From my works done during my time in Deutschland, this one dates back to 2007, part of a series of black and white, very personal works I completed.
much like C3-PO, I’m not much of a storyteller but perhaps this small event can help explain “So What now”…

One day, in the great city of Berlin, I left my apartment, a walking ball of fatigue and stress.
I needed some fresh air, so I proceeded to fire up the ol’ posterior rockets that were necessary to lift myself from the chair in my lab, to which I had been solidly attached for way too long.

I must have had a Charlie Brown storm cloud over me that day because I had only taken about 30 steps down Kastanienallee, when a woman, I’d have to say in her 40s, beautiful, tall if i remember properly, stopped on her bike, stood and said to me: “HEY. Smile a bit! Don’t let those germans get to you.”

Now no matter how you interpret that piece of dialogue right NOW, back THEN, it made so much sense. And to have a random stranger inject herself into my dark cloud of crap, well, it made a difference.
It hadn’t made me less stressed or anxious and the only berliners I knew were good berliners… but it left a monument within my mind, a sort of idea, a seed planted, that would perhaps germinate a little bit from within that tainted shit soil and become a positive notion I would hold on to.

And this illustration, if I can label it as such, is a testament to that state of mind I was in during that week or most certainly, if i can correclt recall, that month.

Maybe then…just maybe, even, it’s the way you might feel right now, or at the very least, the way you felt, at one point in time.

Take it easy…and smile ! It’s easier than you think
…and instead of taking that anxiety pill, listen to some power metal. It’s healthier.

- Justin Odderside -