The spiral staircase of life

A few days ago I noticed the total absence of the Bauernbergpark man. All his belongings were gone too. Before that he had been the proud owner of a large tarpaulin that had covered all his other things. There had been carton boxes of different sizes, one of them containing tobacco packets (predominantly Maverick), lots of bottles, stones and gravel, blankets, jackets a backpack, two trolleys and a sleeping bag. Then, suddenly everything was gone. Did someone take it from him, just cleaned the park benches, took all these precious goods away. Where did he go?
Yesterday night I saw him again, sitting there, doing some weird motions with his hands. He had nothing.
Today I passed by his two favorite benches again. There was a plastic "Lidl" bag with some bottles and a blanket. So I think he is about to start all over again.
While we sit inside our warm apartments, playing Minecraft or hugging our loved ones, he starts to rebuild his mediocre empire again from nothing but a few pieces of gravel and with the help of a few nice people who obviously help him.
This gives me hope for all future catastrophes. I think we can always trust the world to get us back on our feet again. This is also one of our weaknesses, because with this hope and trust, we sometimes forget to keep on walking without any help. Maybe next time we get back on our feet without touching anything.
Maybe everything will collapse pretty soon. If so we can be sure that there will be something new, something even better and somehow worse.
That is the spiral staircase of life, the universe and everything.

Synthetic PhD

Between my walks in Bauernbergpark I travel. I was in Berlin another time.
First I met my wannabe taxi driver actor friend, who has moved from London to the German capital.
Then I attended a conference on synthetic biology, life and art at the Berlin Brandenburg Academy of Sciences. The most interesting aspect of it all was the Butterbrezel on the flight back.
I didn't know that you can make tiny holes into a Brezel and fill them with butter. I'll never say again that the Germans have no idea of haute cuisine.
The conference was a big success as regards applying an interdisciplinary approach. Maybe it also inspires my own work, although, so far I don't know how.
In the nighttime I read about Plato. It is entertaining but makes me wonder how he was able to influence christian philosophy to such an extent. Maybe I can read about that in a later chapter.
However, due to climate change, winter arrives late this year. That is good for the Bauernbergpark man, who can still stay outside, but bad for winter tourism.
I had another conversation with my PhD supervisor today. It ended in me having no idea what to do and us  together having birthday cake and coffee.
To sum up: My new thesis title will be "The Impact of the Butterbrezel on Synthetic Biology", nah...better "Platonic cosmology and the Bauernbergpark man". I don't know.
Maybe I start all over again, reading some Max Weber stuff instead.
Sometimes I wish I had the courage to sit next to the man in Bauernbergpark and drink a bottle of beer with him instead of wondering about my PhD work. Sometimes I wish I had followed another line of work.
Nevertheless yesterday a colleague told me: "We always want to do the opposite of what we are doing at the moment." So I am waiting for the next moment, in which I know that I do exactly the right thing. Here it is. Nice. Bye bye.