Gereon Klein has been talking about his partnership of almost 20 years with Marie-Luise Gerhold for a few minutes when things threaten to become too harmonious for him. "No, no, wait a minute," he shouts across the living room of the flat they share, "we both sometimes have a lot of stress together." Just don't romanticise everything, please don't glorify and kitsch things up. After all, arguments happen almost everywhere.
That shouldn't be underestimated either. Gereon Klein, for example, is sometimes annoyed when he has to repeat himself several times because his partner can no longer hear well. This occasionally leads to misunderstandings, which cause further conflict. However, this is not unusual; after all, disagreements are part of everyday life in most marriages and partnerships. What is much more interesting is how Gereon Klein and Marie-Luise Gerhold support each other despite their differences and, above all, despite the impairments they live with.
This becomes clear, for example, in their answers to the question of which of them leads whom when they leave their flat in Bielefeld-Gadderbaum. "You lead me," she says. Logical: Marie-Luise Gerhold is almost blind. "Yes, but sometimes you guide me too," he replies. Of course: Gereon Klein has epilepsy and can only use his left arm to a very limited extent. So he guides her, but at the same time she also guides him. We can do it together.
