2023: the year of Venice and a chartreuse-coloured mid-life crisis

2023 was the year when I abandoned contact lenses, bleeding, zumba, ignorance of current events. 

I started out weak from surgery but recovered. My car - my first one ever - was broken for almost four months and I sold it with no regrets the moment it was fixed. I rode the bus and kept two companies afloat single-handedly (or so it sometimes seemed to me) during a crisis year. I read 126 books, drank wine with my friends, went to concerts and the theatre, went to the gym not often enough, joined a church group to find God, joined a choir to defrost my voice. Despite all this, I spent a surprising amount of time alone.

It was a year of special significance. A year when a fantasy novel (one I didn't even enjoy much) taught me that life is what it is, so ditch the shame and resentment and go do what you were created to do. Ditch the self-pity too and go help the people you can.

People around me suffered this year, so I worried, prayed, spent much of the summer alone. A poodle died, an old lady was hospitalized, the autumn was exhausting. But it was also a jubilee year, with a strong new focus and a tender heart.

Highlights:

* New Year with spumante in an island cottage kitchen and debates regarding divinely installed outdoor toilets and the evilness of Putin.

* April picnic with thick snow, warm sun, sausages grilled over a hot fire.

* First draft of my space opera (poor fiction written for my own enjoyment), finished after about three years.

* Celebration month and crafting my own philosophy while walking dusty streets and drinking wine by the sea. 

* Helsinki weekend with my sister: the House of Nobility, the theatre, deep talk in vintage bar Kappeli surrounded by the Helsinki nightlife, an art museum, spring flowers and singing blackbirds, silk shirts, café visits just like in the 90s.

* Birthday alone in Helsinki: exploring the Fortress of Finland and reshaping my world on an almost-deserted island, warmed by the infinite horizon, a bleak sun, wine and history.

* A big surprise birthday party, two planned parties, and one balcony party to finish off the cakes.

* A chartreuse-coloured new car.

* Cruising in a convertible, playing "Cha Cha Cha" loudly, with my middle-aged friends, to the ridicule of the neighbourhood teenagers.

* Field trip to a sheep farm to pet the lambs, and to an old mansion to look at half-burned attic rooms and luxury spa areas.

* Meteorite explosion that shook me to the bones, late one night.

* Memorable chat with an AI about explicit phrases, historical novels and Slovenian caves.

* Last(?) zumba class ever, last(?) time bringing my old mother to the cottage by the sea.

* New air-conditioning, new fridge, new stove in my 60s flat.

* The cute town of Kristinestad, explored on a hot day with a funny friend. The cute town of Jakobstad, where further exploration was abandoned when we found the cutest café ever.

* Nightwish's last concert which I eavesdropped on, sitting on a rock in the woods on a warm summer night.

* Midsummer with old and new and marvellous Midsummer People, in the forest by a sea of reeds, with a barbecue and strangely-named cats.

* Volunteer assignment as interpreter at a church conference, where I battled social phobia and other demons and decided I might as well become a full-time warrior while I'm at it.

* Exploration of various forests, marshes and villages, sometimes in sandals and silk shirts where hiking boots and safari gear would have been more appropriate.

* Road trips with an old lady: the pavillion where Jean Sibelius got engaged in secret, an ancient meteorite crater, dark lakes with silky water, bohemian farmhouse cafés, faraway villages where we might have lived our lives had fate not intervened.

* Summer almost alone by the sea, with repetitive strain injury, occasional visits by the motorcycle club and excavators and swimming elks, and putting out the bonfire after everyone else had gone home and left me.

* Music of the exquisite kind - in a church fragrant with incense on a hot, thunderous summer evening, in another church as the autumn darkness crept in and coloured lights twinkled in the churchyard.

* Night of the Arts, when I skipped the arts and holed up in crowded café to plan an Italian journey with my friend. 

* Singing in a choir after 25 years of silence. First song: "The Sound of Silence".

* Italy, hot and lovely. Venice - falling into a fairytale and fantasy novel. Florence - crowds and art exhaustion. Cinque Terre - riviera life with beaches and fresa coladas. Pisa - an unexpectedly emotional evening.

* An autumn wedding where I arrived in summery silk, looked after an old lady, talked at length with a father figure from my youth.

* New book club with a minister and a pathologist, Of Mice and Men, Piranesi, and The Call of Cthulhu.

* A week and a weekend with the 16-year-old poodle, nearly blind and deaf and lame. Dark, early mornings dealing with his health issues, knowing it was time to say goodbye.

* Wintry November with snow, theatre, dancing at midnight, fancy restaurants, pub evenings, book club (another kind of pub evening), exhaustion from too much caretaking.

* Mysterious black hole appearing in my car.

* December with concerts, nostalgia and literally sickening amounts of chocolate.

* Warm and fragrant Christmas, plus complicated arrangement to fetch old lady with broken hip from hospital. Chocolates and Love Actually with the best people afterwards. Unexpected bliss.

* New Year's Eve with two people who had never met. And pizza with dark gin. And sadly noting that the days of magnificent fireworks are over. And still hopeful, a little.

