I went to the Katharinenhospital today to fetch Nadine’s paitings from the exhibition and to meet her art therapist. We were talking for a while and it was good to hear someone else speaking about her fondly. She would have never dared to think of herself that way, but she was a person who could definitely leave an impression.

On my way I passed the university park where I used to take Nadine last autumn in order to collect chestnuts for little Nick. Now, the leaves are falling and there are chestnuts all over the place again – but there is no Nadine anymore. Even though this still makes me terribly sad I recognized some changes over the last one or two months: Thinking of her doesn’t always feel like getting my heart ripped out anymore. Instead, I often feel a more calm and warm sadness. It seems like grief gets slowly substituted by melancholy.

But, like it is said in that Dave Kusworth song she’s been listening to over nd over again in winter 2015/2016: there’s a place in my heart where she will always stay. And I would steal her from heaven If I only could…

The Stutttgart Cancer Center is going to celebrate its 5th anniversary with open doors for patients and their relatives on September 23rd.  It’s a Saturday and there will be guided tours and workshops plus an exhibition by the art therapy group. The therapist asked me to bring some of Nadine’s works around so that they can be shown too. I like the idea that the pictures she painted with all of her heart will receive some posthumous recognition. For the details of the event please visit the website of the Stuttgart Cancer Center.

A few weeks ago I told you about the new Waxahatchee album Nadine would have loved. I kept my promise to listen to it for her over and over on my walks to the Waldfriedhof and I will continue to do so until next Friday. Then, Waxahatchee will come to the Manufaktur at Schorndorf  and play a gig. Please join me there if you like to!

On her new album, there is that slow and sad song that always reminds me of the calm mood in our flat in the night Nadine passed away. When she tapered off, time seemed to stand still and every moment she lived a little more also meant a moment she died a little more…

Though Nadine’s fate was terrible, she rarely complained. We had our incredible sad moments, but complaining seemed to be mostly alien to her. I once wrote here that she was no fighter and with that I meant fighting against something. Her strength was to endure things, no matter how injust or undeserved they were. Which requires another kind of fighting spirit and that’s what my brave darling girl showed throughout her ordeal.

When it became clear that our journey together would end way too soon, she said she wished that we have met earlier in life. I used the weekend to search for an old ticket to the movie “Following”, but I couldn’t find it anymore. The movie itself stems from 1998, but we must have seen it in 2006 or maybe 2005, when a friend of mine took me to the cinema and brought her fellow student from Tübingen with her. We went for a drink afterwards and it took some time before we met again and became a couple in 2009.

Yes Nadine, I also wish I had met you earlier!