cherubs

www.diamantopoulos.ch

-and my favorite postcard company in the world-

www.edgar.de

because we're young

Tonight while discussing the pending revolution with caligula jones, the Ernst Ludwig Kirchner-authored manifesto of Expressionist group die Bruecke (the bridge) came to mind. It is, in the original:

"Mit dem Glauben an Entwicklung, an eine neue Generation der Schaffenden wie der Genießenden rufen wir alle Jugend zusammen, und als Jugend, die die Zukunft trägt, wollen wir und Arm- und Lebensfreiheit verschaffen gegenüber den wohlangesessenen älteren Kräften. Jeder gehört zu uns, der unmittelbar und unverfälscht das wiedergibt, was ihn zum Schaffen drängt."

Which means:

"With the belief in evolution, in a new generation of creators and art lovers, we call on all youth, and as youth, which carries the future, we want to gain freedom of movement and life against the well-entrenched older forces. Everyone who renders what impels him to create directly and without adulteration is one of us."

Kirchner wrote this in 1906.

good bye, turtle

The Campanile Valley specifically the dance pavillion is a place we used to joke was the ancestral home of the trolls.

The valley is also home to a host of many journeys I only undertook through reading -- Hessel's walks through Berlin, Arturo Bandini having nowhere to go after getting his clothes thrown out the window.

Today I sat under the willow trees of Potter Lake and looked at the Campanile, which in the water wavered like a snake under the spell of its charmer. I remembered climbing it the day Andrew "andmoreagain" Morgan rented the thing out to get a custom recording of the bell player. AC sneaked in a backpack of beer and I poked my head out the top and it seemed like I was caught in a terrible windstorm. AC looked out the window grate and shouted to a kid, "I AM THE ELF OF THE TOWER."

But that was in 2003. Today I sat there and drank a cola from Arby's, and as I was taking my sunglasses off a kid who had been searching for turtles with his father ran by yelling "Bye, Bye, Turtle!"

I listened to him laugh and watched him run and sincerely hoped he wouldn't get eaten by the trolls

The Ruins of Legoland

Wade sent me the link to this photo taken in 1990 (post-reunification) that he saw at the Story of Berlin museum. The story was that 2 Americans were playing frisbee by the wall and the disc went over. In order to retrieve the frisbee, they poked their heads through a hole in the wall and asked the soldiers to throw it back. They then threw it back directly through the hole in the wall.

While I'm at it, I'll go ahead and post this picture of the Kaiser Wilhelm Gedachtniskirche, made out of legos.