the wind harp at freudenberg palais.
freudenberg palais is a true insider's tip, an interesting & playful place for young & old. freudenberg palais offers a field of experiences, experimental, interactive & dialogic. for example you can listen to a wind harp in the gardens of the palais, set your foot on a bare foot path & discover all the different types of soil / undergrounds or you can step into the palais & explore all kinds of acoustic, visual & spiritual surprises. it's a place that wants to make you feel, touch, hear, listen and see your surroundings in a deeper way, stepping into a realm of human experience that people rarely explore. i love visiting this place from time to time, especially the garden, as it connects you to the sense of just being, not planning. you are taking things as they are, and you enjoy the gifts they give you, by just existing. i feel like the whole complex is a work of art and you need to experience it in full to be charmed by it.
i currently have a hard time with accepting & enjoying things as they are, my job is demanding more and more from me, with less support, and there's a dark cloud above the sky that looks like it's going to burst soon, like there's something in the air that feels like something's going to go down. my guess is that my company will soon announce insolvency or the selling of the company to a bigger one, but before they do that, they want to bring the company down, with employee cuts & an accumulation of work that's just not manageable anymore. ( for myself i already decided to try my best in the working hours i have, but not do any overtime hours anymore ). i need to make a cut. i don't work well under stress at all, and i need to tell myself: this is all you can carry out, you've got no more energy for more, stop. it's hard for me, since my work ethics are the other way round. if i don't accomplish my work in a way i am satisfied with, i will add hours until i finally manage them. but thing is, the work never ends anymore. it's a constant sequence of work being replaced by new work, and there is no final cut on it anymore.
and i cannot do this. it's affecting the quality of my work and affecting my mental stability ( which is not the best anyway ). additionally employees get fired, and they aren't replaced by new ones, as the company is focussing on staff savings at the moment. and with less people, the work is simply overflowing.
right now, i really don't know anymore where my head is, not to mention that seeing colleagues go is messing with my brain, since they seem to have options, where when i look at my own situation, i don't see any at all. because in the retail branch it's just simple fact that every single company out there is doing the same thing at the moment, plus, they don't have any newcomers coming in anymore, since apprenticeships aren't desirable for young folks with big dreams in their heads anymore. everything just feels like it's a downward spiral, and i'm in the middle of it, losing all of myself in it.
and i wonder how i possibly can move out of that situation. if i start searching for a new job, i don't want it to be in retail anymore. i am so done with all the schemings of retail. i'm over the pressure & the customers.
this is my biggest hurdle. if i wasn't so over it, maybe i could see a door that would lead me outside, by simply starting at a different retail company, but to be honest, the same problems are everywhere. and i don't want to step into the same trap a second time. but it's the retail job i've grown up in and it's all i am good at. there are no hobbies or talents i can resort to. i am not an expert in anything else, only have experience in the job i've been working in the past 12 years. i do have interests, yes, but those interests aren't deep enough to build something out of them.
people tell me i should start a new educational path, but i have commitments and starting to study or beginning a new apprenticeship aren't paying those commitments. i have to pay a car, and insurances, rent and food. i also want to live. i don't have much else next to my job, except the prospects of vacations & travelling places when i don't have to work. and to be honest, i don't even travel that much. in recent years it's been reduced to only germany & a little bit of france, places that don't cost an arm & a leg. i would like to travel to more places, but i cannot afford it and i don't have so much time on my hands. i don't like travelling for 3 days and only seeing the surface of a place, i want to dive in deep into the culture, the environments. and i realize i should probably get my foot into the travelling industry, or something to do with architecture or nature, but all i can think of is that i would have to start learning from point zero which brings me back to the beginning, that i cannot afford not getting a monthly wage to pay off my living expenses.
it's a neverending cycle. like the snake that bites itself in the tail, the ouroboros. and i am tumbling around all kinds of ideas, but i cannot seem to find a path out of that cycle, a precise solution on what steps to make or which path to take with my limited experience or knowledge in various fields. because... i don't see myself in retail anymore. like i said, i'm sick of it. but how else am i going to move forward if that is all that i am able to give, if that is what i'm best in?
so, as i'm writing this, i realize i need to make an arch back to the initial subject, which is the freudenberg palais with it's beauiful grounds, a place where you can forget the dire life you are leading and just focus on the sense of existing and how wonderful it can be, without all the societal pressures you have to endure daily. why can't we lead a life like this, that is reduced to experiencing what is around us, with all of our senses. why do the requirements of modern day society stray away so far from what we should deem as important? because i could live such a life and never get tired of it. a life without having to fear skidding down the poverty path, without the fear of not being able to pay your expenses, a life without feeling the pressure to adapt to society's standards. why can't we have that? it'd make things so much easier.
nothing is without reason.
nothing is without reason.
nothing is without reason.
sculptural bits and pieces in the garden.
tonewoods in the forest.
dead wood root sculptures.
i really love tree roots. the ramification of those once life-spending tangles is a concept i absolutely love. and isn't everything a ramification of things?
roots alley.
yeah, i probably overdid it with the root photos.
thinking barefooted. the path for bare feet. another part of the garden i truly adore.
you get to walk on metal, sand, leaves, grass, stones, barks and a whole slew of other materials, while stopping at different stations that make contemplate the world a bit different. since it was a rather cold day, though, i decided against barefooting. ( but normally i am the first to try it out. i visited freudenberg a month later again, and you can be sure i definitely was walking on bare feet the whole time :) )
nature awakening.
escaping
decaying
of course the effect is better with the german words for those two words, since the basis stays the same & only the prefixes change. the overall feeling of those two words combined is one of an equal meaning.
progress
regress
insurgance
distance
stagnancy
rocky paths.
old bricks & frames.
walking around the palais, admiring the blooming cherries.
relaxing & taking in the springtime view.
overlooking the playground.
after my brief time inside the palais' garden, i decided to check out the neighborhood. just around the corner there's this very modern district with residential areas all over the place. the juxtaposition of this is, as you well know by the now, something that always makes me fascinated. a place of quiet & solitude ( in winter & early spring to be honest ) can exist in a big area of modern disquietude, and it exists in a beautiful way, like a pacification betweent two alienated entities.
the red high-rise of the schelmengraben district. schelmengraben was once built in the 60ies & 70ies of the last century on the principles of ernst may, a pretty famous postwar architect. it's a district that's well-known for being a social combustion point. the high-rises in this area are actually not in the best shape & the red high-rise was in the news lately as it's withering away for decades now. it still is a very distinctive building and i feel it actually should be more taken care of, since it's such an interesting one. it is also the focal point of the whole district, a meeting place where people come together & establish relationships & connections. it's kind of a shame to let this building fall into disrepair, it could be so much more for the people in this area.
another high-rise which i feel in love with. it looks so space-y & alien!
i can actually imagine myself living inside one of the flats, even though i'm more into tiny houses & old structures when it comes to home dreams.
the tiny windows are pretty strange, though. i wonder how much light falls into those flats.
the hatching patterns are a nice detail of the building.
proof that nature & modern architecture work well with each other sometimes.
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