Carl and Gerlinde (IX)
… is that the question? For Carl’s neighbour Konrad, there is no question! The ever-active gentleman had already plastered his entire roof with solar modules. And if his wife Luise had not protested, his garden would by now also have disappeared under zillions of solar modules.
On a sunny day, Konrad would often visit Carl wearing one of those broad smiles on his face and taunting him among many thanks for the monetary support Carl supplied him with on an hourly basis! In his opinion, it was really a good idea how every hour of sunshine made him richer by governmental decree.
And since Carl was the only one in the entire residential district who did not have a solar collector on his roof, he apparently not only supported Konrad, but also all the others all over the place. Now that was really nice of Carl, wasn’t it? He mumbled something about impressive social dedication into his greying beard, never forgetting to keep that broad smile on his face…
Of course, on hearing the solar jokes, Carl always forced himself to put a relaxed smile on lips taht wanted to remain clamped together, but secretly he felt that something was not quite right in the State of Denmark…
More and more often, he caught himself wishing all kinds of misery to all the Konrads of this world: first weak cyclones that would blow their roofs away, then locally restricted gas explosions that would send the entire photovoltaics up into the air. And eventually the occasional hailstorm of the century, which would immediately restore the solar modules to their initial state, namely sand!
Or if at least a single swarm of birds might have appeared and graced those damned „plates“ – as Konrad often narcistically called his solar modules – with their offal in such a way that the rays of the sun coming from above would turn them into a smelly cloud. It might have forced Konrad to clean this smelly nuisance with a high-pressure cleaner while endangering his own life. And he could have cleared his constantly complaining Luise away along with it…
And in winter time, when masses of snow caused Konrad’s roof to make ominous cracking and sizzling sounds, Carl often enjoyed hours of happy contemplation at the view of this beautiful whiteness, not forgetting to ask Konrad about his current energy income with an air of satisfaction.…
For Carl, the fact that he was not the only one who had to pay his solar dues with the electricity bill had a soothing effect on his nervous system. After all, all city dwellers, who really had not the slightest chance of ever having their own solar collectors – along with the solar income – had to pay just as much and the same was true for all recipients of social benefits!
At least here was balm for his system!
Well – perhaps it was a good idea to turn ‚anti-solar Robin Hood’. The idea did not seem too bad when he tossed and turned in his bed at night. How about becoming a fighter for the solarly disenfranchised, those who did not have the slightest chance of ever enjoying the monetary benefits decreed by the government? Those who were doomed to pay their Euros to the solar electricity providers on a yearly basis…
Carl would also have found solace for his solar misery if lightning had struck in all those cursed houses owned by parasites with their photovoltaics. Why could not one of them go up in a tremendous burst of fire?
Such a scenario would have given him endless satisfaction for a few hours – and it would have been a lesson for the others: because in a fire situation, the solar modules will also remain fully electrically loaded while the fire-fighters are doing their best to put out the blaze. He had once read that the courageous fire-fighters sometimes had no choice but to let the houses burn down to cinders in a controlled way! Now wouldn’t it have been a day of celebration to witness that?
Gerlinde got more and more worried about Carl’s „solar plexus“, as she cynically called it!
When talking last with Hannelore, she told her that her dear Carl got more and more entangled with something evil. Almost every other night, she sensed him tossing and turning sleeplessly next to her: more often than not, he woke up drenched in sweat! Which did not smell very nice at all! Not to mention how he suddenly sat up in his sleep and talked – and all through the next day, he was tired and spiritness, lumbering his way through the endless hours.
Moreover – and in his case, that is really not to be dismissed – he already started loosing his appetite! She could not even tempt him with his so-much-loved beer any more…
And he never turned on the TV either these days, because he went over the top whenever he saw this stupid „solar“ advert with the even more stupid „Lary Hagman“ and his „shine, baby, shine“. That really made him go through the roof in an alarming way…
A few days after having talked it over with Hannelore, Gerlinde talked to Carl, telling him that things cannot continue like this. Again, he sat in front of the TV set and had melancholy written all over him. She told him he already came close to being a tragicomic figure, like that Shakespearean „Hamlet“, whom she remembered well from her days at school; to this day, she knew the first verses by heart …
“To be, or not to be–that is the question”: she suddenly spoke with exaggerated drama, holding her glass of red wine high in the air,
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
And by opposing end them. To die, to sleep–„Well, his case was similar”.
She said it and drank all of her red wine…
Making a fuss about whether or not to turn “solar”, he not only tormented himself, but also his entire environment – and above all: her!
If he continued like this, she was sure he would end up in an institution. Or else suffer from a heart attack!
Wasn’t it time to think about finally biting the „solar bullet“ and – nolens volens – also have one of those „solar things“ installed on his own roof? Then you could also get the Federal subsidies, like everyone else. Above all, you could, at long last, regenerate physically.
„Well, maybe that is what our government means when they talk „regenerative energy“, said Gerlinde as she teased him by pointing her glass of wine in Carl’s direction…
Carl, who had been looking at her with sad eyes all the time, initially just nodded almost imperceptibly. Later, however, he started sucking on his beer bottle. And after he had swallowed once or twice, it was empty already. He had hardly noticed at all – and after a few more sips, the next bottle as empty, as well…
Even Gerlinde was surprised when, all of a sudden and with a very red face, he said that he was going to show them all!
Unlike that strange Hamlet, he was not going to „die and sleep“. Instead, he was going to have a solar device installed on his roof that would make the rocks fall from all their heads. As opposed to Konrad the anklebiter, he was going to have his entire garden full of solar modules. And then he ws giong to earn twice as much money as all the others put together. Yes, that was some triumph he was going to treat himself to, he said with sparkling beer eyes. And if this triumph meant that the garden would no longer be useful as a garden and that even the worms were rotting in the ground, then he could not have cared less, either. After all, the entire affair was not small fish, was it? We were talking the saving of our climate…
Of course, of course … said Gerlinde, smiling and relaxing. To be on the safe side, she directed Carl towards his bed, because tomorrow was still early enough to save the world, wasn’t it?
KH
(Translated by EG)
PS:
Two weeks from now, on May, 19th, 2011, „Carl and Gerlinde“ will not appear. Dagmar von Platen will be starring in “Meerestiefen… “
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