Tuesday, November 11, 2014

Berlin: Artefakte / Artifacts (Je me souviens)

Berlin: nach dem 9. November 1989.
Berlin: Die Mauer. 
Berlin: Pausenloser Einsatz. Die Mauer am Brandenburger.
Berlin: Die Mauer am Checkpoint Charlie. 
DDR East German street art with cosmonauts and spaceships: "friendship of CCCP and DDR." Early 1980s. 

It occurs to me that I don’t believe in states or nation states or tribes. Oh, I know the laws and customs and I pay taxes and all that, but I don’t believe in the ethos of states or nation states or tribes. Maybe I'm a human being, a person first, a mortal being, one man, a global citizen, a Catholic, a libertarian socialist, a professional of sorts, an inhabitant of the 20th and 21st centuries, an environmentalist, a feminist, a thinking denizen who happens to know American English as a first language ~ and maybe I'm a little more than that.  Maybe I'm a refugee, an exile. Or so it feels as I write on this Armistice Day, Remembrance Day, Veterans Day, Poppy Day, Ljour du Souvenir, El Día del Recuerdo. Above all, as they say in Emilia-RomagnaAmarcord; and in Quebec: Je me souviens ~ I remember.

How about you?

Today's Rune: Protection.    

2 comments:

t said...

One day you won't believe in species any more. That won't be a bad thing anyhow. :)

But yes, I've been thinking about "why countries" , it would be nice to recall the historical answers and to construct new answers.

Charles Gramlich said...

Interesting. I haven't really thought about this much. When I do, I think of myself as a "thinking" animal, given occasionally to rationality but mostly emotional. I think of myself as a loner, except for Lana. I think of myself as a reader and writer.