Wednesday, December 27, 2017

where a flag once came down from heaven

The sound of many voices singing "Holy, Holy, Holy" is rising from an ancient church on Sunday morning. Outside the souvenir shop next door, a plastic Santa is playing a tinny, noisy version "Jingle Bells".

The contrast could symbolise this entire December weekend. I pull up my hood against the winter rain and keep walking, stubbornly excited, along slippery cobblestoned streets.
I saw a glimpse of the "real" Tallinn when we slipped into one of the modern shopping centres that looked exactly like any shopping centre in Helsinki, a two-hour ferry ride away. The old town, where we spend most of the weekend, is a wondrous world of winding streets, tall church spires, glowing windows, thick town walls and fortified towers and everything you expect from the most romantic of medieval settings.

It is also an isolated little world of fragrant Christmas spices, alluring restaurants, gaudy souvenir shops and rosy-cheeked tourists snapping selfies - all quaintness and mulled wine.

It may not be very authentic but it's easy to get sucked into the happy carefreeness. To exclaim over Gothic vaults and the glow of Baltic amber, to drink cinnamon beer allegedly made from an old monastery recipe, to drift around cozy cafés and majestic churches among crowds of Russians and Scandinavians. It doesn't matter that the cold is creeping in and that the cobblestones are grey with rain. We're on holiday, chestnuts are roasting and we're having ourselves a merry little Christmas.

Tuesday, December 26, 2017

pleased, as man, with men to dwell

... born that man no more may die, born to raise the sons of earth ...

Words drift past. Mostly unnoticed. Occasionally they knock me out with beauty and truth.

Wednesday, December 20, 2017

a good party and the best part

There is something delicious in stepping out on the porch, at a party where the music is ringing in your ears and the alcohol is buzzing hotly in your veins, and step straight into a snow storm.

To take a break from clinking wine glasses and loud music, burlesque dancers, the heat of many bodies and your companions' shouted conversation. To feel the icy wind go straight through your flimsy dress, to see your high heels make delicate prints in the snow. To wrap a soft cardigan around your shoulders and breathe deeply. To hear only silence. To smell the winter of the North.

Friday, December 08, 2017

like their mothers

All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does, and that is his.
(Oscar Wilde: The Importance of Being Earnest)

I have inherited my mother's, and her mother's, tendency to worry too much, suffer sudden indecisiveness and occasionally fall into despair.

Also their heartfelt smile, thick hair, curiosity, love of the English language, loyalty and soft-spoken independence.

Thursday, December 07, 2017

stare, pry, listen, eavesdrop

Stare. It is the way to educate your eye, and more. Stare, pry, listen, eavesdrop. Die knowing something. You are not here long.

(Walker Evans)

Wednesday, December 06, 2017

a hundred years of blue and white

A hundred years of independence.

Happy birthday, Finland. Independence is valuable to us Finns on an individual level so a hundred years of it is worth celebrating.

I will mark this day by standing on a cold street listening to some pompous music. Then I will withdraw to a warm kitchen where gingerbread cookies are baking in the oven, teenagers are squabbling and an old lady is knitting socks in the corner.

In the evening, I will watch the president's ball on TV with a friend and decide to never have another gingerbread cookie again.

At some point, I will listen to Sibelius' "Finlandia" and cry.

Tuesday, December 05, 2017

red, orange, yellow flicker beat sparking up my heart

My favourite yellow-reddish colour, as seen today:

The sky at sunset, reflected in ice. The candles and the coloured light bulbs chasing away the darkness. The sweet strawberry drink I'm clutching between cold fingers. The dying embers of my creativity. And the stubborn glow of my joy.

My blood is a flood of rubies, precious stones ...

(Title from the song "Yellow Flicker Beat" by Lorde) 

Tuesday, November 28, 2017

make an ugly shirt

"Eat the damn chocolate cake, get your hair wet, love someone, dance in those muddy puddles, tell someone off, draw a picture with crayons like you’re still 6 years old and then give it to someone who is very important to you. Take a nap, go on vacation, do a cartwheel, make your own recipe, dance like no one sees you, paint each nail a different color, take a bubble bath, laugh at a corny joke. Get on that table and dance, pick strawberries, take a jog, plant a garden, make an ugly shirt and wear it all day. Learn a new language, write a song, date someone you wouldn’t usually go for, make a scrap book, go on a picnic, relax in the sun, make your own home video, kiss the un-kissed, hug the un-hugged, love the unloved, and live your life to the fullest. So at the end of the day, you’ll have no regrets, no sorrows, no disappointments."

(unknown)




Tuesday, November 21, 2017

the day after the night before

Sometimes, especially when you're not at your best after a boozy party last night, you need a slow Sunday walk in a snowy landscape and a greasy hamburger for lunch.

If only your companion wasn't quite so chipper.

Thursday, November 16, 2017

as if for the first time

To my mind, the greatest reward and luxury of travel is to be able to experience everyday things as if for the first time, to be in a position in which almost nothing is so familiar it is taken for granted.

(Bill Bryson)

Tuesday, November 07, 2017

wasted and wounded at this old piano

The piano has been silent for years.

Now I play again. I'm rusty and slow and yet my fingers still know this intricate system of keys, my brain connects chords and something in my body finds a rhythm and goes with it.

I play the wrong notes and turn the sound down on my keyboard so as not to drive the neighbours insane. But music flows from me. I let myself have fun with it, my soul grows into another dimension and my piano teacher sighs with happiness.

Monday, November 06, 2017

best version

A healthy relationship is one where two independent people just make a deal that they will help make the other person the best version of themselves.

(unknown)

Sunday, November 05, 2017

my Sunday rest

Dreary is the word for the place - a worn-down, bleak school on a cold afternoon when icy rain is lashing down.

It's Sunday but the school is not entirely deserted. In the gym hall, two teams of young girl are playing a mean game of volleyball. I buy a cup of bitter coffee from a stand their parents have set up outside and join the handful of spectators. My friend whispers comments on the girls' sets and spikes, another friend shows up briefly to share a joke or two.

