to him. We remained friends. In fact, we kinda stayed together because we were at that point living together. I knew the trust for the future was gone through the cheating, but I still liked him as a person. Retrospectively, I am not sure this was a good way to handle that. He cheated on me. After everything he knew about me. That's not cool. That's not just a mistake, that's horrible. I should have called Bizzarap immediately and I definitely should have told him to bite it. 

I struggle with this on every level. Last year, a friend I really appreciated really hurt my feelings, details irrelevant. When it was happening, he was sitting on my balcony sipping coffee. So absurd. In my house. I was taken aback by the experience of this person I felt like was a nice human being turning out to be an insensitive, disappointing coward within just a few minutes. He asked me how I was feeling about what we had discussed. I told him I would probably need a few days to think about that. I couldn't fathom I had been so wrong about him. And he probably still doesn't know to this day that his behavior was really hurtful because I stayed nice. Because he doesn't have to care. I even thought if it was my fault. Because his intentions...were good? It took a few days for me to realize I was hurt, mad, and most importantly, not interested in being friends with someone like that. Too late to get mad now. I regret not doing it when it was appropriate. 

I went the silent route, duh! Easiest when you don't like someone. My desire for retribution for people who hurt me is clearly broken. It's enough for me to know that this hurtful behavior was a mistake on his part, I don't need him to know. But I was still struggling to accept that this guy had actually fooled me. He wasn't nice. Nice people don't act the way he did. He sucked and I was hurt, do we really need to know anything else? Like who's fault it was (definitely not mine!). I refrained from even saying anything. Worse even, for a few weeks after I MISSED being friends. Because it's not easy realizing people you appreciate are not worth that. And so you think: am I overreacting?

If I'm hurt, the answer should be no. That's it. I am terrible at this. So bad. I keep making excuses for these people who hurt me because deep down, I don't want to cut them out. I seem to think that cutting out doesn't achieve anything. It's the times when I was younger where I was accused of making a scene when I got mad that were in my head. What's wrong with making a scene? It's better than being the one who does the hurting. Because I never got to say my part while I was breaking up with people, because I hadn't realized I was mad yet, I became one of those letter writers. A few times, I didn't send them off because I thought of myself as dramatic. I made the wrong decision. There is no expiration date on anger; one day mine will erupt out of me like a volcano.

I wish I had been Shakira a lot more often. What an absolute queen if the rumors are true and she has put a mannequin in her window pointing at her mother-in-law's house. And sure, my exes are not Gerard Pique, who sucks, but did I mention cheating? Birthdays, Christmas, random Tuesdays, I stayed "friends". One has now stopped sending me cute animal videos because, I am guessing, he has satisfied what he got out of talking to me, which was selfish, of course, because I'm sure there is a new girl now to send cute animal video to. That makes me mad. It makes me really angry. Because it was never about staying the nice guy, it was about staying the nice guy as long as it served him. I think I have reason to be mad about that. But what can I do now? It's too late. The time for a scene has passed... 

My friend Patricia calls this "making a scandal". She recently broke up with her boyfriend and was telling me how she went over to his house to "make a scandal". This is probably a term in Portuguese (she's Brazilian!) but I was high-fiving her. She was mad, she got it out of her system. Although I don't know what she said, I don't even care if it was fair to him. It doesn't matter if he deserved it. As her boyfriend, his job is to prevent her from feeling the need for a scandal. He failed. So her emotions are valid. And if she wants to get loud about them, I envy her ability to do it. One of my former lovers told me just THIS WEEK he was never frightened of me. This is terrible news. He should have been. I should definitely have tried to kill him (instead, here I am texting him "get well soon" to his hospital bed.... pfff). 

I blame my father...

My father was a very weak man who did pretty shit things. He was pathetic, really. And my mom was never mad at him. I never heard her scream. I wish she had. He didn't deserve for her to be nice, give him chances. It's hard to criticize a person for being loving but I am mad at my mother for not teaching me that when men do you wrong, you show them consequences. You express how you feel, you hold them accountable. If that's a revenge song released on your ex-husband's birthday, go Miley. I wasn't taught that. Being at an all-girls school certainly didn't teach me. As a result, I dated a lot of weak guys who I was very nice to. And being weak is not an inherent vice, but the shit they pulled on me is. But because they were so weak, so seemingly lovely, I didn't want to become the monster that freaked out on them.

