We’ve been here one year today.

To celebrate, I walked over to the doctor and paid nothing, and took my prescription to a random Apoteke and paid 7.73€ for my Advair Diskus (copay $35 on Blue Cross Blue Shield PPO when we left), no waiting. Then I went to a supermarket and bought couverture, candied orange peel and Kerrygold Irish butter (all expensive luxury items in the US).

I also bought a Kinder Egg for my husband.

Then I came home to our beautiful flat, where soon D. will arrive to enjoy his four-day Easter weekend. Tomorrow we’re going to an Easter Friday dinner at the home of Australian friends who live across the street from the goth club in Prenzlauer Berg. I’m making chocolate orange flapjacks, with Lyle’s Golden Syrup I got at KaDeWe. I feel like we won the lottery, every day.

I have this new thing I do, since our shipping container arrived. I lie in bed next to my hubby, listening to the silence of our building and the courtyard, and I just…relax. I lie there, completely at peace and unafraid, with everything in the world I need. I listen to the silence in my own head, where for so many years there was a cacophony of terror.

I can’t begin to express our gratitude to the family and friends who got us here and helped us stay. You saved our souls, our health, and maybe our lives.

Glücklich in Berlin by Anna Depenbusch.*

Hello, how nice you here to go good to see, it seems you
I think you are happy in Berlin
Your big dream to many years finally be many seems true
Part of me wishes you good luck THEREFOR
And a part of me wants you here her back

Yes, it’s nice if you tell me who you meet and so you had play
In dieser city you know your way
I mean who longs as home?
A part of me is very happy for you
And part thinks: Berlin War ‘Not for me

Too big, too small, too close, too far
The one goes, the other remains
I envy you was’ somehow lied
but it’s great, you have hit the jackpot

You say you’re now in the middle because everything else makes no sense
Because here begins the wide world and it sounds true life
Part of me wonders What is the whole search
And part hopes that you are happy

Too big, too small, too close, too far
The one goes, the other remains
Part of me wishes you luck with all your heart
And a part of me wants you here her back

Too big, too small, too close, too far
The one goes, the other remains
Part of me wishes you good luck
Part of me wants you back
to envy would ‘somehow lied
but it’s great, you have hit the jackpot

Hello, how nice you here to go good to see, it seems you
I think you are happy in Berlin

*lyrics courtesy google translate. I am sure I could get a better translation, but I really like this one.

*ps if you’re coming to visit though could you bring me some American deodorant. German low-aluminum-content stuff is no match for perimenopause sweats and I smell like a horse sometimes.