2022: the year of French castles and a knife in the stomach

2022 was a year of exploring paths, listening to 57 different genres of music and reading 115 books. 

In the beginning of the year, I couldn't play volleyball, go to church or have dinner in a restaurant because of the pandemic. At the end of the year, the pandemic was more or less forgotten and people worried instead about war and NATO, high prices, energy crises and iodine tablets.

I worked remotely and in the office, went to the gym, walked in the woods, gave up volleyball (again), looked after my mother, had Lucifer evenings with my world-weary friend.

 

Highlights:

* New Year in suspected covid isolation and a holiday alone in Narnia.

* Graffiti and rebel art exhibition in a spooky, abandoned, Arctic fun fair.

* Kicksleds and flashlights with sister on a dark night.

* Winter party in a snowy, dark forest - lanterns, carrot cake, spicy coffee.

* Art exhibition with French masters, pastry as a reward.

* Participating in a demonstration, shouting "Slava Ukraini!"

* St. Patrick's Day celebration - watching live stream of Dublin parade during a boring day at the office.

* New sofa with sheepskin throws and a sea view and many a cozy evening. 

* Turku, my favourite city, just before Easter: snow and sun, Dumbledore's secrets in the cinema, secondhand stores, emotional Sunday service in the cathedral, Bach's St Matthew Passion with spiritual insights.

* Birthday in isolation with flu, pizza and blackcurrant beer, slow walk at a safe distance from a friend, cookies in the spring sun.

* Studying innovative textiles: nettle, banana, coffee fibre, self-regenerating octopus genes ...

* Theatre with friends: Botnia Paradise, met the stars of the show (KAJ).

* Walpurgis Night celebration: listening to spring songs in the park, party with donuts and Popeda music.

* Street market in my old neighbourhood: Sunday school memories and strangers.

* Trip to Stockholm: two archipelagoes seen from the deck of an enormous ferry, churches and cafés in the old town with a friend, water buses and the charming Söder, window shopping and weird cinema in Mall of Scandinavia, luxurious hotel night with velvet and royal portraits, old friends and a sermon in Arabic at a church service, munching churros with sister and niece, an afternoon alone at a historical Stortorget café and in a wonderful scifi bookshop, a night show with cocktails on the ferry home to make the most of life while others slept.

* Military exercise that I walked straight into on my quiet forest walk - had to ask heavily armed soldiers for permission to pass through.

* Celebration of summer: two-minute boat trip and an outdoor lunch so windy that my friend had to hold down the wine glasses while I cut the pizza.

* Studying French until I dreamed in French and heard birds converse in French.

* Rickshaw ride with excited old lady.

* Midsummer with the usual crowd and a boat trip under the midnight sun.

* Fleeing a heatwave to a house with a hidden garden - read C.S. Lewis, walked a poodle and watered tomato plants.

* Hen night with Slovakian liqueur, chocolate quiz and book bingo.

* A wedding that was all my fault, in a leaning church. Reunion with old friends, the charming of new ones.

* Summer with boat trips and library trips, golf played with tennis balls and steel pipes, butterfly safari and finding fallen stars.

* Epic road trip through France.

* Two Tampere weekends: summer with beachvolley, autumn with exploring, wine and Mortal Engines.

* Dark september evenings in the wilderness cottage - a fire, wine and books.

* My first trade fair, with colleagues, free sweets and strange innovations like exoskeletons and neurological beds.

* Dancing salsa with beautiful people, trying not to crush their toes.

* Power cocktails and fire extinguishers - just another day in the garment industry.

* Crane-watching in a meteorite crater.

* An eventful week in a suburbian house - dealing with bleeding poodles, ambulances, cranky heating systems, videocalls in the dark, ghosts in the garage.

* MRI, laparoscopy, post-op pains - all resulting in a whole month of rest, then physical uproar and trouble finding medicines.

* Christmas season concerts: 90s gospel and traditional chorals.

* Luxury Christmas lunch, crises and passive aggression as an end to the work year.

* Christmas week: five parties, work, plus a New Year's Eve on the Island. Still finding the time to stuff my face with chocolate.

Domestic road trips of the year: Lapua and Kauhava for vintage shopping and too much snow, Jakobstad for books, Isokyrö for the following of a river towards a yellow cupcake.

starting at the end of the world

New Year celebration with candles, friends, a French look, discussions on the war and the latest Jewish Messiah, bubbles, a strong wind and bad roads - on the Island at the end of the world.

the whitefish at world's end

On the Island, not much has changed. I've used the long drive to clear my head of summer confusion and sigh as I cross the tall bridge over an endless sea. 

Sunlight sparkles in the Baltic waves. I take detours into some of the small villages. Forests and fields, winding roads, a craft shop where I buy homemade bisquits. I'm in no hurry. It's the last day of my annual leave and still summer in my mind. I came alone because I needed to be alone.

At the farthest tip of the Island lies a small harbour, looking out towards open sea and the world heritage archipelago. The little restaurant at the end of the universe is getting ready to close for the season but still serves an delicious meal of whitefish and spicy potatoes. Dark coffee and a pink cupcake for dessert. 

