It’s Nick’s birthday today and I’m going to leave for Tübingen and some celebrations now. I remember that special Sunday four years ago when Nadine received the good news and got very excited. We went to the hospital immediately to pay the little guy our respects – that’s when the picture above was taken. Nick has already asked if it would be possible for Nadine to return for his birthday. He had to be told that he must come to terms with me as an replacement.

Nick always reminds me a lot of Nadine: his innocence, purity, truthfulness and his dedication for everything he does. His naive inability of acting strategically or politically and his incapacity to suppose bad intentions behind somebody else’s actions. And the genuine joy he shows when someone does him a favour. Childlike features that Nadine kept throughout her whole life even though they made her highly vulnerable. But they also turned her into that good angel I could never do anything else but outright love and protect.

P.S.: The song is called “child like an angel” and is sung by Dave Kusworth.

I have to admit that I completely underestimated the value of having a grave. Nadine and me always thought that her body could be burned and the ashes simply distributed amongst her relatives. Thanks to German law, this is not allowed and I do have a proper place outside of my home now where I can pilgrimage and relate to her.

Compared to the other resting places around, Nadines hill has considerably flattened. It is also not as grey as the others because we covered it with darker and more fertile soil. But  protected by the limbs of her tree the place stays mostly dry. Last night we had some heavy rain but her burial site remained almost untouched. Knowing that she loved nature and growth, I started to pour one watering can there each time I visit.  This had some effect already – just compare the picture above with the one from my last post ten days ago!

It was very hard for me to visit Nadine’s grave this weekend and it implied a lot of crying. On Sunday, it was exactly four months since she passed away. I do of course know that such dates do not mean a thing, but they are qualified to trigger memories anyway.

On Friday, our friend and Nadine’s former professor back in her days in Kansas visited me. This did not only trigger memories, but also gave me some new knowledge and insights. The two of us were talking the whole day long and he told me that, in his opinion, I was the one who saw Nadine the way she wanted to be and so she could become that person. And that she trusted me from the very beginning so that this became possible.

Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate these words very much, but they didn’t make my walk to the Waldfriedhof on Saturday any easier. They made me feel my loss and the thought, that all of our great togetherness is now buried beyond the little rock pictured above even harder. Doesn’t feel fine, but at least the tears go by after each  visit and mostly stay away for the rest of the day then.