The girls are very loud - their shouts and shrieks of joy echo in the bare hall - and the hall is poorly heated. It's not the environment I would choose for an afternoon of desperately needed rest. Still, as I cradle my hot coffee in cold hands and watch the intense game, my mind stops spinning and a feeling of calm settles me down.

A bar of chocolate completes the afternoon.

Monday, October 30, 2017

the turning

My coworker asks me the question, first thing in the morning. Later in the day, I hear it again - from a stranger that I happen to walk past on my way to lunch. And from my elderly neighbour, dressed in fur. The question is on everybody's lips.

"Got your winter tyres on yet?"
It's time for the biannual, mandatory tyre swap. In Finland, you must have one set of car tyres for summer, another for winter. Most like to leave the autumn swap until the last minute, i.e. just before the weather turns icy or the snow arrives to stay. People study weather forecasts and ponder the risks of driving in snow with summer tyres.

In the evening, the first snow arrives, as predicted by every forecast. I still haven't changed my tyres. I watch the swirling snow and think of the winter ahead - always so long and cold and fraught with danger. The first snow is still magical.

I fall asleep in the eerily yellowish light of street lights reflected in so much white. The next morning, the world is changed.
I drive to work, extremely slowly.

Monday, October 23, 2017

soup and melatonin

On an October day of the genuine kind, I do the following:

* take the winter coat into use and enjoy being warm again
* wander into town for a bowl of hot soup with rustic bread
* buy melatonin supplement and desperately try to get as much daylight as possible
* walk in the park and listen to the soft whisper of yellow leaves falling like snowflakes
* speculate, with everyone I meet, on the possibility of the first snow and when it's time to put winter tyres on the car
* light candles and worry a little bit about the winter ahead
* go out on the balcony before bed, to look for the aurora borealis

Tuesday, October 17, 2017

celebrate yourself

When nobody else celebrates you, learn to celebrate yourself. When nobody else compliments you, then compliment yourself. It’s not up to other people to keep you encouraged. It’s up to you. Encouragement should come from the inside.

(Joel Osteen)

Monday, October 16, 2017

bare, probe, live

Asleep, I dream of sailing on moon-lit seas and exploring unknown landscapes.

Awake, I pray for meaning, adventure and unexpected meetings with beautiful strangers. I learn piano chords and foreign words and come up with strange ideas, like long Sunday morning walks. I take time to stand and stare. I bare my soul to others. I probe the souls of others. I long. I live. I suck the marrow out of life.

Sunday, October 15, 2017

the Cigar Room that never existed

It feels odd to talk about sailing on a dark evening in October when all around us in the marina, yachts and smaller boats are being hoisted out of the water for winter storage.

But the president of the yacht club is an enthusiastic man who enthralls us landlubbers with tales from the club's history. And he gives us coffee and biscuits.

Our motley crew of listeners didn't expect the coffee, much less the history lesson. We came because the adult education centre arranges a course on "the secret rooms of the city" and takes us on guided tours in beautiful, historic buildings not normally open to the public. The point of visiting the yacht club is apparently the mysterious Cigar Room in the ancient club house.

"I have no idea where this room is, or used to be," our guide admits from the outset. In fact, nobody in the club (or among us course participants) has even heard of it - apart from someone in the adult education centre who asked our guide to arrange this lecture and tour. That someone doesn't work at the centre anymore and can't be reached.

Things get increasingly odd when we realize that we have come to visit a secret room that is so secret that nobody has ever heard of its existence.

Still, we finish the tour in a small, cold room with large windows overlooking the marina. It's not hard to imagine sailors of old sitting here, smoking cigars and talking of distant horizons. The room smells of old wood and the sea, and is dimly lit by two boat lanterns - one red, one green. The lights around the bay twinkle poetically.

The group around me experiences a bizarre moment of companionship, joined by our interest in this secret Cigar Room that is probably a figment of someone's imagination. I shiver with joy.

Friday, October 13, 2017

darling books: wonderful troublesome Moomin life

"I'm longing to get away from this stony country. Even a poet can have enough sometimes."

Some children's books are not children's books at all but wonderful and beautiful when you've grown up. The Moomin Books (by Tove Jansson) are like that. They scared me when I was little. Now they give me poetry and life. They make me want to wander for hundreds of miles through the silent forests of my homeland and arrive in a valley where a steaming cup of coffee is waiting in a warm kitchen.

"That's where we're going to live and lead a wonderful life, full of troubles ...."

(quotes from T. Jansson's Comet in Moominland and Moominpappa at Sea)

Thursday, October 12, 2017

unconditional and complete

I demand unconditional love and complete freedom. That is why I am terrible.

Tomaz Salamun

Wednesday, October 11, 2017

ode to October

October is that first lash of cold rain. Your car buried under red and yellow maple leaves. Evenings so dark you can't see where you're going. Social events, evening classes, taking on extra jobs. Apples and all your friends making warm apple pies. Heaters not working properly. Sweaters and candles and movie nights. Waiting for the first snow.

Tuesday, October 10, 2017

road trips in Finland when you're young

You travel in the wilderness of Lapland, along the marvellous sand ridge of Punkaharju and to the mighty rapids of Imatra when you are so young that the memories only consist of hazy, dreamlike images and smells - reindeer crossing the road, the pine smell of a wooden cottage where you stayed the night, the oddly unknown mummy of Keminmaa. Your dad takes pictures of you in front of carved troll statues and your grandmother climbs mountains wearing long skirts and wellies.

You travel along small roads through hills, villages and lots of forest, enchanted by summer. You swim in a few of the country's 187,888 lakes. You cook spaghetti lunches in pure lake water on a camping stove. In the evening, you drink red wine before squeezing into a small tent with best friends and strangers.
You pack an old van full of friends and skiing equipment and drive north on wintry roads. You spend an unplanned day in a non-descript town halfway when the van breaks down. You finally reach your destination late at night and discover that Lapland is a magical realm of snowy forests, starry skies and the breathtaking silence of an icy wilderness. You ski on the mountains all day and stop only to grill sausages over open fire and pass a thermos of hot coffee around in the middle of the forest. You spend evenings in a cottage playing board games in front of the fire with people you will never see again but will remember for the rest of your life.

