Ludwigsburg's Flea

Warm Ludwigsburg evening. Birds chirping, sun setting, Neckar murmurring. The dark used to come at 11, making the evening longer. That walk was my first impression of my host family. Speaking about their traditions, vicinity, where they go to dentist, they made me feel at home.

Church was the tallest building there. It is an old tradition of Germans as it brought luck and prosperity. There were not many people we met, but all of them felt to be close-knit with the family. It was not some form of politeness, but rather a true relation.

They were still young, in their late 40s, and they have been living there for more than a decade. Weird. I thought people want to be as alive as possible while young, living and striving in the hustle and bustle of modern cities. They chose a serene vicinity, though. I asked why. An atypical answer followed.

Anonymous Leben or how Georg Simmel put it "Geistesleben". True, there are many people in big cities, but as big is their indifference towards you. You meet them once in a lifetime, and that's practically all. In countryside, they continued, you form connections, networking. Not the one for the sake of benefit, but rather human. We are social creatures. Telling me how their kids used to play with their neighbours, tears of happiness flowed down their cheecks. The kind, rare and pleasant ones.

Anonymous Leben is somthing we should fear and avoid at all cost. It is comfortable, but life-dangerous in the long term. Communities, even small keep us human.

Wilderness of the nearby forest, calmness of the Neckar, and tens of thousands of steps with warm discussions made up the Vibe, the Family Flea