It takes cojones to interrupt a stranger on a Sunday morning to complain aus Deutschland, but apparently my new neighbour has no such qualms about cannabis.
There are quite a few challenges afoot in my life right now, thankfully made a bit easier by my recent win in a two year plus tussle with my health insurer over the requirement to underwrite my cannabis prescription. Not to mention also thanks to the decision by a court earlier this summer to agree that medical documentation trumps the BtMG.
As a result, I guard my sanctuary for what it is.
Regardless, as of yesterday morning, on a wonderfully quiet Sunday, that my leisurely routine was interrupted by two strong pulls on my doorbell that were insistent enough to not be ignored. I decided to deal with it by trying to figure out what the issue might be, especially as the bell pusher was a lurker in my hallway. Ignoring intrusions from the outside is a great deal easier, and my general policy. If I don’t know you are coming, forget dropping in for a surprise visit. You won’t find me “in”, even if I am.
On Sundays, a day even everyday German law protects to the extent that vaccuming on the Sabbath is verboten, I am even harder to find.
But this was no street intrusion. This person was right outside my door as a quick peep through the eyehole ascertained.
Thus it was that I opened the door to an angry young German woman I had never seen before, in her late thirties or early forties, clearly just home from her early morning run. I on the other hand, while certainly contemplating the gym, a losing proposition already to a leisurely breakfast while entertaining my kitties, was still clad in my robe with hair unbrushed.
“You need to stop smoking pot. You have no right to do so,” she said, in English yet jumping straight to the point in a very Deutsch weg. Clearly, she had done her homework about my Müttersprache. At this point there are quite a few recent additions, read millennials in my building. It is kind of a mix between retired or retiring Germans of modest means (my next-door neighbour was a taxi driver for thirty years) and those a generation younger than I am who are getting good jobs in Frankfurt.
“Good morning to you, and yes I do,” I replied. “And if you want to call the cops, I will show them my documentation. Nothing they can do either”.
“But you are bothering your neighbours,” she said, briskly. My disability of course, was not of concern. I should just suffer for their benefit.
I looked her up and down in a way deliberately designed to make her angry. I have lived in this building now for eight years as of this fall, and as such, count as one of the longer-term residents. Not that I care. The law is the law, however unfair in some circumstances. I should know. In this case, a little inconvenience, particularly to a woman who has just moved in and decided to try to boss her neighbours around, is not high on my action item list of issues to remedy.
“How long have you lived here? What is your name?” I asked her.
“I don’t know your name either,” she huffily said.
I stared at her for about ten seconds, obviously not going to do anything or alter my pot smoking ways.
“Fucking junkie” I heard her say as she stomped up the stairs.
‘Küss meinem Arsch,” I replied to her retreating backside as I closed the door in a response that needs no translation.
I wonder what Germans like her are going to do after April 2024.
