the seals are waiting

Let's go to the city museum, the one where only tourists go, and learn things we never knew about our city and laugh at taxidermied seals.

Let's go to the flea market and completely lose ourselves among the shelves, see things we never dreamed existed, marvel at the folly of mankind, and find the perfect, perfect knitted sweater.

Let's go to the library and forget time, browsing and drowsy and happy.

Let's go to the animal shelter and take a couple of dogs for a walk, watch them play in the October sun.

Let's go to a café, the one where the vanilla latte is perfect and the barista's smile is joyful, and feel the hot coffee and the sugar rush warm our bodies until our souls find peace.

what he wrote to lillflickan

When I was sorting through my box of old letters, which has been gathering dust under my bed for years, I found letters from my father.

"Hope that 'all that is different' over there in the middle of the Pacific is a positive experience for you, so that it becomes something you remember with joy all the rest of your life. We live with you and remember you in our prayers. 'Rejoice always.' Write often, we are waiting to hear from you!"

I must have known that they were there, among correspondence from half-forgotten lovers, faraway friends and childhood penpals. Yet somehow, in the three years since he died, the thought of digging them out and reading them never once struck me.

It hadn't even occurred to me now. I took out that old box just as a part of my minimalist campaign to get rid of anything unnecessary in my life. And there they were. Written communication with my parents only happened during those summers and years when I was off volunteering and having adventures in foreign countries. Emailing and internet connections were sparse back then so I wrote long letters by hand and sent them home. Every now and then my mother, not much of a writer, would put down a few paragraphs on a piece of paper or a card and then ask my father to finish the letter.

Lovely letters! My mother filled me in on news about their daily life, the dog, projects at our summer cottage, the weather, even church meetings they had attended. A newspaper clipping was occasionally enclosed. My father was entrusted to pay my bills and deal with other issues that arose in my absence and, as usual, handled all such things diligently and efficiently. During that summer when I needed to go apartment-hunting but couldn't because I was away working on a tropical island, he did it for me ( over the phone, as he lived in another city ). He sorted out administrative and bureaucratic issues for me, sent me money, forwarded my mail, took my dog to the vet. And in these letters, he explained all the details that I needed to know and assured me that everything was taken care of.

If there was nothing to report, he wrote things like this:

"Hope you are enjoying the exclusive atmosphere over there, and that you find your job also a positive and informative experience. Take good care of yourself and no surfing the waves! Hugs from mom and dad!"

men who feed birds

I like my men manly.

Yet, I find it irresistible and sexy when a manly man takes on a role or attribute that is ( at least in my world ) more typical for women. Like cooking for me while I'm slouching on the couch. Or loving dogs, or feeding birds, or playing with friends' children whom I only spare a disinterested glance. Writing poetry. Or taking pictures, not to post on Instagram for the entertainment of others but for the purpose of having memories later.

And, of course, cleaning the house.

orphan

I'm hungry.

For purpose, for adventure, for peace of mind. For someone to see me, for unconditional love, but most of all for my father.

just add ice to injury

Ingredients in my recent life:

* A book that injured my hand. It goes on and on, and it's weird, and it weighs a ton and my hand continues to hurt because I can't put it down (Chronic City by J. Lethem).
* Rumours of a fox in the city.
* Skidding on ice with a Citroën that insists all the lights are broken.
* Statistics.
* The two Marias, who converge in a busy urban lunchplace like rarely seen angels and ply me with memories of another life.
* The Pillars of the Earth on DVD - how (not) to build a cathedral, always a good thing to know.
* ( Although I play a lot of volleyball but don't hang out much with volleyball people ) I had a weekend like this: Friday night party with volleyball gang, Saturday night girls' night in with volleyball girls ( and a bizarre combination of strong green booze and non-alcoholic Blue Nun, hard to say which one was worse ), Sunday afternoon drive with volleyball man, Sunday night volleyball game with crowds of volleyball people.
* Exhaustion. I just want to be quiet and alone.

tactile, tangible - and tunics

It started with an ache in my heart.

Something to do with being more real, more me, and feeling and tasting the real world. It continued with mental images of a woman wandering the streets and living intensely. I read a story. And I started to wander the streets and making my fantasies real - with limited success, I must admit, but just the fact that I started to dream again was a mind-boggling step.

My fascination with clothes, and looks, was a help. It's been decades since the first time I looked at a piece of clothing in a shop and saw a whole new life, a much more exciting personality - saw the fantastic woman I might become. But now I started to choose my outfits with even more care, started to feel the texture of the wool in my sleeve and the denim against my knee. I painted my eyes dark and felt exotic.

My change was sealed when I found myself in a new environment. Faced with the terror, very real and far away from my useless dream worlds, of learning a new job among complete strangers who expected me to prove myself useful, I desperately turned to my fantasy world of beautiful, fictional people for inspiration. I forced myself to go against my fearful instinct to blend in. I put on shorter skirts and higher heels and looked people in the eye with a smile. If a fictional character could look gorgeous and get the job done and even slay some dragons in the process, then so could I. No matter that my job, at least in the beginning, involved less dragons and more yawning and watching the clock. Being scared and bored was a challenge that required heroism too, in my opinion. My red tunics and my pretty bracelets were my armour.

