The Sickbay Logs

Most people my age would call me crazy, for standing up at five to go to church at half past on sunday morning, voluntarily that is. Most people my age wouldn't be thrilled at sitting in a church for nearly two hours while it's not even light outside, and their parents were still sleeping comfortably in their warm beds. And even I had my doubts if that was such a good idea, when I finally swung my legs out of my bed after the alarm had rung for the third time this morning, mostly because my muscles were still stiff and sore from my near-fall from a horse yesterday (I have then found that ones will, or at least my will, to cling onto a horse, while you're practically falling already, is directly, or maybe even exponentially proportional to the size of the horse, and this one was even higher than the 1,70 meter Safir).
But then again since when I am most people my age?

I am a catholic christian. And while I might not exactly be proud of the catholic part, I believe that there is some kind of god, and I find the idea that this entity has somehow suffered all of those large and little problems of human life somewhat comforting.
I'm not someone who needs to go to church every sunday, but every now and then and on high hollidays. And when I go to church, then I like to go to the church in my village, a) because I usually spend the weekends at home, b) because you know everyone and everyone knows you and c) because there's some sense of home connected to it. Appart from the most important reason, off course: because it's there.

So as easter is just about as high a holliday as it can get, I went to church today, at half past five in the morning. I stopped by my grandma ten minutes earlier, because I had promised to take her, otherwise she wouldn't dare go outside in the darkness, and then we spend the next two hours in church. I know most people are dreaded at the thought of standing up earlier than they have to on a normal day, when you have vacation and then spending two hours in church, but I can tell you, it's worth it, it totally is.

At first all is dark the church is only lit by the flickering shine of the easter-fire outside, and although all the rows are filled, there is complete expectant silence (appart from the occasional clatter of an accidentally falling candle). Then the priest starts by sanctifying the fire and the easter candle outside at the fire, which thanks to modern devices can also be heard in the church, which still is completely dark.
Then the priest, the deacon who is carrying the easter candle, and the altar servers enter the church in silence, stopping three times, with the deacon (who, by now, can sing) chanting "Lumen Christi!" (The light of christ) and the people answer "Deo Gracias!" (Thanks to God). During those stops the two altar servers who also bear candles go into the rows, lighting the candles people brought, who then give the light on to the others in the row, so that by the time the priest has reached the altar the whole churh is dimly lit in gloomy candle light.

The next part consists of a singer than reciting the gregorian chants that are usually sung in the easter night, and just let me tell you, we have a good singer. Through these recitals, in the flickering shine of god knows how many candles, you can almost believe you are in the church of a medival monastary, although the church around you is definitely barock style.
After the end of that chant, the night part goes on some more, with lections, for example of the exit from Egypt, and songs, without the organ, mind you. Here it needs to be said, that although my village has a rather musical and well versed congregation, in this night I've never heard them sing without a singer starting off every single verse, and even then rather shyly.
And then, after a short lecture from the priest, it get's day.

With the priest chanting "Gloria in Excelsis Deo!" ( Glory to the Lord) the whole church is led up, suddenly sparkling in all it's magnificence (for our church has only been completely renovated a few years ago). The organ starts to play the prelude to the Prais the Conquerer of Death (a song only known in Germany I fear) in a majestetic way, all the bells are rung and when the congregation starts to sing, there is no sign of their former shyness. This is a moment you simply get washed up in, and I have to admit that I really strained my voice, still stiff in this early hours, but I didn't care.

The mess then ended with a normal service, just that it involed a little more singing and organ and ceremony than usual. And when it was over and we went outside, a beautiful sun was just rising over the houses behind the church.

There is something to that night that is special, something about the athmosphere in the church. Something that makes you not care that it is still in the middle of the night, that you are sitting around for two hours or that it is freezingly cold. When I went out, I noticed that quite a lot of kids had been in church, too, and not one had cried during the whole service, someting you don't have on normal sundays.
And it is a feeling that stays, when you go home with the rising sun, looking at the flowers that are slowly coming out of their nights sleep and listening to the song of the morning birds. A feeling of youth, of new begining and of hope, that what ever is going on, there is always a future.

Actually I had other plans, and I still don't know how it came that I ended up going to party with a few of my classmates. Originally I had planed yesterday to watch The Undiscovered Country and before that clean up a little and pack my things, for I'll be going home tomorrow. For that I had acquired some amount of sugary, cofeinated baverages (commonly refered to as "Coke") so that I could have watched until deep into the night, for today was our last day of school before our half-a-year-is-over-vacation.

