The Hof

Hofs are courtyards. This is the one in the building I am subletting in. This Hof is maybe the nicest I've ever been in. Some of the women who live in the building tend the gardens. The daisys seem to be growing in the lawn on their own, though.

Hofs are good places to lock your bike up and also to sit and read, when it is not raining.

The apartment building is a lesbian social outreach project. I'm still working out exactly what that means. The building is all women, and there's a women-only cafe and a women's travel agency on the street side. The other night, they were having a women-only ballroom dancing class in a big room that looks over the Hof. A couple of apartments are set aside for teenaged girls who are having troubles at home and come to live here under supervision. Some of them live right below me and blast cheesy American rock into the Hof. I can have men come to visit, but if they stay for more than a few nights I am supposed to write a note on the blackboard by the front door explaining to my neighbors who the guy they may pass in the stairwell is. A yellow cat also hangs out in the Hof and at night makes a disturbing cat-noise that I guess means he is looking for a love relationship with another cat. The noise sounds eerily like a child mewling. One of my neighbors chased the cat out of the Hof the other day because, she told me, he doesn't belong to anyone in the building.