But I've learned very important lessons, and it might have taken me longer than the average person but action and intentions are two completely different things. If actions hurt me, the intentions don't matter. We say the same about racism and sexism. When I am discriminated against by an old, white guy, does it matter he meant well? Of course not. So why am I still calling my exes, who lied, cheated, took drugs, undermined me, gaslit me, you name it, nice people? Stupid is as stupid does, clearly people who do bad things at least qualify as bad men in a way. It's not hard to become a bad man. But you know what's easier: being a good guy. It's really easy. I managed to be a good woman. I didn't hurt any of them. So I think I should practice my "scandals" a bit more. 

2023: When Failing To Fulfil Expectations Became The Best Year Of My Life!

Tasting a good wine is a pleasure I knew nothing about when I was younger. When I was a bridesmaid at my friend Claire's wedding this November, I was telling her dad how the bottle he shared with me in 2010 changed how I felt about wine. For Claire's wedding, he shared Abbessee Sauvignon Blanc with me - I remember their names now! It was one of those rare moments in life where you realize - helped by company, setting and circumstance - how you have changed: I have become a wine lover - against expectation -, evident in 2022 also by my choice of vacation spots and Saturday night activities. But I have also become the person that accepts that I am a wine lover: probably fairly snobby, knee deep in privilege and too boring to opt for a rum & coke, like back when I first met Claire's dad in uni. As I sit with my virtual pen and paper here once again to reflect on my year (while drinking a Sangiovese from Toscany haha lame!), the truth is palpable: I've become many things I didn't expect.

Gay men in their 30s and 40s
are basically ideal for single ladies

You probably think I refer to my surprise that Christmas time when you are 33 years old, single, not married and without a dog is different because one imagined "33" looks different; it does for most of the people that mingle in the old streets of Aachen, my hometown. But I have heard many interpretations of what this age should represent, depending on where I lived. In Hanford, CA, where I was an exchange student in 2005, my high school BFF has a teenage son now. His 33 couldn't look more different from mine although - I believe - we are kind of the same person. In my hometown, the annual piss up before Christmas Eve this year revealed that we "lost" quite a few people to parenthood in the last year. Also fine. But look at me: I am not that 33. And while not all of this happened by choice, it's really hard to see how it could have ever been different.

I never chose this 33. I wanted, very much, to be in love at 33. The reason this didn't happen wasn't the result of my own doing but merely the actions of those I did fall in love with. They blew that - not me! It's actually quite sad I wasn't in love with anyone this year. When my last boyfriend and I put a final stop to "it", the clock had just gone announcing 2022 so it was symbolic timing. But soon I was 33 and society perceived I am running on another clock. This clock has a different plan for what 33 should look like - and that's not traveling across the globe, going to raves, drinking in hot tubs and sit on a topless guy's shoulders at an Open Air Scooter concert - yet that's what I did this year. And I regret nothing. In fact, it seems, it was the happiest year of my life. Yeah, that was unexpected... 

It's easy to accept a different kind of 33 when you 
aren't alone in the slightest... 

But unexpected isn't bad! I have no clue who came up with that. There is no reason for me to not be pleased with my life. Sure, I am lacking recognition at work, I could lose a few pounds and I live too far from the forest; these aren't problems, they're part of this weird experience of being alive. It's pretty shitty for a lot of people - but not me! I get to be a person that chooses to be happy. Cup half full kinda thing. As much as I had hoped I'd be in love now, some unexpected turns in my life, like living in Berlin and working in tech, are not things I expected to be part of this life for me. How could I have expected that; it wasn't a thing when I set my teenage dreams. Disappointment is therefore only the result of an incorrectly set expectation. 

In 2022, I had a lot of moments where I felt like I should be disappointed because life had taken turns I didn't expect - until I realized that decisions have no effect on the outcome of the story. Occasionally, I feel mad at myself because I didn't move to LA ten years ago to become a writer; could it have been harder than the last ten years? That decision was made to further security over creative happiness. I left journalism for the same reason. But at the same time, these decisions brought on circumstances that, you know, sucked. I moved to Cambridge to start a new life and career - which would have been a great shout if I hadn't fallen in love with the first guy I met there ever and allowed him to break my heart ten times. Now I can't even regret the decision because taking that tech job got me the one I have now, the life I now have. But it also got me the scar. It's a deep fucking scar. And ultimately probably also explains why my 33 looked the way it did. 

