How 2 friends nourish their long-distance friendship with one word a day

September 17, 2024 Canuck

The Current24:30How one word a day sustains this friendship

It begins with a single word.

Each day, Annette Venebrügge in Hamburg, Germany, types a one-word message and sends it to Tina Oehmsen-Clark in Toronto. And each day, Tina records and dispatches a single word to Annette.

The two met as art students at the University of Hamburg more than 40 years ago. Soon after they graduated, Tina moved to Toronto. They remained close, but their friendship was naturally tested by time and distance.

They wrote to each other as often as possible and spoke by phone on occasion, but they haven’t seen each other in person for more than a decade.

Four years ago, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns, they dreamed up a project: to each share a word a day.

They envisioned it as a way to be in touch, to deepen their friendship and to do so while playing with language. One word, in German — not a sentence or even a half phrase, and no repetitions.

Why limit themselves to one word? Intimacy and imagination.

“The single word is more open for interpretation,” explained Annette. “You have to slip into the other’s spirit, into the other’s mind. And if you explain something with two words or with a sentence, this is gone.”

A splitscreen photo of two women. On the left a woman sits at table with small sculptural balls. On the right a woman stands in front of a wall filled with colourful drawings. — Annette, left, in her Hamburg studio, and Tina remain close. The two met as art students at the University of Hamburg. (Lutz Fischmann, Alisa Siegel/CBC)

“We started with a lot of words from our childhood,” said Tina, “from our upbringing, school, clothing, food, all the essential things that you remember when you were young.”

The project began as an experiment. They had no idea how long it might last — two days, two weeks — “but it kept going.”

Sometimes, a word sent by one sparks something in the other, leading to a series of back and forths, a game that might last several days or even weeks. And sometimes the words stand alone, without any connection to the previous, and without a connection to anything or anyone — a word for its own sake.

Four years later, and now a daily routine, they have exchanged around 3,300 words and counting.

A constant conversation

Sometimes it’s easier to find the next word, sometimes it takes more time and thought. And sometimes the words come to them in their dreams.

“In a way, it is a constant conversation, and so she is, in a way, always with me, always in the back of my head,” explained Tina.

“If I’m reading a book or if I’m watching a German movie or TV show and I hear it, right away, it’s there.”

For Annette, part of the joy of the exchange lies in the sense that she and Tina share an unspoken understanding of a word and its intention. Tina relishes the playfulness, the intuitiveness.

A black-and-white photo of two women sitting on a park bench. — Tina, left, and Annette in Hamburg in 1992. (Lutz Fischmann)

“It’s a process of reacting to the word,” she said, “to also see what may be the emotion on the other end.

“Is somebody not feeling well or is there a fear right now? Where’s this word coming from? And then you realize, ‘Oh, this word, is this happening to my friend? Is she in trouble? Is there something going on that I should know?'”

Together Tina and Annette have created what they refer to as a resonance chamber — a space where they come into contact with each other’s imaginations and inner thoughts.

“These one words, they are floating to me and floating back to her,” Tina said.

Part of the magic lives in the rediscovery of forgotten words. For Annette, an emotional moment was when Tina sent the word affenschaukel, which translates to monkey swing and refers to a hairstyle that Annette wore as a child: two long braids tied up, swing-like, on each side of the head.

“It put me directly back to my childhood. I recognized that Tina is really a witness of those feelings — to be a child in the 60s. For me, it says everything about the emotional quality of this connection,” said Annette.

A young girl with her hair in two braids that are looped. — Annette as a child with her monkey swing hairdo. (Submitted by Annette Venebrügge)

Record of friendship

Tina, a multi-disciplinary artist, creates text and audio-based versions of the words so they exist on the page as handwritten lists and as sound pieces. She feeds the words into her computer using voice-to-text and text-to-voice programs, and then records the sound of the computer as it recites the German words aloud using different accents and speeds.

“I can have it being read faster or slower, by robotic voices, by somebody with a French accent, you name it. So your words that you know so well and that are so ingrained into your past, all of a sudden sound completely different. And they become this mishmash of sound,” she said.

What these sounds will eventually become, how they’ll be shaped, and where they may end up remains to be seen. What’s clear is that the words — both text and sound rich — have become a body of work and taken on a life of their own.

Pieces of paper with lists of words handwritten onto them. — Words handwritten by Tina. The multi-disciplinary artist has been using speech-to-text and text-to-speech technology to create art with the single-word messages. (Alisa Siegel/CBC)

Tina sends her word at about 6 p.m. Toronto time. It lands in Hamburg in the middle of the night.

And first thing each morning, Annette reads her daily word from Tina. “For me, it’s like I’m not alone,” she said. “It just kicks me into the day.”

Ditto Tina. “When I [turn] on my device in the morning, the first thing I get is the ping. And, I know, there’s my word.”

“For me, it’s like a ping-pong,” Annette added. “I receive a word from Tina and I answer. Maybe Tina thinks that she responds to me because it’s a ping-pong. Tina says ping, I say pong.”

The words have become both a lifeline and a timeline, an intimate record of two lives and a friendship.

“Tina and I have known each other for more than 40 years, and we are both getting older. I’m 66 now, and, of course, I know of the limits of life. Tina is one year younger,” said Annette.

“I might not see this person ever again,” Tina said, “but it’s my best friend, so it’s a great addition because it ties you together. I love that.”