You stay at an Orthodox monastery and watch the monks make berry wine. You explore the medieval castles of Olavinlinna and Suomenlinna. You island-hop in the charming Åland archipelago and try seaweed delicacies. You laugh until it hurts and you tire yourself out driving endless distances through empty forests.

You return home to the open prairies near the west coast, with the vast sky and the glittering sea saying welcome.

Friday, October 06, 2017

Nietzsche on reality

"No artist tolerates reality."

(Friedrich Nietzsche)

Thursday, October 05, 2017

the clearest way into the universe

The forest is a part of my soul. I have grown up with it like a silence inside me that calms anxiety. The silence of it in autumn, with only the whispering of a wind setting heavy spruce branches in motion, the lonely call of a bird. The vibrant energy of it in spring and summer, with a thousand birds singing and everything exploding into joyous life.
The fragrance of it. Rich earth and moss, spicy scents of spruce needles, a honey note of flowers.

I played in the forest as a kid and walked in it with my father, in wellies and with bucket in hand, to pick blueberries and lingonberries. I wandered in it as a lonely teenager with a trusty dog as my companion. The moss was soft under my feet, the quiet of the wilderness was soothing. I discovered strange things and wondered, with a shiver of fear, if a bulky shadow was going to turn out to be an elk or bear.

At times, the mere idea of the forest can intimidate me. It is too vast, too strange, too dark in every sense of the word.

The forest is a place of thoughts. Of dreams. I'm in a world bursting with life that humans know nothing about. I can walk for hours and not reach the end of it and never be within a mile of a human being. I can get hopelessly lost. It is a place where everything is born, lives and dies without anyone noticing or remembering. This is the landscape of my forefathers. They walked among ancient trees and dreamed, and now they are gone.

The solitude, the purity and the feeling of infinity. If you want to feel safe, go and lean against an old tree that goes nowhere for a hundred years but slowly and steadily reaches for the stars. Press your face against the sweet-smelling bark. Experience creation.

Wednesday, October 04, 2017

downhill swing café

In a dream last  night I started a blog and called it Downhill Swing Café.

The blog spoke about real life, not airbrushed or edited. It comforted those who thought they were the only failures and losers around. It was a virtual café with the wonderful, spicy aroma of dark roast coffee and sweet vanilla lattes. It played old jazz, the kind that anchors you and takes you flying at the same time.

The blog was an instant success.

Tuesday, October 03, 2017

carry me on the waves to the lands I've never seen

Sometimes, very seldom, this happens: Someone puts me in a speedboat, hands me a can of cider and off we go. With speed, loud music and people I barely know.

My people, the Ostrobothnians, are a boat people. To me, the archipelago is largely an unknown world, even though I can see it from my window every morning.

And such a lovely world it is, vast and intimidating and beautiful. The endless vista of open water, the strange marine birds and the seals, the millions of uninhabited islets with rocky beaches or smooth cliffs. The fresh, salty air. The feeling of being helpless in a world not made for humans.
The silence, when you disembark on an island, as if you were a hundred miles from civilisation. The strange and beautiful labyrinths laid out with stones on many of the outer islands, ancient and mysterious. The stories of shipwrecks, the centuries of perilous fishing and of setting off towards unknown shores in search of something, the tragedies.
On the island of our destination, the autumn colours are vivid, the air smells of paradise and the woods are filled to bursting with mushrooms and dark red lingonberries. The sun is warm but a light mist is swirling eerily among the ancient graves of the shipwrecked. We feast on grilled meat, hot potato wedges and black coffee in one of the old fishing huts and try our luck navigating one of the old labyrinths that could be up to a thousand years old.

Someone should put me in a boat more often.

Thursday, September 28, 2017

chemicals, violence and a governor

A day spent trawling through the legislation of Finland for no good reason. Everything from corporate law to the latest additions to the forbidden chemicals list, the construction of air-raid shelters and what happens to your maternity benefit if you die.

Now, after subtitling a TV interview on domestic violence, I'm going to visit the governor's residence.

This is not exactly how I imagined life as a translator but I'm not complaining.

Wednesday, September 27, 2017

I am a Tuesday 2 a.m.

I am not a graceful person. I am not a Sunday morning or a Friday sunset. I am a Tuesday 2 a.m., I am gunshots muffled by a few city blocks, I am a broken window during February. My bones crack on a nightly basis. I fall from elegance with a dull thud, and I apologize for my awkward sadness. I sometimes believe that I don’t belong around people, that I belong to all the leap days that didn’t happen. The way light and darkness mix under my skin has become a storm. You don’t see the lightning, but you hear the echoes.

(Anna Peters)

Tuesday, September 26, 2017

the Irish saga: the call of the wild

The air is different in Ireland.

It's not just the softness of a mild, humid climate. It's the attitude. I'm not a great believer in supernatural things but suddenly I'm prepared to believe in fairies dancing in the misty fields and meddling in people business.

Strange things happen in Ireland. There are inclines where things roll uphill, not downhill. There is a church ruin where an entire stone wall has mysteriously jumped three feet. There are plaques commemorating the fact that nothing happened. There are strange sounds, optical illusions and people believing in all kinds of mystical things. And I feel a new wildness growing inside me. I'm turning into someone a little more carefree, reckless, impulsive. I don't drink as much as the people around me but at times I wonder if their intoxication is an airborne contagion.

Maybe it's just the freedom of being a thousand miles away from anyone that knows me.

My new friends, a party-spirited, loose gang of mostly Spaniards, Swedes and Canadians, put drinks in my hand. "You are too mellow for this gang," they tease me. "You drink less than my baby sister!" someone complains, almost angrily.

