the world has turned and left me here

a day at the lake

Today is a German holiday, Fronleichnam, so I have the day off. Matt wasn't sure what Fronleichnam celebrated. "I think it's just an excuse to take a day off from work," he said, and that's when you know you're in Europe.

But I'm not complaining. Happy Fronleichnam!

This morning the sun was shining (for once) so I went out to mow our microscopic back yard with the handmower. I churned through lots of little white flowers and moss like an axe-murderer.

Afterwards I started to feel ashamed of my homepage and decided I would revamp the thing. But then Mark, Claudia, and Matt asked me if I wanted to come with them to a lake. One moment I was looking into content management via XML and XSLT, the next I was flying down a German country road at dangerous speeds with the top down and the music blaring.

There are actually wide open spaces in Germany. Lots of them, in fact, you just have to get out of Munich to see them. I was hyper-aware after having two cups of coffee and totally into the moment, excited to be alive. When we got to the lake I unloaded the 20-case of Franciskan Weiss-Bier that I got for 10 Euros the other day (10 Euros!). I thought such a thing would be normal fare for the Germans but in fact my roommates were pretty amused by this and the looks I was getting lugging it around. We ended up taking the long way around the lake to avoid the beer garden, it not being exactly kosher to parade through a beer garden selling Franciskan Weiss-Bier with your own case of the same. My arms paid for it. Matt and I only drank three between us so the other 17 were dead weight.

For me it was a fun-filled afternoon of lounging around, gawking at the casual nudity, and people-watching. A Norman Rockwell boy jumped into the lake, all spindly arms and legs. A father took his toddler for a walk around the perimeter, buffering him instinctively when he got too close to the water's edge. A reclining husband with his hand resting on his wife's back. Two pairs of pregnant women and their two husbands eating and talking. Lovers, everywhere, lovers. People in the early or middle or late stages of being in love.

When we finally settled down, we were behind a thin fashion-designer type and his fantastically-made girlfriend. He was small, looked to be about 40, had close-cropped hair died blonde and a tan hide. To me he was "Versace." His girlfriend was a panther-bodied 20-something. They made no attempt to hide their amorousness. She enjoyed a popsicle and he watched, enjoying it just as much or more so. She poured water on his back and rubbed it in, poured the last drops of beer into his mouth from on high, he reached over and squeezed her buttocks, they slept with limbs intertwined. At any moment, I thought, these two are just going to start going at it, and none of these people around here will even take notice.

I took a walk in the forest. The trees were massive coniferous things with trunks limbless until about 20 feet up, as if to say "we have better things to do than waste our branches on you ground-dwellers." A thick undergrowth of ferns covered the ground. Beneath that, and sometimes breaking through on protuberances that may have once been stumps, was a blanket of moss so full that it felt like I was petting a cat when I ran my fingers through it. Smaller birch-like trees which held their leaves perfectly parallel to the ground punctuated the scenery. The amber late afternoon sun streamed through and it was like the pictures of forests you always see on posters, the kind with little motivational sayings in the corner.

When we left the lake we left fast, rocketing down the windy road through the little country villages and back into Munich. Whoever came up with Fronleichnam, thanks, and I hope this is the way you intended people to spend your day.