The wind from the sea is chilly but I sit in the sun on the open patio to watch boats come and go, carefully navigating between thousands of islets and reefs. I wrap up in a cardigan and warm my cold fingers on the coffee mug. Before the long winter I have to soak up every sunray, every scent of saltwater and vibrant earth.

A hike along one of the trails takes me past birch forests, inlets and fishing spots, old cottages and ancient rock formations. Even some highland cattle grazing on what used to be seabed.

The Island wraps me in its mystical air.

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.

in a rain of slush, gravel and sparks

Do you remember that March day when we hitched a sleigh to a snowmobile?

You drove, one of my best friends sat behind you, and two of us rode in the sleigh. There wasn't really enough snow left so when we went along the forest road, the snowmobile pelted the sleigh with gravel and slushy snow. My friend and I shrieked and laughed at this torture. The metal runners occasionally hit a gravel patch and sparks flew.

Then we went onto the ice, staying close to the shore just in case. We stopped and had a lovely picnic on a little islet, turning our faces towards the sun. On the way back, there was so much melted water on the surface of the thinning ice that it completely drenched the two of us who sat in the sleigh.

I remember being scared that the ice wouldn't hold us. By the way you drove, occasionally changing course to get closer to the shore and making sure to keep up the speed, I could tell that you were worried too. But at that point in my life, I was used to danger. I had learned to let go of my fear, think "when your time is up, it's up" and feel the thrill in my every cell. That's what I did that day, too.

We came back as soaked as if we had actually gone through the ice, and  my toes were frozen. We dried ourselves and changed clothes in an ancient cottage on the Island and you told me the history of the place in a solemn voice. Your life had such a long history. I envied and admired you for that.

But that day, I was back together with friends I had not seen for a long time. There was history in our relationships. There was adventure, too. That was a very good day. I have a picture of us all there on the islet, grinning.

Do you remember it?

2014: the year of subtitles and smoothies

* New Year with friends in the countryside, fireworks and green tea. I also heard the snarl of  Cerberus  in the dark behind me.
* Cocktails and an anomaly: a volleyball game on the TV screen in the pub, to the joy of me and a handful of hardcore fans.
* Lost my dearest neighbour,the best widow in the house, the one who first saw me in pyjamas and who could tell me what the view out of the window looked like in the Sixties.
* Endured a few months in a gym with coldhearted people, stuffy changing rooms and excellent dance classes.
* Stocktake: counting ten thousand pieces of clothing plus a few reindeer hides.
* Composed a 10-page quality plan without knowing what a quality plan is. (Brought back memories of every essay I ever wrote at university.) For a company that was went bust a couple of weeks later. (Irony not lost on anyone.)
* Weeks and weeks of compiling business statistics for lack of anything better to do. Never thought I would look at spreadsheets as a source of entertainment.
* Second-hand shopping in Suicide City with an unusual man and a GPS navigator that favoured cow paths. I learned that Toyota apparently does sewing machines too, bright orange ones.
* Lived in  suburbia  for three weeks during the most desperately depressing phase of winter. Cheered myself up with dog walks, good espresso and lounging in front of a real fire.
* Abrupt end to my new career in the clothing industry when I came back from my lunch break one day and was told to pack my stuff as company was bankrupt.
* Abrupt start of my new career as audiovisual translator when I was headhunted by a tattoo-heavy rock'n'roll biker dude. Visit to a strange little television company where I was crammed with new software skills.

*  Return to the Little Shop of Harmony (the job I left a year earlier) for a few days of work among books and people.
* Went to a concert to hear a Nineties pop star (Jenny from Ace of Base). She can still sing.
* Debut as fanfiction writer.
* Visit to Helsinki, star-struck by the city lights. Everything was a delight - the four-hour train ride, the hostel that had birdsong in the bathrooms, the mozzarella sticks, watching football over a beer with the locals and the Japanese tourists - but most of all the urban air. Must have walked five hundred miles just to take it all in.
* Hen party with Finns and Russians - shabam-core-stretching, film discussion in a sauna, too much thai food, a club that wouldn't let us in and one that did. The dancing went on for a very long time.
* Another visit to the nation's capital, this time in a hostel with less birdsong but more exotic people. A glorious evening walk in an odd part of the city and the dubious pleasure of sleeping in a 20-person dorm - rocked to sleep by Russian whispering.
* A three-day wine picnic by the rivers of Germany with a woman who cuts dead people for a living. Highlights included a bowl of carrot soup in a twilit garden, and a bomb scare.
* A wedding. I cried, charmed a whole table of introverted bachelors, tied a ribbon into a stranger's beard and endured forced labour afterwards with the cleaning-up. Will never go to a wedding again.
* Guided tour in a garbage truck factory and a preacher museum. Just another day in the life of a translator.
* Scary and unsafe and yet the best job I've ever had: subtitling TV shows while sitting in the sun on a balcony overlooking the sea, sipping coffee.

* Six cocktails on one summer's evening, served by an unlikely cocktail master who was also an expert on child-rearing and on going naked for extended periods of time.