I'm grateful for being included in the "in" crowd so easily and fascinated by the carefree attitude, so far from the sobriety and intellectualism of my university friends. I'm also dismayed by the way they slander people behind their backs and constantly complain about the job. We spend long evenings in the bar or partying with kalimotxo, chorizo snacks and bottles of Jameson in the staff house. There is plenty of dancing, singing, kissing, hugging and punching. The Spanish boys get louder the more they drink and are prone to impromptu stripteases. The Irish demand everyone's attention and then sing a melancholy song about injustices suffered under the hands of the Brits. Scandinavians and Canadians throw themselves joyfully into the festive mood. Belorussians and Romanians take one look at the party and withdraw to their rooms to watch TV.

There are fights, love affairs, weed and broken bottles. Hotel staff love to party hard.

Late at night I'm often exhausted by the rowdy atmosphere and the cigarette smoke and sneak out without telling anyone - I learn the fine art of the "Irish goodbye" long before I realise it's a thing. Then I go for a walk in the dark. Through the thousand-year-old cemetery, straight out of a horror movie, if I'm feeling brave. Along the winding mountain road if not. Away from the inn, the quiet of the wilderness surrounds me like a warm blanket.

But the magic does its work on me and it's not long before I'm dancing with strangers and throwing rocks at someone's window. I still take my midnight walks but sometimes I bring a boy to kiss and sometimes I need to be alone to scream out a rage I've never, ever felt before.

Wednesday, September 13, 2017

art and strangely alive

Wandering through a few artists' studios on a rainy day.

There is a vague smell of mould, paint and rain. People look through art prints for sale, mumbling to each other and leaving wet footprints. I huddle on a chair in a dark room next to the studios, half-interestedly watching weird movies. I'm feeling vaguely sick today, nothing serious, just one of those days, and it is making me feel strangely alive and aware of everything around me. As if life has slowed down.

I hear my friends discuss bird photography with one of the artist as I curl into my Nepalese hoodie and space out a bit.

We go for coffee and cake in a bright café afterwards. The caffeine and sugar restores my strength as if by a miracle.

Tuesday, September 12, 2017

the year of seeking help

This is my year of seeking help.

Today I sought the help of a physical therapist for my obstinate back. With godlike hands, he pummeled out the kinks and I went home feeling as if I'd had a divine healing. Next time, he's going to sort out my weak knee. After that, my soul perhaps?

So many times I had to seek help this year, and I don't regret a single one.

Other things I'm presently receiving help for: my weak core, my inability to understand major seventh chords, my helplessness in doing the rumba.

Sunday, September 03, 2017

the echoes of swans and other wonderful things

At the cottage between the forest and the sea, it's a cold night. I untangle myself reluctantly from my nest of warm blankets to go outside and pee.

In the dark night, all the stars are out. The moon is painting a silvery streak across the bay with a bright light that forms sharp shadows around me. The whooping swans are shouting at each other somewhere further down the coast and the echoes bounce back from the forest line. I shiver with cold in flannel pyjamas and thick sweater but it's hard to tear myself away from all this beauty.

At the cottage between the forest and the sea, the cold night melts into a balmy day with only a hint of crispness. I sit outside with my laptop and stare at the quiet sea. The neighbour comes over to share a catch of perch, not five minutes out of the water, and my mother fries the fish in plenty of butter. There is golden sunshine and fresh raspberries and mugs of steaming coffee.

The day softens into a long sunset and a chilly evening. I haul wood from the shed to take me through another icy night and can hardly believe how lucky I am to have an evening of reading by the fire.

I know there are dark days ahead but they can't defeat me when there are days like these even further ahead.

Friday, September 01, 2017

digging up my soul, going down, excavation


Twice every month or so, this past spring, I went to an ugly building in town to talk to a wise woman. I left home in good time and walked there slowly, along quiet backstreets, so I could think long and hard about the meeting ahead.

The woman sat down and listened intently. Her warm eyes seemed to warm my cold and terrified soul. I spoke with a desperate determination to take every aspect of my life that seemed messed up, offer it up to this kind stranger and not leave or back down until it was sorted out. Things I thought I would bury forever. She listened and asked a few probing questions.

For a person who didn't say much, the woman taught me many secrets. After an hour with her, I felt as if I had been seen as the troubled person I am, and accepted anyway. Strong and capable not despite, but because of, my problems. More at home in my own skin, vulnerable and resilient at the same time.

I'm glad a life crisis forced me to do this. To dig out the old ghosts and let them see light. The ones that still exist don't seem that dangerous anymore. I think that woman saved my sanity.

(Title borrowed from U2: "Elevation")

Thursday, August 31, 2017

not every day has a bonfire

A bonfire in August darkness, fireworks and a million lights around the bay. Small cabins glowing with candlelight, filled with people who are feasting on snacks and laughing at bad jokes. All around, the peace of forest and sea.

Every day should be like this.

Wednesday, August 30, 2017

there's poetry and there's porridge

Still don't want to leave my tiny room in the summer paradise that is now yielding to autumn weather. I huddle by the fireplace, listen to my favourite music and stare out over a grey sea and a few rain-pelted birch and alder trees.

Two of the islands I can see from here are poetically called (translated from the local language) Isle of Shadows and Isle of Grey Souls. The third one is named Porridge Island. What happened there?

Tuesday, August 29, 2017

marry me


"marry me.
let’s spend our week nights eating cereal on the floor
when there is a perfectly fine table behind us.
we can go to the movies and sit in the back row
just to make out like kids falling in love for the first time.

marry me.
we’ll paint the rooms of our house
and get more paint on us than the walls.
we can hold hands and go to parties we end up
ditching to drink wine out of the bottle in the bathtub.

marry me.
and slow dance with me in our bedroom
with an unmade bed and candles on the nightstand.
let me love you forever.
marry me."

(whispering bones, Tumblr)

Monday, August 28, 2017

soul landscape

I'm surrounded by dark skies, sea and candles, a soul landscape of rest.