Now, when I came back from grocery shopping, I was greeted with several overly cheerful voices calling my name, as soon as I had come onto our floor, followed by the question of: "Do you want to have a drink?"
Wondering what on earth their idea of a "drink" was, I simply set down my groceries in my room and then followed the voices of my classmates into the kitchen. I thought they might have prepared some kind of punch or something, and although I didn't really want any, I thought I could at least have a look.
In the kitchen two of my classmates were sitting at the table, where an different alcoholic drinks were set, or rather the mostly empty bottles, the amount of which must have been roughtly equal to the amount of cofeinated sugary drinks I had bought earlier. Together with them, another classmate and her boyfriend were sitting, having dinner.
When I appeared in the door I immediatly was offered a drink (again) and after some time, I finally accepted, mainly because a quite funny scene had evolved and I wanted to have a reason for standing around.
Obviously the two with the drinks, let's call them Ann and Hellen, were quite intoxicated already, and wanted to meet up with some other classmates to go to some place they called "The Boat", which however seemed to be not quite as easy, due to where the others curently were. It ended up the way that Ann went to meet with some other classmates and we, especially Hellen, was to call her, once another classmate, let's call her Susan, would be there. Then she'd come back and they'd all go to The Boat.
All this happened with a lot of discussion and texting back and forth and by the time all of the three were assembled in our kitchen (again), it was at least two hours, and from my point three drinks, later. Of course I was repeatedly asked, if I wanted to come with them. I refused at first, but in the end, they ended up, dressing me up and so finally I thought, why not?

As I am not usually one to go and "party" I soon thought of it as some kind of social study. I have adopted a way of thinking Vulcan whenever I'm annoyed with something or don't know what to do, and from the moment the already drunk pair of Ann and Hellen had started discussing stuff in a way that was right out hillarious to someone still relatively sober, I had decided there was no other way to deal with this.
Now, to understand what followed then, I have to explain the German / Bavarian laws concerning alcohol a little. The general legal drinking age is 18. Because of that most clubs only allow people of the age of 18 or above to enter. However around here one is allowed to drink "softer" alcoholic baverages, such as beer and wine, already at the age of 16. Thus people who are 16 or 17 may enter clubs already, but only in the presence of a parent or other person in charge.
A lot of kids use this to get into clubs in presence of a friend who is 18 already, but for that to work, they need to have some paperwork, which shows that the parents are ok with said friend to be the supervisor instead of them. And some clubs require some more specific paperwork than others, meaning that some are alright with a sheet of paper with the young persons data and the signatur of the parents and supervisor on it, but some also require copies of the IDs of all involved.
Now, Ann still is only 17. The plan was that Hellen would be her supervisor and she had the neccessary paperwork, just that when we had started out, they noticed that for some reason it also required a copy of her ID, which was the only thing we had not.
We had started out at quater past nine, and walked down to The Boat about an hour later. Ann had photographed her ID and obviously send it to someone who would print it out for her.

For some reason the entrance into the boat was free up until half past ten, so we decided to all wait for her aquaintance and then try to get in together, the emphasis being on try as the security guys of The Boat were said to be rather unfair about the whole supervisor thing.
And so we waited.
And we waited.
And we waited.
And while we waited, it transpired to me that:
a) There was another club, roughly translated called "The Magic Mountain".
b) With the entrance into either The Boat or The Mountain one also (theoretically) got entrance into the other.
c) The security guys at The Mountain were much more likely to let Ann in together with Hellen.
d) However Ann would only be accepted in, if she went in together with Hellen, and only if Hellen hadn't been in already.
From those facts the plan arose that if Ann couldn't get into The Boat we would go into The Mountain and then try with the stamp from The Mountain to get into The Boat.

However, the guy supposed to have Ann's papers, didn't show up until half past ten, and so shortly before the free-entrance-deadline came up, it was decided that Susan and I should go in, taking the free entrance, get our stamps and get out again, and Ann would pay for Hellen's entrance later. If she got admitted, that is.
So we went in, got our stamps and got out again, earning quite strange looks from the security guys, and went on waiting with the others. As it was slightly raining and Susan already had complained about her hair getting wet on the way, we were waiting in a half open parking garage. It was damp, cold and miserable. And we waited for another half an hour, at least.

When the guy finally showed up, we decided to finally try, if Ann would get admitted, after all she had all the neccessary papers, but on three sheets of paper. What happened now was that the security guy looked at the papers once, then gave them back and shooed her away, stating that he was not her accountand and she should have it all on one. Susan trying to require, what exactly was the problem, didn't get quite far either, and so we decided to retreat so we wouldn't all get banned.
So finally, at about eleven, we went into The Mountain. The security guys there didn't have any problem with that, the one who admitted us even joked that only two of The Boat's security guys could read and write.

The plan here was, to party until twelve and then, when free admission was closed here, too, (obviously the two clubs didn't agree on common admission times), we would get our stamps here, go back to The Boat and see if Ann would be admited there with the stamp from The Mountain.
In the meantime I found that my classmate's idea of party basically was drinking ethanol-containing baverages and dancing to very loud music in very crowded areas. Talking was hard already in most parts of the club, besides I knew non of my classmates common friends, so I simply followed them around, until finally I had lost all of them.
At that point I decided to have a look around myself. What I saw was, that the club was basically constructed out of three rooms (excluding the foyer and the toilets), each with a bar, constructed aound a bigger, roughly square room (also with a bar), where the music was loudest and which was called the dance floor.
Obviously the purpose of the dance floor is that everyone wants to get in there for dancing, although the doors are open and one could here the music just as well outside, where there would also have more space. It was as if one ran against a wall of people, once one stepped through the door.
However it seemed mandatory to enter the dance floor if one wanted to dance, which obviously wasn't more than a random sequence of more or less rhythmic moves sideways, or obscure moves of the arms. This usually resulted in a lot of stepping on one anothers feet and bumping into one another.