* Day on a deserted island with a laptop, an excavator and a man.
* Watched the icehockey world championship final with friends. Someone bit me in the knee when Finland lost.
* A summer lunch in the cemetery (with the thought "Maybe I'm sitting on my future grave?") and a National Ballet show in the market square.
* Summer cider evenings with a seaview and a friend, and this year's only cigarette.
* Coldest midsummer ever with gang of friends, almost-midnight-sun and a concert with an American artist who arrived by helicopter.
* Watched the traditional old-school boat race on the Island with friends, my mother, my friends' mothers, my mother's friends...
* Summer of my dreams: five weeks on the beach far from everything with family, books, beachvolley, water games and a hot, hot sun. And no worries about returning to work. Enchanting additions to this summer included shrews, squirrel babies, and locals who let me refill water canisters free of charge.
* Camembert and cannoli at the European food market where vendors greet you with "bonjour" or "buongiorno". Melts a cold Finnish heart every time.
* Became a half-hearted fan of junior football, either roasting or freezing in the bleachers.
* Sampled the best of a summer in the city: giggling among the beautiful people on a summer's evening with crazy friends, watching beachvolley championships barefoot in the bleachers with icecream.

* The Night of Arts, this town's annual carnival day. Personal highlights included an  Orthodox church crypt  (not at all what you would expect), Shetland ponies, an enchanting tango show in a back room, "Whiskey In The Jar" and overdosing on tea in an artist's studio. The best thing about this annual chaos is always ending up in the weirdest parts of the city.
* An August of electrical storms - like the one that went of for an entire afternoon and almost slaughtered the city while I was trying to keep four kids and one dog calm, or the completely silent ones that brightened the midnight sky.
* The end of summer: cousins and Norwegians, bonfires, country roads in harvest time, the silence of a million stars, bittersweetness.
* Emergency-babysitting two kids, an experience not unlike that of trying to contain a bunch of wasps after giving their nest a good shake.
* Peaceful last coffee break ever in my old workplace, the Little Shop of Harmony, which now closed its doors for good. Nostalgia but a sense of grace.
* Free tickets to the theatre: Edith the crazy poet, me, my intellectual friends, silver shoes.
* A few boisterous Saturday nights in a bilingual Irish pub packed to the rafters with all kinds of humanity. In the company of the girl who reads Camus in French and drinks me under the table, and the stone-sober girl who only reads Fifty Shades of Grey. Or the scruffy guy of rough hands and a kind heart. A good time was had by all and we got through the list of selected beers.
* My first senior citizens' trip, at least 25 years too early, across the pond to Sweden: sunny landscapes, great seafood, a sing-along, hilarious elderly gentlemen.
* Autumn days wrapped in wool, warmed by the laptop on my lap or the fireplace at my side.
* Harvest feast with an abundance of melted chocolate.
* A world-class gospel concert with my teenage crush, a boy I knew in third grade, and a one-time card-game partner - all of them now professional musicians - and familiar faces all around. Suddenly it was 1992 again.
* Lunches in my ex-workplace just to confuse the boss who fired me.
* There is a first time for everything - like editing web pages, digging out ancient Finnish poems, job interviews on Skype.
* Walked like  Quasimodo  for a few days.
* Work that brought freedom but also hours upon hours of installing software, reading instructions, learning how to use strange databases and convert files. And wondering what would explode first, my laptop or my brain.
* A really weird party in a fancy villa, stone sober, with wasted women, bemused bachelors and a privately guided art tour.
* An international night with input from Honduras, Nigeria and the U.S.A. and the reminder that a dark, dangerous winter lies ahead. The night ended around a bottle of wine with friends as a storm howled outside and the reminder that I have survived Finnish winters before.
* Trendy Saturday brunch on  raw food and liquorice balls.
* Computer courses - the same ones I've taken before and forgot all about.
* Weekend in Tampere with the girls: mad laughter, Spanish tapas, Beaujolais Noveau, cozying up in bed watching Bones and Magic Mike, spilling scented candles all over the IKEA parking lot.

* Back to the night shift: debate, exhaustion, bucketloads of vanilla chai.
* Barely made it past Christmas Eve with family before crashing down with the flu. Thank God I have friends with the good sense to give me DVD box sets for Christmas.
* Singles party on New Year's Eve. Singles party! This is SO not me. Fell head over heels in love with life.

meet Robinson and Friday

Another random picture from the ancient archives:

We made landfall on a deserted island one autumn afternoon, my friend and I. At least we thought it was deserted. Two sheep showed up and tried to force themselves aboard as we were setting out again.

Some Islanders take herds of sheep out to small islets over the summer to let them roam free. These two had apparently been left behind when the rest were collected in the autumn and were feeling rather put out. We informed the sheepfarmer about this. So I can kind of take the credit for saving two lives that grey afternoon.