I will light a fire and go to sleep with a dog next to me, and I will delay autumn for a little while still.

Saturday, August 19, 2017

pilates and a vanilla quilt

A quilted blanket is hung up to dry in the cramped confines of my flat, near a scented candle so it will smell of vanilla.

Songs from my past are playing on my phone while I cut tomatoes and goat's cheese. I'm making pie and find the heat of the oven comforting, like a hearth fire. I seldom make real food but as summer darkens toward autumn I will light this hearthfire more often.

This autumn I will be doing pilates and foam rolling, stretching my body and getting to know it. There will be piano music again. And when body and soul are tired, I will lie down under a vanilla-scented quilt and rest.

Friday, August 18, 2017

eating cake in bed

"I am made up of bad habits. Consistent in how
I love boys who will never love me back.
Letting the phone go to voicemail when my
mother calls. Biting my nails bloody.
Wearing dresses when I should wear jeans.
Making my body small. Forgetting names
but not asking for them again. Maybe I should
have called. Maybe you should stop calling.
Maybe I should have remembered how you
take your coffee, your favorite band,
that you smoke a pack a day. Maybe I should
have apologized. If it’s any consolation,
my next birthday will be me eating cake in bed
and licking the icing off of my fingers alone.
"

(Kristina Haynes: "Bad Habits")

Wednesday, August 16, 2017

current inventory

There are invisible Pokémons all around my house and a cigarette stub in an empty flower pot. There is a finance minister in town and a frustration inside.

All my newfound energy is about to go into overdrive, nosedive and a crash.

Tuesday, August 15, 2017

peace in cheap rooms

Cautiously, I allowed
myself to feel good
at times.
I found moments of
peace in cheap
rooms
just staring at the
knobs of some
dresser
or listening to the
rain in the
dark.
The less I needed,
the better I
felt.


(Charles Bukowski: "Let It Enfold You")

Thursday, August 10, 2017

the Irish saga: an academic enters the maze

The fairytale inn, a little Irish hotel in a hidden valley, is bursting with people on the evening I arrive.

I'm exhausted and shaking with adrenaline as I walk into my new life with no idea what to expect. Darkness has fallen on the May night outside but the inn is as merry as one would expect of a fairytale - lights, laughter and clinking glasses. The geography is confusing - I wander winding corridors with slanting floors before I find the hotel reception.

I am a twenty-seven-year-old woman who just days ago completed the last assignment for my Master's degree in English as a foreign language, back home in Finland. I have no experience whatsoever of hotels, unless you count a few unmemorable nights in cheap chain hotels during my travels. Nevertheless, here I am in an Irish hotel, hoping the job offer sent to me in an informal email is still valid. Hoping that my father's irate prediction, that I will end up chained to a brothel bed in a foreign country, is NOT valid.

I'm two days into my new freedom after a completed university education. My official graduation "ceremony" is still months away and will consist of me opening a boring envelope with my diploma inside, sent to me care of the hotel. I'm dizzy from the sudden transition from university life to working life - over a thousand miles and a lifestyle shift away.

I'm fresh off the plane and the bus, so exhausted that I'm leaning against my heavy suitcase. But it will be three hours before I get to fall into bed in my temporary staff accommodation. In that time, I will have experienced my first hour behind the reception desk, found my first friend - the chatty Canadian receptionist who will later lead me into so much trouble - and fallen in love with the red-haired chef who put together a simple spaghetti supper for me.

Before I fall asleep I look out from the window of my tiny room, somewhere deep inside the maze of corridors. A cobblestoned courtyard, the bright windows of a bar, a merry party. So this is Ireland?

Wednesday, August 09, 2017

like yellow paint, like dark-roast coffee

This summer is grey, like the clouds hiding the sun, like the cold sea.

It is yellow, like the paint shining in the can, spattering my fingers and my legs and the Nokia rubber boots that I inherited from my father.
It is red like the raspberries and wild strawberries I pick in the jungle in the bottom of the garden.

This summer smells like a thousand flowers and dark-roast coffee. It sounds like birds and silence.

This summer is cold but soothing.

Friday, August 04, 2017

the Irish saga: the white bus of a saint

My first sight of the country, coming in on the plane from Helsinki, is a patchwork of fields, one greener than the other. No trees, only hedges. It seems foreign and fantastical, like something out of the Enid Blyton books I read as a child.

Treading my way uncertainly through the airport, someone hands me a clementine and a smile.

I walk through sunny Dublin streets, hating the heavy suitcase I'm dragging after me. I find a beautiful park near the bus stop - the bus isn't due for several hours yet. This park has duck ponds, hedges and fragrant spring flowers. I stretch out on the grass with relief and stay there, half asleep, until the bus arrives. My longing to explore the strange city has been subdued by my tiredness, the suitcase and my anxiety for what lies ahead - a job I've never done before, an employer I've never met, a new life in a foreign country.

The bus doesn't look like the other city buses. It is completely white, with a graceful script adorning the side - the name of a saint. It is packed with both tourists and local commuters. It winds its way slowly through town, through leafy suburbs and into the countryside - climbing into the hills on narrow roads, past tiny villages and fields filled with sheep and cows. The road gets narrower, the landscape rougher and wilder. Hills turn into mountains.

I eavesdrop on a conversation in the bus. "You know, he always loved you," says a man to a woman. This fact seems a surprise to her - something she never knew, but wishes she knew. I marvel at the intimacy and gravity of this conversation, the first one I hear in Ireland. I don't think I would ever hear something like this on a bus at home.

Twilight in the mountains, and we arrive at last in the valley that is my destination. Shadows play with the last rays of the sun, the road dips sharply. Through the wild hawthorn hedges I glimpse a real mountain - steep, dangerous, beautifully offset against the evening sky. It takes my breath away. There are no mountains where I'm from. The bus comes to a final stop in a wooded valley, dark but with glittering lights from the windows of a fairytale inn.

