Love out of sight

I never said goodbye to him before I left Berlin. It's hard to believe even now, a year later, after all that had transpired between us. At the time, I just couldn't face it. He had come to see me at the hospital about a week before my scheduled flight home to the US, and I had told him I was going to postpone my move until September. That actually had been my original plan until that perfect storm came raining down on my parade. I didn't want to leave Berlin this way, broken and in pieces. I wanted to enjoy the side of the city that I loved, enjoy the people that I loved, and I needed more time to heal. 

The conversation between us was not going well that day as we tried to come to grips with our sadness and find closure to our shattered love story, one that had officially ended 2 years before. And I being in complete self-preservation mode had to walk away, back into the hospital where it was safe, from him, from the fleas, from the massive change that was about to occur. Little did I know these would be the last words spoken between us, because in the end I did get on that plane a week later after much back and forth deliberation with my doctors. Just a mere two days after I checked myself out, I was floating 35,000 feet above the world making my way home. I never told him I was leaving and I never said goodbye.

The irony of it all lies in the way we first met, because 6 years earlier, I could not leave Berlin without saying hello. 

I first saw him in the local cafe where I always gathered with friends after a day at the studio. He was sitting there alone, quietly drawing in his sketchbook, and he appeared to be so calm and present within himself. He radiated a strong sense of character. Of course I found him very handsome too, with his pensive look behind edgy dark-rimmed glasses, that contrasted sharply against his shoulder length blond hair. It had been a lovely summer, I spent my days painting at my studio sublet , and spent the long evenings drinking wine and sharing conversation with other artists, writers and musicians. It had been a dream come true, it was almost cliche. Then on that inauspiscious evening just 2 weeks before my departure back to NY, there he was at a table behind me. I had never seen him there before, but the moment I laid eyes on him I new we would have to meet. It was love at first sight. Later he would say that he saw me first. Who can really know.

We did not say hello that day, and what commenced was a an exhilarating and somewhat nail-biting 2-week non-verbal courtship that went something like this. Unbeknownst to either one of us, we were both showing up at the cafe at the same time every day in hopes of meeting each other. And so it was that every day we both were punctually there. Now I have a tendency to want my actions to appear unintentional. That's a real problem. Especially when I like someone, because I will behave so intentionally unintentional that I will downright avoid or even ignore the person I fancy. This ends up keeping me single for very long periods of time.

 And so, like pieces on a chess board, we maneuvered ourselves around the cafe every evening for several hours, starting at approximately 6 pm, sometimes finding ourselves sitting at the table next to each other, and at other times much farther away. Both of us were internally scheming on how we could manifest a chance encounter. We laughed about this later when we started comparing notes about this day and that. It was a perpetual comedy of errors. We did  manage to exchange some glances, and that too was quite funny. Not wanting to appear overtly flirtatious, I would shoot him a somewhat morose or serious look from time to time, and he would in turn shoot one back. An outside observer might have wondered whether we had a previously established disdain for one another.

Then push finally came to shove, my magic summer was coming to an end. It was Friday and I was leaving for New York on Sunday. I was terribly hung over that day having had an open studio party the night before to share all the paintings I had done during my 3 month stay and to celebrate with my new found friends. Those paintings would never make it back to the US by the way, the airline would mysteriously lose them all, never to be found again. So on that fateful Friday, I dragged myself out of my sick bed at 5 pm with puffy eyes, determined to meet him come hell or high water. I could not leave Berlin without an introduction.

It was a cool and cloudy day, like many days in Berlin, I would discover over time. As I approached the cafe, I could see him sitting on the long bench underneath the awning protected from the impending weather. He was the only one sitting outside. My chance had come. So what did I do? I ordered myself a soup and sat at the table farthest away from him, and I wondered to myself what the hell was wrong with me. There we were, and I had gone and created an ocean between us even before my impending transatlantic flight. I was broiling with determination despite the lingering headache and nausea that taunted me from the night before.  I was not going to blow it this time, but now I would have to move boldly like the bishop in a game of chess, diagonally across the entire board. No way, it was too risky, and it would be far too conspicuous. What to do, what to do. My only saving grace was that my table was not under the protection of the awning. So I did the only thing left to do in that situation, I prayed for it to rain…

How did I get here? To Berlin that is. A tale of two cities, and a case of love at first sight.

A great number of people arrive in Berlin for a visit and then just never leave. There is a magnetism about the city that can't be denied. Something I would later liken to what I imagine it would feel like to be sinking in quicksand. I tried to explain this feeling to the psychiatrist at the hospital. In my best German, I tried to explain that I had had this feeling for quite a long time, and that at the moment I finally made the decision to leave Berlin, I felt as if the quicksand had come to life and was trying to pull me under with such great force that I was about to drown. I was diagnosed with adjustment disorder. She said it was temporary, would probably take me 6 months to a year to recover, and that my breakdown was centered around my ambivalence about leaving Berlin. The fleas were just a symptom of that.

But let's focus on the beginning now, how I went there for the first time in the fall of 2006 to visit a long lost cousin, who would in turn visit me in East Harlem, New York, where I was living at the time. I wasn't terribly excited about going beyond seeing my cousin, and I had no idea about the city's preceding reputation as the creative capital of Europe. After all, I had been living the last 3 years at the center of the universe, living out my dream to, well, live in New York. And to be an artist. What could possibly be more exciting than that?