2013: the year of crooked seams, introverted dates and a cucumber candy cactus

"I'm a hopeless wanderer and I will learn, 
I will learn to love the skies I'm under"
(Mumford & Sons)

The year 2013:

* The New Year: eating Sacher Torte in front of a roaring fire after an eleven-course Chinese dinner, saying "I have no illusions that my life will change at all this year".
* Not three days later, a big change in the form of zumba.
* Not four weeks later, a massive change in the form of a new job. Now emailing China about high-visibility fabric and heat transfer prints, sorting out button holes for prison guards and sleeve badges for firemen.
* Other changes included: not feeling like a nerd anymore, spending 40 hours a week with complete strangers, spending too much time at work, having too little to do, studying languages out of sheer boredom, witnessing one disastrous crisis after the other.
* Not being dirt poor anymore: the happiness of buying a bottle of raspberry sparkling water and having delicious lunches all over town.
* Claiming my own ground: now I know how to register new land risen from the sea.

* The feeling of pulling open a heavy door and enter a deathly silent church: the funeral of my very first and very special childhood friend.
* Smashing a computer to very pretty pieces.
* Pinterest: source of overwhelming inspiration and beauty.
* Slipping even further into  minimalism and the American dream.
* Another Irish adventure: a cold and glorious spring, chasing cats, driving criminally, feeling loved, dancing with a Spaniard,  walking into a glitzy Citibank building in dirty denim, going through every second-hand book shop... and enjoying haunted houses, an indie film premiere in a dark basement, tall stories from Polynesia, bubble tea, heart-breaking people and places.
* Death of my first night-club friend, with whom I once got life-threateningly lost in a Russian slum.
* Accused of being an anti-fur activist, by 82-year-old lady who threw her fur coat at me.
* Life crisis: haven't accomplished a family or anything memorable, think happiness isn't for me - but that isn't going to stop me from sucking out all the marrow of life.
* Celebrating on a pink moon day, deciding what music is to be played on the radio in the future, and going on a date that included red roses.
* Throwing a party, with more than a little help from my friends. Presents included hot stone massage and a cucumber candy cactus.
* Traditional May Day hike on the Island to look for perch and have a picnic with sun and the fragrance of ice.

* Best friend's wedding, proudly seated at the weird table, co-presenting the most entertaining entertainment.
* Hysterical photo shoot with best friends, with instructions from long-suffering photographer: "Kiss her on the cheek! Give us some girl power! Boy power, then? Was that it, was that your moment?!"
* A summer night's dream, barefoot in a red dress and wild hair at midnight, smiled at by strangers.
* Planting potatoes (10 pcs).
* Midsummer weekend with family and some very loud volleyball.
* One measly week of summer vacation - managed to squeeze in as many diseases and thunderstorms as possible but also some peace of mind.
* The usual, lovely city summer life with beachvolley, lattes in the sun and cannelloni bought with "grazie mille" from a real Italian.
* The usual, lovely country summer life with beachvolley, instant coffee in the sun and glow-worm hunting at midnight.
* Watching a vintage boat race and having waffles with a pathologist and a politician.
* A night in the emergency room with an ailing mother, The Shadow of the Wind and rather fascinating patients.
* A blissful evening by the sea, for once alone in paradise and feeling at home.
* Hot stone massage, luxury lunch in the sun and wine evening with the giggle girls.
* Date on a deserted island with an introvert.  With the same man on other occasions: cider at seafront cafés, take-out pizza in the park, burger meals, a delicious Mexican dinner to celebrate an excavator.

* Nostalgia, chocolate cake and some really incomprehensible academic terminology.
* A hot autumn day in the great forests of the east where my father was born - a funeral and a family feeling.
* IT consulting and various other consulting for my old job, realised my old job was much more demanding than my new one.
* Lessons on how to treat a fur coat.
* All Saints' Day multi-religious cemetery tour with friends, including a bit of geo-caching and cheesecake.
* Under-stimulated at work, over-stimulated at home.
* Winning in volleyball with the town's biggest, baddest and biceps'est men.
* Making a film documentary about a Shell jacket, in Chinese.
* Making an ex-boyfriend jealous for no reason ( and feeling rather good about it ).
* Sick leave: Three days with a fever on the sofa and howling with laughter while watching old episodes of QI.
* Christmas with bucketloads of mulled wine, rain, The Elegance of the Hedgehog and being put in a headlock by my brother.
* New Year's Eve with the Spinster Club, Hopeless Cases Division. Included a long drive in my White Witch coat, a new constellation of friends, fireworks and green tea.

Marvels I have beheld this year:
* A genuine London cab in a small Finnish town.
* A dog in a bag on a picnic table. Not for eating and very much alive.
* My new life: zumba, salad and statistics
* A supernova reflected in a quiet sea
* Moon cakes straight from Shanghai
* Exhaustion, over-interpretation and a break from church
* Random fact learned: An IRA terrorist wanted in connection with a bombing is now teaching religion in a Catholic school in Gambia

Parties:
* A hen party in a charming cottage next to an airport runway.
* Midnight trampoline bouncing with maniacal laughter.
* A night of Mexican food, airhockey, jiving with a Romanian among pub tables, dancing all night.
* Sangria and Glee with a pathologist who doesn't want to watch CSI because "cutting up people myself is more fun than watching others do it".
* Dinner, a rom com and chocolate-dipped popcorn with family.
* Pub evening with my weirdest Cockney friend and tales of stabbings, prison and heartbreak.
* Pie with volleyball friends and talk about starting a cocoa farm.
* Discussions of dreams and Downton Abbey in a blizzard on the Island.

