How well do you know your city ? Can you find me ? XO
Dear Auntie SAM: How are you ? Is all OK ?
At the School for Wayward Men live 23 male ex-convicts & me.
An entire world behind one unassuming gate adorned with steel, spiked spires in a lovely, tree-lined neighborhood protecting us from the things we want … or thought we wanted.
One must perform the secret handshake, then successfully navigate through seven doors – all varying in size & difficulty – to reach my room. A room with hardly more than a sink & a single bed on the top floor in a section of a building no one else may enter.
I leave my window open, & awaken to church bells & chirping (whistling) birds every morning.
In Seattle, before Basel, I also lived in a tower. My husband hired snipers for each rooftop corner & filled our poisonous moat with ravenous carnivores. Daring friends could only visit by climbing my hair. Those who couldn’t feel the pea were shot. Or, something like that.
It was certainly … fantastic.
Seattleites don’t correct the rest of the world when outsiders say it rains all the time in Seattle. Yet no Seattleite owns an umbrella or rain gear.
Tiny wet fairy kisses baptize your skin so gently you can’t be certain they are happening. And, forever doused in a gentle fog, everything remains green and beautiful, rough edges obscured like my vision.
It rains in Basel like the gods mean it. By bucketfuls, they torrent. A thousand angels joining throw thunderbolts that crack through your peaceful sky – whip-smacking streaks of white lighting cauterize anew.
After the rage: trees, walls, your world … glisten. Drenched & still dripping, shallow pools at its feet, Basel stands proud & fearless, knowing the gods threw their best, yet it remains.
Even the air is different after a real storm.
Real storms wash dirt away. Rearrange life. And with the ebb & flow of a town with real storms – & 30,000 expats coming & going each year – this land-locked wonderland, its bubble bursting daily, is more akin to an ever-replenishing sea.
Lashes wet, hair strewn across my face, my raft finally drifted to the shore of the School for Wayward Men. My feet touched the ground and I stumbled crossing its beaches, cutting myself upon rocks & broken shells. With barely a moment’s hesitation, the kind couple running the school took me in.
In the tower in which I now reside, I keep my hair cut in a bob & regard 23 ex-cons rebuild their lives. Reclaim their passions, their skills, & their trust in themselves & other people.
My heart – though wounded – rests easily at night. Protected by a new group of snipers, loving landlords, & seven doors.
Knowing: its better to live with 23 ex-cons than one on-going con.
Because fantasy’s one thing, Darling. But all the things the fairytale promises — a life with love, freedom, truth, beauty, & triumph through danger — these things are what we live for. Something else, entirely.
I’m well. Thanks for asking.
XO
AS
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Speaking of THRILLING FANTASIES, come to the 12th UNTRAGBAR ! & dance till dawn with DJs HIGH HEELS ON SPEED & SHOEGAZING. Hirscheneck. (Every SUNDAY in OCTOBER: HOMOBAR). 9 PM
And … THE GAY BEGGARS are back !! w/ another great selection: „TAKE FIVE“, one act plays by DAVID IVES in ENGLISH. OCT 2nd / 3rd / 6th / 8th / 9th / 17th / 18th / 21st / 23rd / 24th www.gaybeggars.ch 8PM, except SUNDAYS 5PM