I don't feel as if I'm in a foreign country. I'm in an alien world, an alternate universe. I gasp at the sensation of a free fall. Ireland, I'm in Ireland. God help me.

Thursday, August 03, 2017

darling books: the only hotel you need in Dublin

"The walk to Room 105 was all too short. They reached it in seconds. Silently, Karl Brown took her key-card from Detta and opened the door. The room spread before them, dim and seductive in pale mushroomy light. Its red and black carpet was thick and soft, and its enormous bed, shaped like a medieval longship, beckoned them to its fluffy bosom. 'Try me!' called the sirens of the bed.

Detta turned a deaf ear to them, and so did he."

The two novels Finbar's Hotel and Ladies' Night at Finbar's Hotel (written by several authors, edited by D. Bolger) found me in Ireland and followed me home. These two books speak of heroes and villains and some very curious characters in a Dublin hotel. It doesn't get more Irish than this. Wonderful.

Wednesday, August 02, 2017

shakshuka and a Finnish summer

The weekend was spent at the summer cottage in the eclectic company of an 83-year-old woman, a 20-year-old boy and a poodle.

It involved a village party with a vintage boat race and salmon soup under the hot sun, poodle games, wild strawberries, evenings with everyone curled up in a corner of the same room with a book, and me improvising a shakshuka.

Tuesday, August 01, 2017

down in seagull town

Noodles at a café table in the market square. I'm sitting outdoors on a cloudy day and it's too chilly for summer but I love the market square. It has cobblestones. I love cobblestones - terrible for bicycle wheels and high heels but great for a sense of ancient European town.

I can smell the strawberries for sale at a market stand nearby. Seagulls are screeching and swarming around a homeless man who shares his sausage roll with them. Annoyed glances are thrown his way from shoppers and café patrons but the sight of the gulls is hilarious, lining up in a squabbling but dedicated semi-circle around the man.

Seagulls, strawberry sellers and not-great weather. My city in a nutshell, really.

Monday, July 24, 2017

howling

The eerie, ululating calls of a fox woke me last night.

I ponder Maslow's hierarchy of needs. My basic need for safety is not being met and it has nothing to do with spending my summer among foxes.

Inside, I'm howling too.

tools for a rainy day

Scratchy old blankets in Sixties' colours, scratched Gilmore Girls DVDs on the laptop, a packet of crisps and cheap wine.

Saturday, July 22, 2017

between novels and eagles

Four days into my long summer holiday.

Four hundred pages into my eight-hundred-page fantasy novel that is guaranteed to sink me into blissful holiday mood.

Halfway through my first-week-of holiday restlessness.

The sun is undecidedly weaving in and out of clouds. Mornings are chilly dew, fragrance of clover, chittering wagtails. Afternoons are bare feet and coconut sunscreen. Evenings are huddling in a sweater in front of a fire, telling tall tales to family.

I have watered an oak, screamed "eagle!" and crawled on my stomach.

Further adventures await.

Thursday, July 13, 2017

lions in her heart, a fire in her soul

Anxiety attacks - when you feel as if you're literally dying or going mad, or both, for no good reason. You can't breathe, can't think, and your heart is about to explode. I had attacks like these for a while last winter. Next to the death of my father, they were by far the worst experience I've ever had.

The strange thing about this crisis is that it brought a lot of things to my life, all of them good. I eat healthier food, exercise more, try to avoid stress, allow myself good things. But of all these necessary life changes, two stand out as by far the most effective:

1. I'm more open towards my friends. I ask for their help instead of stubbornly try to cope on my own. I share my weaknesses and get involved in their lives. I also went to therapy sessions with a professional. As a result, when I'm cold and lonely and panic is pressing in, the support of others is like a warm blanket to wrap myself in.

2. I realised, with the help of my therapist, that I set impossibly high standards for myself. This makes me harsh and judgemental towards myself, which creates stress that brought on the anxiety. I'm learning to be merciful. To change my negative self-talk to encouragement and kindness. To allow myself rest and recreation when I need it. To not conquer all the world in one week.

Now, six months later, I feel OK. I'm still taking the antidepressants a doctor prescribed when I begged for help but I will try weaning myself off them soon. Occasionally, very rarely now, I feel as if another attack might be lurking in the shadows but that I will be able to deal with it.

I know that I'm skirting dangerously close to burnout and exhaustion and that I must be careful not to burn my candle at both ends. I never even realised that this is what I do - I see myself as a laid-back, almost lazy person. But constant, negative self-criticism, fretting about all those dreams not yet fulfilled, and filling my waking time with information overload from social media - this can break me sooner than I thought.

I'm learning to listen to my body and my mind and give them what they need.

Monday, July 10, 2017

taught to be tiny

As women, we are taught to be tiny. To have small bodies, to never be imposing. The ideal of our gender are thin and childlike, hairless and dainty. We are defined by our bodies; defined by our control over them. We are taught to obsess over our physicality and to be repulsed by our desires and intelligences. We are taught to walk scared late at night. We cradle our keys between our perfectly manicured fingers, walking gracefully like a baby antelope in a herd of lions. That our virginity defines our character. That I am a frigid bitch if I do not fuck him, and a dirty slut if I do.

(Michelle K.: "The Truth About Growing Up a Woman")

Thursday, July 06, 2017

boring day at the office

Meanwhile, in the garment industry, I dug through the office fridge for some butter. Behold my findings:

Ketchup
Antibiotics
Kahlua liqueur
Czech beer
Beets
Kippers
Anchovies
Sardelles
Ginger
Soy sauce
Snuff tobacco
Capers
Pomegranate-flavoured mineral water
Fig jam
Cranberry jam
Cranberry juice
Lactose-free milk
Barbecue sauce
Pickled cornichons
10 small packets of wasabi sauce
Container of something unknown with rice

There was no butter.

Sunday, July 02, 2017

study the science of art

To develop a complete mind: Study the science of art; study the art of science. Learn how to see. Realize that everything connects to everything else.

