Adorno writes (no.52, Minima Moralia, “Where the stork bring babies from”) “For every person there is an original in a fairy-tale, one need only look long enough”. My life, however, has taught me, more specifically since reading Etty Hillesum, that I am indeed each and every one of the characters in the fairy-tale, especially those I react to, and so with humans (and that one grows by making peace with the itch). Every way of being human is shared by all, however unsavoury and gruesome this sometimes feel, and, not to judge but to decide which facet of humanity I will feed within me, what I will put my energy in. In After Life, Hirokazu Kore-Eda’s most precious film that I may possibly have already praised here, I recognized myself as a little shriveled old woman who went about gathering leaves and twigs peacefully in her plastic bag. It made me briefly really look forward to being old one day until I returned to the now. I’d like to imagine that this film has the power to reconcile one with the idea of death, pictured as it is here, as so emphatically part of life. I am one to believe in reincarnation, but if there is such thing as everafter I can well imagine enjoying this home-manufacturing of eternity.