It's me, getting drunk by myself on MCC at a
wine farm in Cape Town in a bikini in February 
(I did probably get Covid there #worthit)

So overall, 2022 sometimes feels like failure. Because I did want career advancement, I wanted to fall in love, I did want to, like all years, find the place I want to stay. And in yet another year, this did not happen. But I had so much fun. So much fun! I often sat in my room, like right now, feeling so deeply fortunate and grateful for my life. The good things in my life outweigh the bad by, like, a lot. I cannot help to feel like it was the best year of my life with a lot of love for myself and high fiving me for being so awesome. Because the things I do have are not just the result of luck. I'm pretty badass. But all this is unexpected: I planned, like you all, to be a mother by now but I am loving not being one. I feel bad for saying it but I often cannot believe so many people want a different 33 than mine. Ouch! I am an arrogant bitch but it's working, I'm happy, so I guess I win... 

For 2023, I now feel confident saying, there is really just one thing I am missing: love. I have everything else I would ever want, but I haven't been in love in 2022. It feels wrong to say 2022 was the best year of my life when it was one of the only years in my life I didn't so much as like anyone. I mean, I liked my friends a lot, a 2020 Waterford Chenin Blanc and being pretty wasted at almost every Berlin event this summer had to offer (and vicinity, thanks 9-Euro-Ticket). But love is important, and I want it. Not from those guys who overthink when to text, not those who think they have commitment issues (or don't think they do but do!) or those who need company to go to movies. I don't want company, I want a partner. Get a dog, people! And I am cool with this taking so long because what I am looking for is worth the wait. And if I find this kind of love in 2023, I have everything - and 34 is a bit early to peak, no? I joke... but I don't. I'm a happy gal with very little incentive to change anything about life. But I am willing and excited to see if there is a turn in my life I will look back to that makes this good time an even better one.

Then again, looks like the world might end, so if it does, I'm going out on a high...

The Revised List Of My Favorite Songs Of All Time

Years ago, I made a list of my Top 50 songs of all times. That list reads like my teenage diary, man, it's awesome. The theme was very clearly "memories" rather than actual connection some actual artistry. In the last few years, I've added many memories. Not all of them should be remembered. But the songs that went through it with me are imortalized in a Spotify "Liked Songs" playlist I don't pay for. Time to revise this list, then. 