Mutant from the Garment District

Phenomena in the Garment District (a.k.a. my workplace):
* Learning the Chinese sign for "wool".
* Pondering the fact that the Finnish Army might have to wear asymmetrical shirts with crooked seams.
* Coworker taking foot soaks in the sink.
* Quoting Shakespeare to win an argument with a supplier.
* Screaming in rage down the phone to China.
* Eating moon cakes with ice sand egg yolk filling - can my Chinese friend really not find a better translation for the ingredients or is she having me on?
* Not receiving the promised garment samples because someone has constipation.
* Rating couriers according to their social skills, ability to lift heavy parcels and choice of the music that is blaring from their van.
* Studying the teachings of Nietsche and playing a Dr. Who game.
* Chasing a bird through the office.

by the seaside with strawberries

Coffee, wild strawberries, waffles with jam and cream, a cheeseburger.

The day in a menu, on  the Island.

The entertainment consisted of a vintage boat race of the type that is popular around here, with traditional old fishing boats being sailed or rowed, the crews dressed in vintage fishing garb. We only witnessed the start of the race, as the finishing line is across the pond, in Sweden.

 But the sight of twenty-odd wooden boats setting sail towards the horizon is awe-inspiring. Even when the day is grey and overcast.

The company consisted of a pathologist who handles corpses for a living ( no pun intended ), a politician on his way to Brussels to do some lobbying in EU headquarters, and true Islanders: chatty, motherly women who always try to feed you and men of the strong and silent type.

dachshunds, perch and other wildlife

1st of May, and the almost-traditional hike on the Island.

Meaning bright sunshine and icy winds, and the bliss of finding a picnic spot in a sheltered, sunny spot. Add to that the excitement of going to that little creek to watch the spectacle of spawning perch, and the magnificent views from the lookout tower.

The company: a good friend, a guy who dumped me, his new girlfriend, a pregnant Chinese woman, a couple I have never met before, a slightly mad man, a true Islander (strong, silent) and a fat Dachshund.

2012: Cleopatra, a fairytale cottage and freedom fighting

* With much-longed-for solitude, wine and the beginnings of a dream I entered the year of the world's end (according to the Maya calendar). Signed up (on FaceBook) for the Post-Apocalypse Party in December just in case.
* Chased a man all the way into a church.
* Entered the smartphone world and realised my days of texting while driving were over. So were my FaceBook- and Twitter-free vacation days.
* Chinese New Year celebration with vintage Pu'er tea, dumplings and non-Chinese people. Hail the Year of the Dragon!
* A sisterhood founded in the Beach Hut.
* Followed monsters around the Island on Shrove Tuesday and was a little bit scared and very fascinated.
* Almost fell through the ice walking across the bay. Excitement of the year.
* A new boss with digital ideas.
* Once again paralyzed by shyness - in the company of the closest family.
* Finished last in a volleyball tournament with much bloodshed and almost death by laughter.
* CABIN FEVER.
* Lots of coffee dates that never led anywhere.
* Fell in love with the sound effects in Angry Birds.
* Eastern Europe Easter - a dinner mixed with a little African colour and funny YouTube-clips. Our discussion topics: flash mobs, thesis writing, kulich recipes, Bulgarian Idols, man-hunting Chinese girls, Indonesian women who have plastic surgery to look like Korean women.
* A reminder that true friendship includes detailed involvement in somebody else's life, jealousy-free trust and bacon pasta.
* Bought my very first own washing machine. A washing machine is a heavier possession than a car - mentally speaking.
* Spent a morning at the police station and came back with a stolen laptop.
* Two days semi-paralyzed. Questioned the wisdom of getting that tetanus shot, but it turned out to be worth it since I almost lost a finger to the vicious teeth of a mini-turtle some time later.
* Me and my mother discovered  Turkey.  Celebrated my birthday and was thrilled to be brutally/seductively woken in the middle of the night by the call to prayer. Drifted around (lost but always finding a way, and loving it), tried to avoid the flirts, discovered the Turkish language is inundated with French loanwords, felt at peace among the ruins from Cleopatra's time, watched BBC, realised Turkish women sometimes bare their heads and tourists bare almost anything. Saw a camel use the pedestrian crossing, wearing a cowboy hat. And what is that spicy scent that always appears after nightfall around the Mediterranean Sea?
* A couple of clubbing nights with euphoria, beer spray and dancing on shards of glass. Also included a nice chat with my worst enemy ever, until two burly security guards told me enough is enough.
* Language-checked books on farmers and prophets.
* New experience: buying land and watching surveyors do their stuff.
* A summer month in the countryside, living in a fairytale cottage with a sheepdog, getting involved in the village gossip and contributing to it.
* Midsummer on the Island with the Midsummer People. It involved midnight shopping, tobacco flowers bought on credit, cat-and-dog fights (between actual cats and dogs), lots of food and laughs, a lullaby and a spectacular midnight sunset.
* Realised that a five-week summer vacation should always start with pavlova and bubbly.
* Summer weeks at the cotttage: Acted as mediator in dog fights, director of trampoline action movies, rescuer of drowning seagulls, volleyball coach, Twitter addict.
* Squeezed in as much as possible of what I live for, summer's essential activities: beach volley and raft floating. This makes me feel like myself. (And this is what I will be doing in heaven all day long.)
* Family reunion with seldom seen cousins, my hilarious aunts, mixed feelings and a sense of belonging after all.
* Road trip with mother and poodle.
* Proudly discovered that I'm woman enough to change a flat tire by myself, in a mini-skirt on a hot day.
* TV taught me to love my mother.
* Binged on clearing out closets, drawers and even those never-looked-at boxes of stuff in the attic storage space. OCD? Possibly. But such a feeling of  freedom! When the time to fly comes, I will be ready.
* Happiness is a chilly evening playing pretend volleyball in high heels on a muddy lawn, warmed by three glasses of wine and cool people who laugh at  my jokes.
* Impressed my dentist ( one of the few people I managed to impress this year ).
* Witnessed my laptop die and be brought back to life ( speaking a new language ). 
* Got tired of church.
* Found the meaning of life in a great pair of jeans and a great pair of boots. Spent October haunting the city streets and rediscovering autumn leaves.
* Paid my last TV license ever.
* A visit to the maternity ward and plans for the baby's future - these plans included flirts with strangers on a train to Durban, South Africa.
* On the winning team in women's AND men's volleyball - at last!
* Made  my modest contribution (a translation) to the geocaching world.
* Saw fighter aircraft fly in formation past my window and decided I live in a real city after all. Saw a big owl kill a hare outside my window and had to admit I live in the boondocks.
* New experience: push starting a car on my own, on a busy city street. ( Damn French cars in cold weather! )
* Seafood and laughing friends at a semi-oriental wedding.
* Spent the entire year addicted to a TV series I dreamed up as a 5-year-old. Hated Finland and experienced its beauty and quirkiness in intense detail. Trawled YouTube and found fascinating music I never knew existed. Had  a troubled mind.
* And the world did not end. The last evening of 2012 was spent cooking for three hours, but in a very relaxed manner, and resulted in nine courses of real Chinese food, as well as in chocolate cake by the fireside, in the company of friends, when the clock struck midnight.

