Escaping out of Bathroom Windows

Last night I watched together with my daughter the movie “Where’d You Go, Bernadette”. Cate Blanchett brilliantly portrayed Bernadette Fox, who seems to have it all; a loving husband, a brilliant daughter. But the one thing, which is missing – is her.

Bernadette Fox was not just an artist but a star architect some twenty years ago before she got married and settled down with her husband and daughter in Seattle. There she almost becomes a victim of the madness of society.

Her main struggle is that she had stopped being creative a long time ago to support her family. And while she is trying to hide her struggles with normality and adjustment issues, she is of course surrounded by the so-called super mums, which some of us are afraid of.

Her neighbor Audrey, which is played by the brilliant Kristin Wig, blames her for not making the slightest efforts to settle into the local community and another mum, Soo-Lin will eventually even try to steal her husband, Elgie. Needless to mention that the daily school runs don’t occur without any confrontations.

Things get out of control after Audrey's home gets flooded, which has something to do with blackberry bushes, which Bernadette had grown on her side of the wall. And Soo-Lin, who had started working for Bernadette's husband, suggests an intervention and a longer stay in a psychiatric clinic.

With a psychiatrist, an agent from the FBI, Soo Lin, and her husband waiting for her in the living room, Bernadette eventually only sees one option. She jumps out of the window of her bathroom and runs away and towards the next big challenge in her life, which she had waited so desperately for. This challenge will ultimately save her.

After the movie finished, I explained to my daughter that us parents had life before we became parents and remembered that the focus went on her after she was born. Many parents might not realize it, but unless they find ways to reinvent themselves, they will start taking backseats in life.  

Society won’t allow us to admit that there are moments in life when we just want to follow Bernadette's example and jump out of those bathroom windows. I experienced that time when we returned from New York to Germany in summer 2024 and suddenly struggled with the so-called normality.

While I considered buying a family home in my university town, Hanover, I found myself having daily lunches with my colleagues at that government-owned bank. They complained about having to carry the cushions of their garden chairs inside every night or not having decorated the house for Christmas yet.

I would go to those evenings in my daughter's school and meet the other parents, whom I didn’t have much in common with. People were owning houses and not considering giving anything back to society. I remember others voting for right-wing parties who promised to kick out all foreigners out of Germany, while my kids are half Colombians.

What I was missing at that time was diversity, working and living with people with different cultural backgrounds after having been abroad for more than 24 years. And I started to feel after less than 3 months that it was time to look at alternatives again after we had ended up at the wrong place.  

I think that we all feel sometimes that even jumping out of a bathroom window might not help anymore. Sometimes we are stuck in life. In those situations, it is important to find the strength to keep on going and to make the right decisions instead of throwing ourselves into a midlife crisis and fathering two children outside of marriage. That happened to a friend of mine from Hannover, which led to the divorce from her husband.

How important are passion and creativity for us? I really think it depends on what kind of people we are. After my daughter was born, I felt forceful about putting the focus on parenthood and trying to survive and writing for magazines, which started when I was on paternity leave.

But when I wrote my books “Live as Heroes” and “Stonewall 1969” in 2019 and 2020, I felt that was the time, when I was getting my voice back. Suddenly I was not just running in between home, work, and the office. I started to discuss issues that mattered in my community, such as the fight against AIDS or supporting the LGBTQ rights movement and raising donations for good causes.

Since we moved to Barcelona, we have been surrounded by diversity again, and I love that. My colleagues are from Spain, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, France, Italy, and other countries. I am proud of being a busy parent with different jobs and the aim to obtain a doctoral degree.

But what I am deeply grateful for in life are the friends who support us in those challenging times when we simply want to run away. I met my British friend Will on a playground in Hannover. We became friends instantly and kept in close contact after leaving Hannover for England and Spain, which made us happier people again.

When I look at Bernadette Fox and my own journey, then I really think that it is important to be at the right place for us and, most importantly, to be happy and content with the life that we have created. Sometimes we need to move away, and sometimes we need to stay where we are right now.

I don’t consider one way to be better than the other one as long as we don’t consider jumping out of bathroom windows. I had a high school reunion last weekend, and while we were having dinner, one of my former classmates pointed out that everyone at the table seemed happy and content with their life.

Some of us started their families earlier and others later; some of us had studied at college and others didn't. Some of us had been involved with their local communities more than others. But no matter what path we had chosen, we all seemed to be at a good place in life.

We left high school a very long time ago, and what I really enjoyed about that evening was enjoying each other’s company and not being interested in who was the homeowner and who wasn’t.

The evening was more about us coming together again and realizing that we should do that more often.

I would like to take that opportunity on this sunny Saturday morning in Barcelona to wish you all a lovely weekend.