After I had been picked up again by my company and persuaded to "dance" with them, at some point we found that it was nearly twelve already, and it was decided that we would try to all get onto The Boat again. We crossed the streets to the other club (which by the way litteraly is a boat), mind you, without checking out our jackets first, because otherwise we would have had to check them in again if we had to come back later, which then would have cost us again.
Back at The Boat the security guys recognized Ann and did not let her in (which I had already expected), not even at her argument that the guys at The Mountain had. We were already standing in the cold for some time, and tried to get Ann to not pick a fight with the security guys, when somehow her boyfriend turned up.

Her boyfriend, I have to say here, had been on The Boat the whole time, not answering his mobile phone, and now had obviously been shooed out by some common friend of theirs. He was about as drunk as Ann was at that point, which was drunk enough to make me wonder how they even managed to still walk in a straight line. There then followed an interplay with a lot of discussion, complayning and kissing between the two while we all were still standing out in the rain, without jackets.
When we finally decided that we had been freezing long enough, and finally got through to them, we proposed that the couple would go back to The Mountain and we would go onto The Boat for half an hour (although I didn't understand what was the sense of that) and come to pick them up later.

The Boat essentially was the same as the other club, just that it was bigger, even more crowded and a boat. We were dancing for some time, getting bounced around some more, and I tried not to think about the things I could feel lying on the floor through the soles of my shoes.
When we finally got back to The Mountain we met some other classmates, one of which then called Hellen outside, because otherwise the security guy was about to call the cops, because Ann had picked a fight with them. Looking back at it that was the most hillarious part of the night. Back then it was a welcome distraction at least for me (not so much for the others I believe).
We all rushed outside, and tried to get Ann to take a Taxi home, but without her boyfriend, for Susan wanted to sleep in her room that night. Ann first refused and then asked each of us for our house-keys, so she'd at least get into the residential home. Her room was obviously unlocked.
We refused to give her any of our keys and for some time the discussion went back and forth, with us having to explain everything again every two minutes, for she seemed to forget everything else, once she laid eyes onto her equally drunk boyfriend again.
In the end, after another at least half an hour of standing around in the rain, it was decided that the one who had taken the others of our class in her car should drive her home and Hellen would open the door for her and make sure her boyfriend didn't stay. However she didn't succeede in the latter part.

Until the others came back, we went back inside and the rest of the evening was like the beginning: Too much alcohol, too many people and too loud, too bad music. Only that I was growing increasingly tired.
At around three it was collectively decided we should go home, all but Hellen that was, who had found a guy and still wanted to stay. Because of that, and because of the afore mentioned boyfriend sleeping in Ann's room, Susan finally ended up with me.

Surprisingly we did not oversleep. I didn't even have a hangover, only a huge lack of sleep, I compensated with the sugary cofeinated drinks I mentioned in the beginning. Still I believe that the activity of "partying" interferes too much in my ability to study for the little amount of pleasure it brings.
However this has been a most fascinating study, although it brought up more questions than answers. Still, I think I'm not going to do it again.

Before you read on, don't worry! (Or rather don't panic?)
As far as I know I am not depressed and still very far from suicidal or anything along those lines. I've only had a pretty shitty time this month, although, as you might remember, my birthday was somewhere in that month too.
It's like every time I think, well, you got over that crisis, and everything's going to be OK again from now on, something else is crashing in on me.
To start with, today was my aunts funeral, which had gotten to me much more than I ever thought I would. Although I hope that my funeral (hopefully at some very distant day) will be quite different, I had to try very hard not to cry, mostly because I didn't have any cleenex with me.
Afterwards I had managed to pull myself up enough that I thought I'd make it through the rest of the day, when on the drive back home, the car radio switched on just in time for the news, which told us that another aircraft had crashed, a german one, and this time in the french alpes. There had been 150 people on that plane, 67 of which were Germans, 16 students, 2 teachers and 2 very little children, of which most likely non had survived.
And since then I can't keep myself from thinking: "What if I had been on that plane?"
It's pretty illogical, because I've only been on a plane twice, to Ireland and back. Also I don't plan to take a flight in the near future, especially not to Barcelona, but still, the thoughts are there. And they don't seem to go away.
The usual trick of hiding in one of my books, or movies, or any other fictional reality has stopped working long ago already. I feel like I want to run, but something keeps my feet on the ground, always pulling me back to reality. I'd literally like to run. Just go outside for an hour and run or walk or bike or climb, but that only works in the forest or open fields and there's only more city nearby.
Overall I feel like the personal chew-toy of some very sadistic canine deity. And I belive I'm not alone with that.
By now I believe how Terry Pratchet and Douglas Addams got their ideas. After all it sounds like something they would have come up with:
Humanity as a chew-toy for a giant, drooling dog, god of the universe.

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