(Leonardo da Vinci)

Saturday, July 01, 2017

silk and anger

On a hot summer's day, I have brunch in the shade on the balcony, clad in buttercup yellow silk. Staring at the sea, talking to the neighbour's cat who is tight-rope walking between balconies.

I walk to the island of my dreams. Through fragrant woods full of birdsong, past beaches teeming with the playful and the sun-worshippers, along abandoned railroad tracks smelling of hot steel.

There was a lot of anger and bitterness in me. It melts away somewhere among all this.

Thursday, June 29, 2017

not finished with you yet

Every single time my heart beats, and my lungs expand, God is telling me, ‘keep living. I’m not finished with you yet.’

(consurgo, Tumblr)

Tuesday, June 27, 2017

lose myself in landscapes

I should get in the car and just drive more often. Turn up the music, stop for coffee at a cute café, explore an old town that I always meant to visit sometime.
I should go back to my old university more often. Visit places where kings ruled and bishops decreed eight hundred years ago, where I had giggly picnics with my friends eighteen years ago, where venerable past and glorious future have always mingled in bubbly hope. Walk the streets where I was once so clueless and worried and excited. Look back with nostalgia and enjoy the confidence I have gained since. Have coffee in ancient, sunlit gardens and wine by the river at twilight.
I should travel by myself more often. Explore endless pathways on foot, linger at the places where my spirit ignites, write in badly lit pubs. Send pictures to friends and caption them "wish you were here", lose myself in landscapes that would seem boring to them. Remember lost friends and be grateful for present ones.

I should ... and I do, sometimes.

Monday, June 26, 2017

silver sequins in a nightless night

Yet another Midsummer was spent in the white kitchen on the Island, celebrating the summer solstice and the season of strawberries, tiny potatoes and the smell of meat sizzling over hot coals.

Friends not seen for a year hugged each other and immediately started sharing: food, ancient memories, roars of laughter, painful tales of death and suffering. This is how friendship always should be. But if I only experience it once a year, under the mild light of the midnight sun, I still count myself lucky.

There was unmerciful teasing about a silver-sequined beanie someone wore with a lacy dress. I choked on my food as someone brought up a story from my indiscriminate youth that involved heated kisses behind a refrigerator. In the middle of the meal, we called the ambulance for a neighbour with a broken leg. The kids, unsupervised, gobbled down corn on the cob and infinite amounts of chocolate while the adults laughed until we cried over stories involving tofu and showers with strangers.
After endless cups of coffee and big bowls of strawberries and icecream, we took a late-night stroll to see the sun glide along the northern horizon. It is easy to be happy in the season of the yötön yö - the nightless night.

Friday, June 23, 2017

passion instead of foolery

Whoever wants music instead of noise, joy instead of pleasure, soul instead of gold, creative work instead of business, passion instead of foolery, finds no home in this trivial world of ours.

(Hermann Hesse)

Thursday, June 22, 2017

of cakes and castleyards

I had white chocolate cake the other day, in a castleyard that was silent and hot with sunlight. You could say that I drove four hundred miles just to have cake in this castleyard. I had a sudden craving for something sweet and the Middle Ages.
Turku Castle
Where I am from, there is history too. Things like million-year-old meteor craters and Neanderthal caves - but they look just like enormous fields and any old caves. People lived here a thousand years ago and more, but they left no castles behind, just a few mysterious stone labyrinths and the fields they plowed.

When I went to university in a city far, far away, many years ago, I discovered what it was like to walk down the same cobblestoned streets used by monks seven hundred years ago and explore a castle where a king threw his brother in the dungeons. And staying up late, labouring over my books, seemed easier when I knew students around here had done the same for centuries.

After graduation and some exploration of the world and even more ancient history, I eventually returned to my homeland of silent forests, birdsong and diligently plowed fields. I love the pure air, the flowers, the small boats in the archipelago, the earthiness of the people. But I miss the visible history and the atmosphere it brings. That's why I took the car and drove hundreds of miles to the castleyard.

I ate my cake and breathed deeply, and felt better.

Saturday, June 17, 2017

wake up and taste the raspberries

I write about the taste of raspberries, fragrances, the heat of the sun on my skin. The comfort of soft wool and a touch that instantly calms me. And yet I seem to be so disconnected from my body.

Every spring, as the outside temperature rises to a level tolerable to bare skin, I awake as from a frozen sleep. It surprises me every spring. And I never feel as alive as on a hot summer's day, straight after a dip in the sea, when I stand half naked on the porch and brush out my wet hair.

This year, my soul woke up with my body. I finally understood this. That I'm not just my head. That the screaming dissonance in my entire existence is my body trying to make itself heard.

I need to learn how to love this body, feel it, be patient with it. I need to really taste the raspberries, not just write about them.

Tuesday, June 13, 2017

lighthouse lorry

This week, I have rearranged my furniture and my emotions. I have also seen a lorry full of lighthouses drive past my house.

Thursday, June 08, 2017

of threes

Summer heat, milky coffee and a Kate Atkinson novel. I should find more work, wash my windows, get my bike fixed up. But I have a slight headache, deep-rooted sorrow and a wonderful life to live.

Saturday, June 03, 2017

doodle and dine

1) Eat better. You have a chalkboard; use it. Make menus. Plan meals.
2) Read at least one chapter of a book for fun each day.
3) Go on a drive once a week. Have no particular destination other than a stop for iced tea. Put on music and see where you end up.
4) Listen to a record straight through without doing anything else. Sometimes music needs your full attention.
5) Doodle. Who cares how shitty of an artist you are? Give it a shot. Create.
6) Go to coffee shops. There’s a million in the city. Get out of the house for a while.
7) Ask a friend to go to dinner. Simply as friends and for no particular reason. Pick up the bill.
8) Allow yourself to fall in love. Let things happen. See where it goes. Take the risk.