1. Haerts- Wings The best song in the world for me for 15 years standing. Never heard a better one. Underwhelms everyone else lol 
2. Alphaville – Forever Young Even without the nostalgia, this song s such a God damn masterpiece! 
3. Bronski Beat – Small Town Boy (Acoustic) Every time I listen, I see myself driving into Vaalserquartier, home, a place that will never not be awesome. 
4. Beach House - Space Song The ultimate Hawaii song. Imagine sitting on an island in the pacific, at night, with a million stars, listening to this. 
5. Luca Wilding - Wales I was in love once. And this song is what it felt like. 
6.  MGMT – Electric Feel This is on the list because it's a song that doesn't remind me of any other song. 
7. Lord Huron - The night we met One night at a wedding in France I couldn't sleep. The thought of someone I liked kept me up, I listened to this song 20 times until I fell asleep. "Like" is the wrong word, too. 
8. Sufjan Stevens - Mystery of Love My most listened to song 2020 by an easy mile. What a year. The memory is actually believing in love after the experience from song #5 & #7. Ouch!
9. Frank Ocean – Thinking bout you In my old list, it says this reminds me of summer 2013 which was awesome but I don't even remember summer 2013 now. Now it just reminds me of Frank Ocean and how awesome he is. 
10. Christmas Canon - Childhood memories which are probably not even about Christmas. 
11. Tame Impala - Feels Like We Only Go Backwards After I returned from the lockdown in Germany, I was cycling through London on a sunny Saturday, stopped at a pub for a pint and sat outside when this song came on. I don't think I realized then how backwards the next two years would be.
12. The Staves - In the long run - One more for heartbreaker from earlier who I in fact saw again in the long run (see #18)
13. The shins – New Slang Another one going back to puberty. Maybe it's "Garden State", but it just reminds me of my hometown. VQ forever.  
14. aHa - The sun always shines on TV My early Alexa days were a happy time. I would play this song at the office to annoy my colleague Richard who acted like I annoyed him but I don't think i really did. 
15. Lion King – Kann es wirklich Liebe sein Key change at the end gave me goosebumps at age 4.
16. Gigi d’Agostini – L’amour Toujours I want to walk down the aisle to this in my techno wedding one day... 
17. Sam Cooke - Bring it on home to me Somewhat ruined by a guy I dated who knew this was my favorite song and played it on our first date to show me "he listened". He didn't... 
18. Neil Young - Harvest Moon Like I love this song but it wouldn't make the Top 50. But I was very, very painfully in love once (have I mentioned it yet? 🙄). I was walking through Bristol one day trying to get "distance" from that shit and some busker sang this. "But I'm still in love with you" made me, you know, feel the expected. I saw the man I was in love with again a few years later in a hotel lobby and coincidentally this song came was playing. Like, it never does ever. But then it did! It's a literal anthem for my heart getting broken.
19. Keane – Try again On my 18th birthday I was driving home through the countryside at night when it started snowing and this song was on. One of the best moments of my life. The song stuck...
20. Band of Horses – The Funeral In October 2008 I have a memory of walking through Denver on a very sunny day listening to this song and feeling deeply happy. 
21. Broken Bells - Shelter I don't know how this got here but this song makes me feel and most things don't. 
22. Cigarettes After Sex - Heavenly This was playing as my plane was touching down in Hawaii in January 2020, the moment I realized I had just flown across the globe to see a man... again! 
23. Kygo - It Ain't Me My breakup hymn when I was miles away from letting go haha
24. Muse - Bliss I'm a huge Muse fan and when they played this at the 2019 Manchester show I think I lost it. 
25. Mumford and Sons – Below my Feet This song is a prayer!
26. UB 40 - Red Red Wine This is a song that reminds me of my friend Jake who I love. I went to see him in London one time and he only had this song on a CD so we put it on and listened to it all night. 
27. Paolo Nutini- Jenny don’t be hasty Who could have known that the lyrics of this song will become so relevant to me when I saw Paolo in March 2007? These days, I'm Jenny...
28. The Radio Department - Strange things will happen I was obsessed with this song from the day I heard it in a hostel in Iceland. A day later Richard told me he would be leaving the job, being my only friend there. It started off a very weird time in my life that would probably count as "trauma" these days
29. Billie Eilish - Ocean Eyes Driving through Dorset in summer 2018, it was hot, it was relaxing. I'd been through some stuff (see earlier positions ha).  
30. Regina Spektor – Samson "You are my sweetest downfall, I loved you first!" Before I was second, I was first, once. 
31. Burning Hearts - Into the Wilderness I mean, I relate... 
32. David Gray – This year’s love Have you heard the lyrics to this song? Unreal!
33. The Panics – Don’t fight it My first week in Dundee I was hanging out with this guy one night after a party and we were talking for like 7 hours. Then he put this song on. I was in love (with the song but later, obviously, with him as well)
34. Braveheart – Sad Theme Perfect song set in the perfect country!
35. Paolo Nutini – Autumn Another bad memory. After my dad passed away this was my alarm clock for weeks, resulting in me having a casual cry to start the day with every day.
36. Blümchen – Herz an Herz Memories & Masterpiece
37. Mumford and Sons - Winter Winds This song came on when I was driving to my friend Tina's funeral. It fit the day like a glove.
38. Coldplay - Paradise This was my favorite song when I first started dating my ex-boyfriend. The beginning of that experience was pretty awesome, I love to think back to that.
39. Fun. - Some Nights In Summer 2013 a boy I liked came to visit me from Scotland. One day, my friends Conor and Becca also came to visit from Brussels. The day we all hung out in my hometown was one of the best days of my life. It was super sunny, warm and we were driving to a party with the windows down, shouting along to this song. Sweet, sweet memory!
40. Aqualung – Strange and Beautiful This was an early favorite when I first moved to Hanford. I didn't have a phone and it was before the internet so I couldn't very often listen to it. 
41. Coldplay – Swallowed in the Sea For some reason I'm reminded of getting a Starbucks in Laguna Beach in October 2005 which only a song brings back. 
42. REM – Let me in Another summer lover of mine left back home without "letting me in". However, I love to think back to this guy, still one of the best guys I ever met and another one I didn't marry because he was too far away
43. Lana del Rey – Bel-Air One of the few songs I get negative memories with. I was hardly ever feeling as bad as I was in December 2012 when I was in Israel. The Newtown shooting had happened a few days prior. I was sitting in the old city of Jerusalem, listening to this song, and had to start crying. 
44. Kings of Leon – Closer My only choice on here because it reminds me of a sexy incident hehe
45. Red Hot Chili Peppers – Road Trippin’ I mean this shit was my life for my twenties
46. U96 - Heaven Fuck, it's so much energy, and so good!
47. Ich & Ich – So soll es bleiben In April 2008 I was driving home from an awesome party, this song came on and I realized that everything in my life was perfect and should in fact stay like this forever. It didn't but one day I hope I'll feel this song again. 
48. Adrian Lux - Teenage Crime After I came home from Ibiza I had post-holiday blues to the max. This song was torture!
49. Incubus – Kiss to send us off
50. Labrinth -  Still Don't Know My Name I think I just love this song so much because I love him so much. Kentish Town memories.

