It has been three  months today since I published my last blog text (“Why aren’t you working with Female scriptwriters?”) and since then several film and film political texts as well as statistical analyses are in the works, which I plan to publish soon, hopefully. In the meantime, here’s something quite different.

I’ll water a Tree Tonight

Everyone is talking about dry summers, about climate change, everyone is thinking about the environment – no, not everyone, of course. But many. Some? And many are wondering what to do, they commit to not taking domestic flights (even if they are cheaper than the train), have no car, do without plastic and disposable packaging as far as possible, always carry a shopping bag with them, buy only regional fruit and vegetables and so on. Now the question is whether this changes anything and whether it causes the environmental impact caused by big car- people or the ones taking 6 domestic flights every week or the permanent online shoppers, or whether it only calms one’s conscience, or whether it is simply a basic attitude, ultimately inconsistent, but a guideline for one’s own social or ecological aspirations. I don‘t really know. But I prefer doing something, however little it may be, to an “it doesn’t help anyway” attitude. But that is not really the topic today.

And enjoy Urban Flower Beds

Actually I only want to talk briefly about trees and plant beds, and ackknowledge that city plants are a good thing. And that we can be responsibility for it. Trees, green spaces, flowers, they are good for the urban climate (photosynthesis!), and for the social climate as well. Sitting on a bench in a small park or next to a flower tub is nicer than sitting in a concrete desert. Most of the time anyway. And when I walk through Berlin or cycle or run (urban running!) I am always happy when I see beautiful beds in tree slices. How imaginative and elaborate! Sometimes like a small jungle, sometimes a colorful conglomeration, sometimes a sea of flowers, and sometimes it’s just grass under a tree, but even that’s nicer than dry grey earth with garbage and dog poo mosaics. In the  vast majority of cases, the trees and bedding plants will not belong to the gardeners (I recently called the Green Space Office: They plant the trees and fix them with wooden poles, but do not lay the beds and are not responsible for their wooden or metal borders). That’s what some people do, who finance it out of their own pocket and simply start gardening. Awesome! And there are still many tree slices that could use sponsors and adoptive gardeners. Certainly not only in Berlin. So if you have something like that in your street, how about it? I also started it recently, at first simply because I felt sorry for the tree. I always watered it last summer, and now it gets a bed. Like most others in the street, it’s contagious! And if you don’t want to make a bed, then maybe just water the tree in front of your door during the dry summer months. Depending on their age, trees need 60 to 100 litres of water a week. That’s 6 to 10 normal buckets of water. So help! And please don’t throw garbage under the trees, and no cigarette butts either.

For the following gallery I put together some photos, which I have taken in the last days about wood and trees and tree slices. Just click on the first picture and walk through them. Everything else you can find in the captions. Don’t be surprised, it starts with an exhibition I visited recently.