(Joshua Angell: "Eight Things to Start Doing")

Thursday, June 01, 2017

do not deconstruct

I will teach my daughter not to wear her skin like a drunken apology. I will tell her ‘make a home out of your body, live in yourself, do not let people turn you into a regret, do not justify yourself. If you are a disaster it is not forever, if you are a disaster you are the most beautiful one I’ve ever seen. Do not deconstruct from the inside out, you belong here, you belong here, not because you are lovely, but because you are more than that.’

(Azra T.: "Your hands are threads, your body is a canvas")

Wednesday, May 31, 2017

climbed the highest mountains

I once heard this song referred to, by its singer, as "a gospel song with a restless spirit".

I'm listening to this song while walking through a world slowly turning into the sheer loveliness of spring. I still don't feel well. My mind is weak and under constant siege by nameless fears. I look at the tiny pills I take every night and wonder how I, the strong one, became dependent on these. These pills, people who reply to my anxious text messages on dark nights, and a woman with kind eyes who listens to my deepest secrets twice a month are the only things standing between me and a falling sky. That, and the Word of God.

I believe in the Kingdom Come
Then all the colours will bleed into one
Bleed into one
But yes, I'm still running 

But I still haven't found what I'm looking for

Wednesday, May 24, 2017

darling books: the isolated princess



"They are the Shaman, Medicine Man, or Witch Doctor of the tribe, the Prince or Princess in fairy tales, the True Knight or Defender of the Faith, like Don Quixote of Joan of Arc. Isolated by their seclusiveness and infrequency (around one percent of the general population), their idealism leaves them feeling even more isolated from the rest of humanity."

I'm browsing through one of my favourite books again, one of the few non-fiction ones I own. Never have I seen my own personality (and those of all my friends and acquaintances) described in such unerring detail.

The book is Please Understand Me II - Temperament, Character, Intelligence by David Keirsey, who bases his temperament studies on the Myers-Briggs personality categorization. I turn to this book every now and then to learn more about how I and others function as we do, and why, and to console myself that I am not, in fact, "isolated from the rest of humanity" - I am an INFP, briefly outlined above.

The book describes sixteen different personalities in great detail, including such things as their interests, orientation and self-image, as well as how they function individually and together with others in career choices, mating, parenting and leadership. Fascinating! Variations of the personality test and its interpretations can be found online but this book really seems to contain everything you need to know, ever, about yourself and others.

"[Idealists] forget very easily yesterday's negative, disagreeable events and tend to remember the positive and agreeable - they are always the romantic about both the future and the past, and always the cheerful dreamer in the public presentation of self ..."

Welcome to my world.

Monday, May 22, 2017

cupcakes and unexpected hazards

Combined three of my favourite things today:

1. Coffee and a cupcake
2. with my best friend
3. in the library.

Afterwards I went to the gym to work off some remaining aggression and depression. Witnessed a man doing complicated, rotating movements to exercize his neck muscles while standing on his head, not once but many times. It looked impressive and dangerous. I found that it is really hard to avoid staring when you're expecting someone's neck to break at any moment.

Friday, May 19, 2017

bent and broken

"I have been bent and broken, but - I hope - into a better shape."

(Charles Dickens: Great Expectations)

Thursday, May 18, 2017

butterflies, wolves and a few Neanderthals

I'm not a museum person. But I love losing myself in foreign worlds.

I had the afternoon off so I wandered into the Ostrobothnian Museum, where I haven't been for years. I studied the exhibitions in detail. Before long, I was far, far away in the last ice age, in the world of butterflies and wolves, in a cave with a Neanderthal man.
I have seldom pondered the fact that I live so close to a cave where Neanderthals lived. Or that I take walks on the impressive site of a major meteorite impact, or that my summers are spent in an archipelago that has been deemed a world heritage site because of the bizarre effects of the last ice age.
It is a fascinating thing, learning about history in one's own home town. I stared at black-and-white photographs from the market square and wondered if the man selling produce from his horse-drawn cart might be my great-grandfather. I recognized streets I last saw in my early childhood but sometimes dream about, irrevocably changed now. I even saw familiar faces on the museum dummies because they were made by friend of mine and and modelled on other friends.
I exit a boring old museum and feel as if I've been on holiday.

Tuesday, May 16, 2017

Europe's night out

Last Saturday night, I was dipping bread into cheese fondue with friends while watching and heavily criticising the European Song Contest.

Everybody loves and hates the ESC but it is a bonding moment between friends and the 200 million people watching the show. It is always so predictable and so surprising, with the daring dresses, the biased voting, the dancing monkeys, the pyrotechnics, the odd mooning, the false notes, the protests and the oddities never seen before.

Oh Europe, you are so very bizarre and so endearing.

Monday, May 15, 2017

two odd moments

Chilly morning air is streaming in through the open balcony door and I'm scrolling through my Facebook feed lazily while a man in work gear is stretched out on my floor, muttering to himself.

I'm sitting in a chair with blood flowing out of my arm into a little bag, while I'm laughing at a girl practicing Swedish phrases: "Jag ska byta din blöja!" ('I am here to change your diaper!')

Saturday, May 13, 2017

a mother's day

What my mother talks about when she calls to chat:

* church services
* walking to the shop
* how hard it is to reverse the car out of the garage without denting it
* what is on her latest bank statement
* what she had for lunch
* when I will come to see her
* what is on TV

My therapist says I should tell my mother more about my own life. So I try. I love my mother, but being an adult daughter is so hard. I love my mother, but. I love my mother.

Friday, May 12, 2017

a curse on my kingdom

Today I borrowed a wifi, had an unhealthy lunch, drove in rush hour traffic with broken brake lights, decided to rearrange my bookshelf for no good reason and abandoned the project halfway through because it turned out it was terrible (books by colour? What an insanely insane idea. I'm staying off Pinterest from now on).

I also managed to do some work, wear new ankle boots, have some negative thoughts and comfort myself with the latest novel by Tana French.

By the way, it snowed. In May. Even in Finland, it should never snow in May.

It may turn out that I am the Ice Queen after all and have put a curse on my kingdom.