2021: The Year Without Writing

I've become a better writer this year. I have not put a word on paper, and yet I know that I am so, so much closer to the art that I expect of myself. And surely you would know that this blog is not where I designated my life's writing to live. Maybe, sometimes, it came to die here. But over the years this has been the space where I wanted to track my progress. Not always as a writer, but as a human being. All the lessons of life and how I experience them. And this past year this space was silent because I experienced them. All of those horrible, gritty truths we have all been through. I was forced into uncompromising realism by a virus that introduced me to new concepts such as loneliness and stagnation. But good writers aren't born, they're made. 

I decided not to write anything. For the first time in my life, I listened to the voice in my head that said "you don't have to do this". Two years of a therapist telling me finally paid off, eh? I never wrote a line (I wasn't paid for) for anyone but myself and, this year, I couldn't do it for me. I needed to do nothing. I have never, and I mean it, never just sat in my feelings and watched them. This year, I had to learn to not chase the sentence, but the actual feeling. And you know, that is why I sucked at writing: you need to know who you are to write. You will otherwise write what you expect to write. This blank page right here is a mirror and I cannot expect it to reflect me if I make stupid faces all the time.

Those faces have been small, subtle lies over the years: "No, that guy didn't break my heart, I totally moved on". "Investing time into the guy I liked in High School was not a waste of time, it was a lesson." "My father was a great man deep down." "I don't know if I want to have a family." You know what's worst: I believed it myself. I was standing in front of my mirror smiling, thinking what I was putting out there was my true self. It wasn't. Anything I wrote down wasn't me. But it took me until now to know it wasn't me. Because for some reason I was unable to feel pain, and without pain those things that happened to me can't possibly be processed. 

So this year I sat down to do it. I've known for a while I was using my career as a distraction, but my career wasn't going to progress so well, there went that distraction. I was still very busy because I am a privileged, lucky son of a bitch that bought an apartment and then had to deal with the painfully happy stress of organizing a new life. Again. And in those moments between that I was sitting in an empty apartment that I owned torn between agonizing loneliness and physically painful gratitude. I wouldn't change a move of my life because I did everything I could have possibly done to get me where I am. And that's where the problem was lying: I was always doing it, always nailing it. It takes a global pandemic for me to face the demons because, trust me, I would have found a way not to because I do everything I want to, and usually successfully.

So I couldn't actually write because I wouldn't have nailed it. My feelings were actually happening off the paper for once. I am new to many of the feelings of this year, so I was new to writing about them. It makes me feel so insufficient that I cannot write a sentence about what I feel when I listen to "This Year's Love". Nobody could ever understand what this song means to me. Of course there are lyrics that are not hard to interpret, although I didn't as a child listening to this song for the first time not knowing English. But I had to be today years old to understand what this song means. Because sometimes it takes understanding life to understanding a written word. And because of that, my words couldn't have the correct meaning.

What does this mean for the future? Probably nothing. Actually learning how to be "mad" is just a really good lesson and will hopefully mean I make less mistakes, especially with men. Understanding that "sadness" isn't a bad emotion was also necessary and probably essential to being the writer I want to be. I feel more than myself than ever because, well, I don't care that I am lame. And now often lazy and introverted. I wanna be that. I bought my first ever TV in 2021 and am enjoying watching "How To Get Away With Murder" with ice cream for hours. That's never happened. I was never that person. Or maybe I was, who knows. I don't think about it anymore, I'm just doing whatever I'm doing. No reasons. Just being.