Saturday, January 29, 2011

while you wait

Infinity and a coffee is what I'm having. While enormous snow drifts are melting in mild weather outside.

I have played my volleyball and read my books and watched my DVDs and treasured my friends and performed my job. While I'm waiting for this deadly winter to end.

this is not one of those trendy interior design blogs

But this is my favourite charity shop find at the moment. Who can resist the combination of stained glass, gold stars and a tiny cow bell?

Friday, January 28, 2011

held down

"Get up, God! Are you going to sleep all day?
      Wake up! Don't you care what happens to us?
   Why do you bury your face in the pillow?
      Why pretend things are just fine with us?
   And here we are—flat on our faces in the dirt,
      held down with a boot on our necks.
   Get up and come to our rescue.
      If you love us so much, Help us!"

Psalm 44, The Message Bible

Thursday, January 27, 2011

what to do when you're in a hurry

I was invisible in a room, in a sphere of my own, just sitting there quietly, reading. You came and laid a hand on my shoulder and said, "Happy new year". You asked me how I was and sat down to listen. The meeting was delayed because everyone was waiting for you. Because you were there in the back room where nobody else could see me, making me visible.

another list of me

I like: spring rolls, diaries and exploring new places.
I need: woollen socks in winter, coffee and xylitol chewing gum.
I crave: chocolate, approval from people I admire and walks in the forest.
I hate: arrogance, early mornings and ugly clothes.
I fear: disease, public disgrace and growing old alone.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

2010: the year of death and other quirks

Year 2010: two very cold, snowy winters, one very hot summer. The details:

* Ten-year anniversary of perhaps the best year of my life.
* Tried to follow conversations in Finnish, Hindi, Arabic and pidgin English simultaneously.
* My first real 3D-film and female FaceBook-conspiracy.
* Learned (in theory) how to be a strong and true woman and what a good masseuse can do to you.
* Took a trip to Ireland and learned how to live deeply, live lightly and shine. Also found out what a head shop is and the modern way of lighting a turf fire.
* Found the most difficult relationship of all: that between a woman and her mother.
* New nickname: "me little Cockney sparrow".
* Realised my thesis supervisor in English lit has turned into an Irish fiddler, and not a bad one at that.
* Best book title of the year: Special Topics in Calamity Physics.
* "Beauty is truth, truth beauty - that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."
* Mostly used phrase of the year: "Bloody hell!"
* Tried a new identity as a van driver with work gloves, heavy boots and dangly earrings, reading Newsweek in between loading heavy boxes.
* Obsessions of the year: CSI:NY and strong men with good hearts.
* Bought a Citroën and sang songs in French for a week.
* Made eye contact with a fox.
* Picnic at the bronze feet of a buddhist monk.
* Admired a mirage of Sweden and climbed Mordor.
* Tried being one-eyed.
* Gave up on learning Gaelic.
* Danced myself to one-third of a beachvolley ball. Danced some more.
* Inflatable mattress-surfing on a windy beach.
* Happiest moment: floating out to sea on a raft under a summer sun, reading Paul Auster and humming "her name was New York, New York..."
* Fell in love while spitting sand and getting bruises.
* Was accused of supporting African arms dealers.
* Revived my dream of running away with the circus. Practiced my psychic skills on FaceBook.
* Jazz, Picasso, the theatre, iPads and flirting - all the arts in one night.
* Drove an hour to attend the opening of the world's most boring exhibition at the world's most boring museum in a city that always gives me suicidal thoughts. The wine and company was excellent.
* Endured extreme temperatures: +95 and -27 degrees Celsius.
* Attended a football game and discussed unkissed body parts.
* Event invitations received on FaceBook: Crazy Sales Showroom at Consentido Bar-Lounge, Madrid, and Lughnasadh Tree Lore Weekend in Donegal, Ireland.
* Found that there are worse ways to spend a sunny autumn evening than watching 5000 cranes (my favourite bird) fly over a meteorite crater.
* Spare-time jobs can be rewarding. Learned more than I ever wanted about Indian pantomime, Israeli orphanages, dementia, Dead Sea mud cosmetics and something called the Quark Region.
* Dreams: 1. I spray-painted E=mc2 on the wall at my workplace (boss wasn't happy). 2. I created the new slogan for Finland's largest company (a power plant manufacturer): "The spinning wheel isn't the solution". 3. I was a singing algae (voice: bass).
* Dilemma of the year: can you be friends with a former wife-beater?
* Visit to the "village shop" of Tuuri, one of Finland's major tourist sites. (That fact says something about Finland.) Listened to Sibelius' "Finlandia" on the way home.
* Things I've never done before: taken sleeping pills, given a speech without the help of notes and eaten highland cow marinated in Coca-Cola.
* Got to know my brother.
* Lost my father.