kicksleds and monsters

Normally somewhat pessimistic, I knew it was going to be a perfect day from the minute I picked up some fresh donuts from the supermarket and drove out to the Island. Maybe it was because of the brilliant sunshine over white snow and the ideal winter temperature, just below freezing.

The Island has an ancient mummers tradition of sorts on Shrove Tuesday. It's mad, bad and dangerous to know... Young people get dressed up as monsters and walk around the village, making noise and entering a few houses. The general idea is to attack random people on the way, drag them into the ditch and "wash" them with snow, a cold and rather unpleasant experience for the victim. A crowd of children of all ages and some adults follow them around, drawn by morbid curiosity, and every now and then the mummers turn around and attack their followers. It's not exactly safe - I saw and heard complaints of scrapes and bruises, ruined cellphones, and witnessed children shaking with terror or cold or both. At one point I was trying to comfort my friend's toddler who cried as he saw his mother dragged off by two monsters while another approached him to rub some snow into his face.

And still, all the children were completely exhilarated afterwards. The adults bought hot dogs at an improvised concession stand and muttered about things getting way out of hand, but the same was muttered last year and the year before that and still everyone is eager to keep this tradition going exactly as it is.

I was trailing after the monsters like the others but was spared any attacks. Maybe because I am a stranger in this village where everyone knows everyone. But I was as exhilarated as the rest. It's a strangely scary feeling, standing passively still and avoiding eye contact as gangs of masked monsters - who never utter a sound - advance on you, while children run away and adults shift nervously but never resist as they are randomly and rather violently dragged off the road for punishment.

And the rest of it - moving around the snowy village roads on a kicksled with a toddler bedded down in sheepskins and wool blankets, passing ancient cottages and sleeping fields, golden sunshine giving way to blueish dusk and starry skies, hearing the locals chatter around me, warming myself by a gas barbecue outside the community hall, going home to hot chocolate and traditional Shrove Tuesday "klimp" soup and pastries with the Warrior Princess and her elderly aunt - it was all just perfect. As I knew it would be.

gonna have a riot

Heading out to the Island, where they apparently have their own quirky take on Shrove Tuesday celebrations. My friend's only clues were a vague "well, they hit people on the head" and a worried "I really can't guarantee that you won't break any bones".

But there is actual sunshine today, the bright "promise of spring" kind, and a dripping sound of melting snow on the windowsill. So I go bravely.

saturday night on the Island

Driving the long, dark road to the Island. The car skidding in every curve on the wintry road. Having to dip my headlights and slow down every time I meet another car (which is not very often). Keeping my eye out for elks and hoping the road won't get snowed in before it's time to go back home.