Time slowed, that winter-spring when I sat at a desk or cleared out stuff in the storage room, having too much time to think and feel. So I felt my muscles move in my body and watched my polished nails tap on the keyboard. I saw the afternoon light fade outside the window and heard faint music from the radio in the next room. I stroked with fascination the fur sample pieces I was supposed to archive. I listened intentely to everything that was said in the office, even when it was not addressed to me, even when my coworkers were just discussing what they had had for lunch. And I watched how they moved, where they parked their cars, what they wore. I wanted to learn everything about them, besides learning about the job itself - because it was the key to survival.

Dyed fur - from animals who died for you. I don't have to like it in order to like the feel of it.

I did survive, at least the first few months. I still withdraw into my dream world all too often. But now, I see more. I see weeds growing out of the asphalt when I walk the streets. I hear faraway trains. I know more about people than they think I do. I know that you can survive terror or boredom by wearing a red tunic and pretend that there are dragons to slay ( there usually are, in some form ).

And I sometimes have to stop myself from staring at people, or beautiful things. Stop myself from touching them in awe. Because I know there is so much to experience, see, feel, even in a seemingly boring world. Especially in a boring world.

Reach out and touch it.

from the jazz club to the souk

... she checks out Mozart while she does tae-bo, reminds me that there's room to grow ...*

Well, I'm checking out music too. I've just moved on from the Rat Pack to Arabic groove - none of them familiar to me - and I can feel my brainwaves being forced to reroute.

And my diet this year - thanks to a cash flow increase - has moved from sandwiches to salads ( always a favourite ) and also in a distinctly Asian direction. Sushi - yes.

* lyrics from Train: Drops of Jupiter

paralyzer, my arch enemy

Can't decide if I want to:

Roam the streets of the city right now, breathing chilly air and rustling the autumn leaves on the sidewalk. Being intensely there and yet far away in my mind, aching for other cities and another air.

Or forcefully work towards my dream, sit down and study hard.

Or meet a friend and try to connect my dream world to reality. Or hide in delicious solitude and fantasies.

So I waver, and waive all my choices. Curse my indecision.

Beautiful autumn trees hidden behind prison walls. I think there's a metaphor here somewhere.

où mon coeur me pousse

Je voudrais retrouver mes traces ... Et garder l’or de mon passé, au chaud dans mon jardin secret...

A song is playing on repeat, often on my CD player or my laptop, always in my head. I want to fill a ship with the images and perfumes of my voyages. I want to find the colours in my heart and set sail for the unknown.

Je voudrai partir avec toi
Je voudrai rêver avec toi
Toujours chercher l’inaccessible
Toujours espérer l’impossible
Je voudrais décrocher la lune,
Et pourquoi pas sauver la terre

But above all, I want to find again, inside me, the voices of the ones who taught me that no dream is forbidden. I want to talk to my father.

Mais avant tout, je voudrais parler à mon père... 

( Céline Dion: Parler A Mon Père )

a van Gogh view

In my kitchen nook, on the wall, is a postcard with van Gogh's Starry Night Over The Rhône.

Because, although I don't live by the Rhône but by a little piece of the Baltic Sea, this is more or less what I see when I look out the window at night.

I may not have a good life, or happiness, but I am so blessed. I have beauty.

( Picture from Wikipedia )

a whisper overheard

That feeling when the first snow starts falling and you can hear it hitting the dry autumn leaves in the silence of the dark evening - a strange whisper - and all the wool in the world doesn't seem warm enough, and you get out the candles and the rum and curl up under a blanket to watch The Pillars of the Earth.

And someone is singing outside. The first snow always comes early, it makes you think "oh no, winter already!" and yet, everyone is strangely  exhilarated.

not too late to seek a newer world

Someone once said to me that the true marker of how old you are is the amount of time that has passed since you last did  something you've never done before.

I think of this often. I'm not an adventurous person by nature, yet I take real pleasure in doing things I've never done before (big or small).

And in doing things differently than I'm used to. Creating new routines, or temporarily changing routines.

This year, so far, I've done a few of these things.

Changed jobs. Taken up zumba. Had a hot stone massage. Thrown a big party ( I'm an introvert ). Bought a watch. Stopped going to church. Changed my attitude to a language I previously hated - now studying it with fervour. Taken a more tactile and mindful approach towards life.

And every time you change something, you force your brain to create new pathways, becoming more flexible. Or so they say. Making way for the changes you long for, the ones you never thought possible.

an excellent failure

A day of digging deep into Excel sheets and feeling I've lost my way but that's OK. And there was chocolate cake. All in all, not a bad day.

If you had said to me six months ago that a day involving Excel sheets could be considered "not bad", I would have laughed. ( And then cried. ) I have evolved.

a box and a paradox

A candle, a glass of wine and  a box of old letters.

Darkness falls over the bay as I curl up on my sofa and am reunited with old friends. Many of whom are lost a long time ago, disappeared as the world beckoned us each towards different horizons.

As I read, my phone beeps twice. Text messages from two present friends - one of them a long-standing and long-suffering one who has written a couple of the ancient letters I'm reading. The other one quite new. Imagine that these people stick by me! Me, who take them for granted, who am slow to reply to messages, who disappear into my own world when they need me.