Stress and solidarity on all channels

The wonderful thing about solidarity is that you sometimes get it - even from the most unexpected place.

The stupid thing about solidarity is that when you experience it, you often really need it.

The last few weeks have been pretty tough for me. A lot of „small shit“ has happened. My nice neighbour lent me her car to transport things to the ship. During loading, a cover and a lever on her car broke. My liability insurance refuses to cover the damage. No small shit, even though I don't know exactly how much it will cost yet. Then my bathtub drain leaked and caused water damage to the neighbour below me. Then the mixer tap on the bathroom sink broke. When it was repaired, the shower hose burst and the hinge was so tight that I didn't have the strength to loosen it. One day after that was repaired, the cistern broke. All within a short space of time. Expensive. Annoying. Time-consuming. Labour-intensive.

But the worst thing is that I'm currently in a legal dispute with a photographer.

I used a photo from a photo agency for our 2014 charity calendar and a free desktop background created for advertising purposes. As usual, my graphic designer acquired the licences for this and added copyright notices to the calendar and the download. Everything was fine. Or so I thought.

In April, I received a complaint from the photographer's lawyer alleging copyright infringement and licence infringement. I was asked to pay a good 1700 euros for the damage plus 805 euros in legal fees. A steep sum for a picture for which the licence cost 12 euros. I tried to sort it out directly with the photographer, but that failed. In the end, I was able to prove with my own lawyer and with the help of the legal department of the agency from which the licence was purchased that there was neither copyright infringement nor licence infringement. According to German law, the other party must then pay the costs incurred.

The small problem. The other side does not accept this. And continues to fight with all means at its disposal.

Just two of many examples:

Cropped evidence photos: The photographer has - I give her credit for this - apologised to me by email that she was careless and overlooked the existing proof of copyright. Nevertheless, her lawyer submitted a printout of the picture to the court as „proof“ that the copyright notice was missing. Strangely enough, the picture was cut off by about 1 cm at the left edge - where the copyright notice was located. Fortunately, it was done so amateurishly that you can still recognise the cut-off writing if you look closely. Nevertheless, such a procedure is still very annoying.

Exciting argumentation: The lawyer accuses me of having committed a copyright infringement by not naming the photographer in the legal notice of our website. As „proof“ they enclose a printout of my legal notice dated 10 October. As we have had a new calendar in the shop since May, the picture is of course no longer on our website. So they accuse me of not mentioning a picture in the legal notice that no longer exists on our website. Interesting.

The whole thing is emotionally and practically very stressful. I've already spent a working week on this stupid dispute - I'd rather spend my time on something else. The other side denies everything: that I hired the lawyer, spoke to her, paid her and the employees I commissioned to do the research. I have to provide evidence for everything.

At the same time, it kills me that people act against me like this. Of course they are acting for themselves and their interests, but the effects are damaging to me. Yesterday - when I was dealing with it intensively - it made me very tense. Today I was still super tense and exhausted. I prayed first thing in the morning and then thought about and wrote down what was important to me for the process, which takes place next Friday, in order to gain inner clarity. That helped a little.

I realised that I just couldn't get out of the tension. That feeling when you want to cry but can't. I know that when I feel like this - fortunately very rarely - I need an empathetic person to help me recognise my own feelings through their resonance. I texted a friend who is really good at this and asked if she had time for a chat, but didn't get a reply.

Then an employee forwarded me a warm email from a customer that said: „You do a great job laying such material, all respect!“

The warm words broke the dam - suddenly I was able to cry and let out all the pain of being treated like that. That felt really good.

During the course of the day and even before that, I experienced some really great solidarity:

• A friend asked if a loan would help me pay for the many repairs.
• Another friend, who has a mailing list of 5000 addresses, mentioned my situation in an email and asked her readers to pray for me and the situation.
• The boat builder, who helps me on the boat, got a new cistern from the DIY store - unfortunately the connections don't fit - and came to me to fit it.
• A lawyer (not the one in charge of the case, but another one), to whom I wrote that I was unsure how to behave in court, wrote me a three-page email with the most important points. It's so great that you could almost publish it as a guide - without the reference to the case, of course.
• A punk, asked me today how I was doing. When I briefly told him about the trial, he asked: „Have you got the lawyer's address? Have you ever thought about going there? And when I said no, he added: „I know a few people there for the rough stuff!“ I then told him that I tend to resolve conflicts differently. But I was still very touched that he told me in his own way: You, I won't leave you alone, I'd be willing to help you.

And on the way home from the ship, from which I removed some rust and donated new paint today, I met a woman who had helped out on the ship from time to time. She wasn't feeling well at the moment because she had a lot of stress in her training. There was room in my heart to listen again, we ate soup together - I ate, she watched - and I was able to help her a little further.

Solidarity is great. Even if I would sometimes like to do without the problems that make it necessary.