RENEE'S WREASONS

Humans have gotten a lot wrong, but sometimes we get it right; I mean REALLY right. These are just a few gestures both large and small that make me cheerful:

WREADING BENJAMIN

Everything Walter Benjamin has ever written amazes me. He looks at the world in such fascinating detail. Sometimes, I wonder if history had not conspired against him, what other works he may have created.

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WATERING MAILMEN

When my grandmother was alive, she always left a glass of water on the front porch for the mailman. To be honest, I don't think he was that thirsty, but he drank it anyway to make her feel good. Kindness comes in an infinite multitude of tiny


exchanges.


LISTENING TO BOB

The other day, I was listening to Bob Dylan's Masters of War. What a powerfully lucid ballad against the powers that were, and still are, so dominant. Hearing that song reminds me of the potential of an individual's voice to speak the truth with such acuity.

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THROWING FISH BACK IN

Last week my four year old son cried when we ate fish. He said we should put them back in the sea. He's right. I have a lot to learn from him. Who knows, his generation might teach us how to deal with the environment in more responsible ways.



ADMIRING KURT

Sometimes I wonder what made Kurt Schwitters build the Merzbau three times. One bombed in Hanover, another one burned. It's amazing his spirit compelled him to keep on pursuing the project; in fact, it's absolutely logic defying. He reminds me that our breadth of imagination combined with determination might make us dream of other fantastical worlds.

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WATCHING FLIRTING

There is a bench at the corner of my house, just across the street. Every afternoon, a Moroccan boy meets with a Dutch girl. Although they sit without touching each other, the flirtation is incredible. Maybe their desire will do more to solve racial tensions in our city than any blue-suited politician with the best of rhetoric and intentions.


LOVING SOMEONE

For the past twelve years I've woken up next to the same person. I still enjoy seeing his face on the pillow. Together we are discovering that imperfection is pretty seductive stuff. It might be the very foundations of "getting it right".


I could go on and on... There is a lot to be both cheerful, and moreover, hopeful about.

- Renee Turner