Love in the Times of the Macrobiotic Muesli

By Cora Buhlert

A Romance of the Counterculture

West Germany, 1982: Hans-Dieter and Katrin, both active in the peace and environment movement, meet at a protest march against a new nuclear power station and manage to fall for each other, while fleeing police truncheons, tear gas and water cannons.
Navigating the intricacies of romantic and sexual relationships is tricky in an era where the personal is political, heterosexual penetrative sex is tantamount to rape and he who sleeps twice with the same woman is already part of the establishment. But hormones will not be denied and so Hans-Dieter and Katrin embark on the adventure that is love in the times of the macrobiotic müsli.

This is a short story of 5000 words.

Warning: This story contains descriptions of sexual activity using both bad nuclear war metaphors and the sort of words some people might consider crude.
 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pegasus Pulp Publishing
• Release date: Jul 26, 2013
• ISBN: 9781498926188

Cora Buhlert

Cora Buhlert was born and bred in North Germany, where she still lives today – after time spent in London, Singapore, Rotterdam and Mississippi. Cora holds an MA degree in English from the University of Bremen and is currently working towards her PhD. Cora has been writing, since she was a teenager, and has published stories, articles and poetry in various international magazines. When she is not writing, she works as a translator and teacher.

Book preview

Love in the Times of the Macrobiotic Müsli

A Romance of the Counterculture

pinstripe

West Germany, 1982.

Katrin and Hans-Dieter met at the perimeter fence of the Brokdorf nuclear power station. He was carrying a hand-painted sign with the not very original slogan Nuclear Power — No thanks, while she had a black and white drawing of a skull and crossbones, only that the skull was shaped like the containment dome of a nuclear power station.

Cool sign, Hans-Dieter said and smiled at her. Katrin smiled back, but before she could answer, police whistles blew the attack signal and a tear gas grenade exploded right next to them.

Soon they were running hand in hand through the marshlands of the river Elbe, fleeing from police truncheons and soaked to the skin by water cannons. And still they couldn’t help but notice how their wet parkas and hand-knit sweaters clung to their bodies. They looked into each other’s tear-gas reddened eyes and a nuclear chain reaction went off inside their intestines.

More protests followed, more police truncheons, more water cannons, more tear gas. And Katrin and Hans-Dieter were always in the thick of the action. Frankfurt Airport Runway West, nuclear waste final disposal site Gorleben, public pledge of military recruits in Bremen, protests against acid rain and dying forest syndrome and more marches against the NATO Double-Track decision than either of them could count. At the 1982 Easter march they walked together, carrying a giant phallic missile made from papier-mâché and emblazoned with the words No Nukes.

As veterans of the counterculture movement, they were understandably wary of relationships and commitment. For how did the saying go? "Sleep twice with the same woman and you’re