the year I lost control

Flashback to the year 2000: My first days in the  Magic Valley,  a quirky hotel in a historic and intensely beautiful valley in the Irish mountains, surrounded by the sweet fragrance of spring. I'm overwhelmed by the strangeness and intensity of everything. I have never met so many weird people in my entire life. They are so unFinnish: they shout, they laugh loudly, they are openly rude, they are intensely alive.

One of my first days at work, I'm standing next to my coworker in the hotel reception as she is being yelled at by the assistant manager. "Around here, we are not allowed mistakes," is her sarcastic comment to me when he's done. The manager fixes steely eyes on me and says calmly, "Don't make mistakes. Ever."

With this in mind, I take a walk later that evening. A winding path takes me high up on a mountainside, through a fairytale setting of crooked trees, bubbling brooks and wild flowers. Unused to the wilderness, I belatedly realise I really should get back to civilisation before nightfall, and it's already getting dark under the canopy of trees. I stumble back along the uneven path, getting nervous. Looking back along the valley, I see dark clouds rolling towards me, the wind picks up and there is the roar of approaching rain.

Maybe it is in that moment that I understand what a sheltered life I have led so far. As an urban girl, I have never experienced the danger in being out in the wilderness at night, chased by a storm. Raised among the polite and coolly friendly Finns who never raise their voices, I have never been yelled at or threatened during my first week at work (or any other week ).

( Although I did realise later that with the Irish, the bark is worse than the bite and you shouldn't take them too seriously ).

As the storm finally catches up with me there on the path I turn around and face it, heart beating wildly from fear and ... exhilaration? The rain and heavy winds sweep over me and threaten to knock me over. I throw my arms out, breathe in the world. This coolly polite Finn laughs out loud and feels, down to her very bones, threatened and unsafe and gloriously ALIVE.