I was painting up a storm in those days in my tiny little apartment at 102 and Lex. I created more work in the 4 years I lived there than I had in my entire life. I had an active social life, great friends and epic experiences, but there was always this lingering feeling that if ever I should die in my apartment, it would be months before anyone would discover my decomposed body. In fact, I might just be a pile of dust that the unsuspecting super would simply vacuum away. There is a certain type of existential loneliness that occurs only in New York, where you are in close quarters with millions of people 24 hours a day, and yet you can still feel totally and abjectly alone. So while I absolutely loved New York and do to this day, it was at times a trying place to live, requiring constant effort to stay in the flow of it all.

My first impression of Berlin left much to be desired  as I stepped out of the U-bahn onto Leipziger Strasse, one of the busiest and possibly ugliest streets in all of Berlin. I stood looking out the window of my cousin's hi-rise apartment, peering out over the endless rows of balconies hanging from the endless rows of Plattenbau, a type of prefabricated apartment building devoid of any architectural character. These buildings were considered to be the height of luxury during the DDR times. I really wondered why any tourist would want to come to such a place.

It only took a few days of wandering into Berlin's many neighborhoods for me to uncover its magic. It was like a dream come true. Bicycles EVERYWHERE. Artists and assorted creative folk EVERYWHERE. Graffitti EVERYWHERE. Cafes, bars, electronic music EVERYWHERE. You couldn't swing a dead cat without hitting an artist, and everyone was unabashedly, unapologetically being themselves. Things were cheap, and spaces were huge. An artist could presumably live there on a very low budget and still afford to have a social life. Everything was slow and easy. No stress. Everybody was totally relaxed, and it didn't seem like anybody had a job. Hmmm, I thought to myself. This is worth further investigation. So I went back to New York, mulling around the idea that I might go back there for a few months the following summer. And so I did, and that's when love struck me.

Upon leaving Berlin, my dirty little secret

On Friday June 14, 2013 I found myself huddled in the arms of a good friend, voluntarily checking myself into a psychiatric hospital on the outskirts of Berlin, St. Joseph's Krankenhaus in Weissensee. What I thought would be a stay of several days, turned into an entire month. How did I get here? came the internal question, from someone who seemingly always had their proverbial shit together. Sure I had had a traumatic and abusive childhood, but I had always managed to live a productive and exciting life, had a successful career, and was pursuing my dream to make art having moved to Berlin 5 years prior for that purpose. I can freely admit now, that I had very little empathy for those suffering from anxiety or depression because I did not understand it, and heck, I had overcome the trauma of my youth. If I could do it, anybody could. Then one day, the perfect storm arrived at my door, and sent me spiraling into a vortex, the depths of which I could never have imagined. 

My decision to check myself in came as I could no longer bear the excruciating effects of the anxiety that had taken control over my body—the night sweats, insomnia, panic attacks, restless legs, loss of appetite, extreme weight loss and an inner tremor that was present in every moment. The worst part of it all was the overwhelming sense of dread that pervaded every cell in my body. Dread was something alien to me because I had no experience with it. Sure I had at times dreaded going to work on Monday, I dreaded doing my taxes, I even dreaded going to the gym from time to time. But this was something different.  It was deeply physical, excruciatingly painful and carried along with it a sense of desperate hopelessness. There was no place of comfort for me in those days, as I was staying with a friend and the voice came inside my head to throw myself off the balcony. Did I really want to die? Of course not, I am a lover of life, I  always planned to live to be over 100, but now I just wanted the suffering to end. Even the smallest of tasks seemed monumentally challenging, like going to the market for groceries, meeting a friend for coffee or even taking a shower.

I remember in the first days at the hospital, lying in my bed and feeling totally overwhelmed at the task of having to recharge my cell phone. I lay there thinking, all I need to do is get the charger out of my locker and plug it into the phone and then into wall. It was just too much. I spent a lot of time pacing the halls in the night, pacing the gardens in the day, then finally decided to take the medication that was offered to me on an as needed basis by the doctors. This was a turning point of sorts, because the symptoms of the anxiety began to slowly subside for the first time in months. There was a ray of hope as I began to feel some relief.

I would like to take this time to mention that I was met with great kindness and compassion at the hospital in Germany, and the experience I had there both with the medical staff as well as with the other patients changed me in a profound and meaningful way. You know the old saying, that which does not kill you only makes you stronger. I believe that 100%. This experience which at first brought me to my knees, then opened a door for me, teaching me humility, acceptance, compassion and non-judgement. It became a spiritual turning point where for the first time I lay prostrate like a child in an open field, fully open to new ideas and new ways of thinking. I wouldn't wish it on anyone, and I hope that I never sink to those depths again, but I can honestly say that I am grateful for having had that experience, because without it I wouldn't be who I am today.  

My heart goes out to anyone who is suffering from severe depression or anxiety, and all that I can say is to trust in the fact that all things are temporary. This too shall pass, but seeking help and not being afraid to talk about it with others is the key. Don't be afraid, it is an illness like every other illness that requires treatment, sometimes medication, and a lot of support from loved ones and friends. You wouldn't hesitate to go to the doctor or hospital if your appendix burst.Talk about it as much as you need to with whomever you need to. 

For the past year, I have shared my story with only people who are close to me. In a way, it has been my dirty little secret. By openly publishing this story, I hope to help in the fight to destigmatise mental illness.