Daily Super High

Repentant Return

Relaxation is the reward for successful adaptation. The more relaxed I am, the better my balance. The better my balance, the more energy I can absorb and turn into my own strength.

Ö... 1994 

Every evening she examines her son. Doris searches her armpits and pubic area for the causes of meningitis. The fear of tick-borne encephalitis runs deep in her mother's caring body. It is mixed with diffuse and concrete fears and an eternal litany in the back of her head. The pressure is currently intensified by news of anthrax pathogens that have been trapped in the Siberian permafrost for ages and are escaping from thawed carcasses in this far too hot summer. The anthrax spores are spreading rapidly. They are decimating reindeer herds and their herders. Indigenous communities have to be evacuated and quarantined.

Melting glaciers drive pandemics. Twenty-eight previously unknown virus groups have been found by scientists in thaw water. There are also ancient varieties of smallpox, Spanish flu and bubonic plague.

Doris' grandmother Schäufele, who was born in the next village, called the tick inspection "lausen". Mothers louse their children and, if the occasion arises, also those of other people. Grandma's expertise included lots of warnings. No water was allowed to be drunk after eating cherries. The supposed poison of the rowan berry was invoked. A sunken world of reproaches, rushes and calendar sayings: a rationalized superstition revealed itself in the irrevocable, regardless of whether we were talking about the weather or raising children.

"Hal-lob-lob-lob."

This is the Paddock call. Doris' parents' property is called Paddock - in German: Koppel - in the family's household. Keno's grandmother calls her grandson to dinner. The boy enjoys the privileges of a crown prince, while his mother and her currently absent lover Raimund Freitag are outlaws and are not invited to a meal in the main house. Not even for Sunday coffee and cake.

Keno escapes from his mother. He sweeps through the door into the freedom of a good life. A mouse darts over cracked floorboards and disappears under a scratched dresser. Doris rejects her reluctance. After her repentant return, she and her followers were assigned a shack. The stall above the stable is a punishment. Doris is ready to repent. She knows that people will still find her stubborn and ungrateful.

She stretches. Doris is flexible in every way. She has no other choice. She listlessly teaches courses at the Pforzheim adult education center. She fiercely wipes gym floors. Doris' best childhood friend is now her best employer. Michaela Frankenstein takes the yoga business to the extreme with impertinence. Despite her highly effective charisma, Michaela is depressed and alcoholic.

The experts move in gray areas of imposture. While they keep themselves going with drugs, they suggest to their customers that they can mobilize the activism of their self-healing powers as effortlessly and turbo-charged.

Both went through the school of the unique Fürchtegott Hölzenbein. The tax officer accredited in Ludwigsburg was a yoga stickler with extraordinary skills.