It's tough driving. But I'm experimenting with some new music on the stereo. And when I reach my destination at last, 40 kilometres later, lights are welcoming me from every window of the picturesque cottage. The candles are lit, the table is set and the guests are mingling. The Warrior Princess, dressed in pink silk, is smiling at me. It's the end of the world and the party is on.

the juniper beach at the end of the world

A forest wild and ancient, untouched by man. A well-worn path where the sun glints through the branches overhead.

It is spring: the temperature mild in the shade, warm in the sun - and when the path veers within sight of the sea, a blast of chilling winter hits my cheeks. The sea open, endless in almost every direction - we are on The Island after all - and wide stretches of impossibly white ice still floating in the clear blue water. I could go mad trying to describe the beauty.

Someone spots a snake, just out of its hibernation. Eagles patrol the blue skies. Near the shore we find a stone oven supposedly built by Russian sailors who passed by in the early 18th century. "Do you think they baked pizza in here?"

Some of my companions on this hike are experienced walkers who think nothing of walking for weeks up and down mountains with a backpack. Others have just stumbled out of bed this afternoon after a late night party. A few are obsessive-compulsive geocachers who have to make a couple of detours to find treasures along the way. Today, I love them all. Who wouldn't, when the sun is melting the ice after a cold winter and people are smiling at you?

We reach the end of the trail, a fishing cottage surrounded by the sea and the sky, and the map tells us we are almost in the middle of the Baltic Sea. A landscape of rocks, juniper and rowan. We unpack our picnic on a tiny beach where the cold wind can't reach us. Stretch out in the sun. Share sandwiches and sweets and coffee and jokes.

And a little flirting on the walk back. Yes, life is perfect.

study war no more

Went to the Island again. The road was terrible to drive, bumpy and icy. Every Islander seemed to be gathered at the community hall for the annual Elk Dinner Dance (elks not welcome, except as the main course).

Xena the Warrior Princess was the exception. She has settled down in her cute little cottage with her man (an insurance salesman), two energetic babies that she fusses a bit over, and a decorative white cat. It would seem like an anti-climax to her warrior life but I suspect this is the life towards which she was fighting all along. A life she could not have had without that fight.

We devour icecream and fudge and watch tv. The sweet rest after a life of war.

four cupcakes and an eagle

Potatoes, acupressure mats, tacky souvenirs, fertilizer.

The little grocery shop on the Island has it all. Even cupcakes with little hearts in the frosting. We eagerly pick them out and need help with the wrapping. The staff and the few customers eye us with interest as we breeze through, two women dressed in bleached jeans, lace, earrings and that unmistakable city air. "Perhaps the lasses are in a hurry?" An old man, barely able to stand, politely offers us his place in the short queue to the check-out. ("No, no, please, no hurry at all.")

An Islander cooks us lunch (seafood and mashed potatoes, cupcakes for dessert). As we go for a walk along the winding forest road towards the harbour, the neighbour's cat decides to follow us and loudly protests (but continues to follow) when he thinks we have gone far enough. In the shelter beneath the trees the mosquitoes make a meal out of us and the sea breeze is very welcome when we reach the harbour.

Heavy rain clouds gather around the boathouses and jetties. Seagulls are screeching angrily at an eagle riding the high winds and the Islander cannot decide if she is more worried about the cat being hit by a car on the road or taken by the bird of prey. Three elderly men are gathered around a quad bike. No hellos or small talk seem necessary but they eagerly point out to us a rare natural phenomenon: due to a mirage over the sea, you can see a reflection of the nearest island on the other side, normally not visible. Today, you can see Sweden from here. We would have taken the mirage for a cloud bank by the horizon but these experienced fishermen know what's what.

The new lookout tower looms black and forbidding. "Is that Mordor? Can you see a huge eye?" This overcast June day, fragrant with lush meadows, not many people are to be seen. Near the start of a popular hiking trail we find a stand selling necessities: a few water bottles, juice cartons and handcrafted souvenirs are on display. The man minding the stand also has canoes for hire and an impressive old-style wooden boat with its sails up. Not a good day for business, obviously, and he does not even bother to finish his phone call when we walk by.

From Mordor's top we admire the view of the archipelago. On our way home, the rain pours down on us. The poor wet cat's complaints can probably be heard all the way to the city. But the landscape is breathtaking and the friendship is warming and we giggle with rain dripping from our noses. It could be that this Island is the mirage.

into the future with sinusitis and soufflé

Year 2008 AD started on the Island, snow under my feet and Veuve Clicquot warming my stomach. The man who explains the stars to me wasn't there. But I had friends, cats, a victory in Trivial Pursuit and what more can one ask for than a long solitary drive back home through silent forests and across the magnificent bridge. Rihanna and Lauri Tähkä on the radio.

Later, sneezes and weariness and a cynical attitude. A dentist who praised my brushwork. My admirable father who took me to buy a camera so the sneaky salesmen couldn't make me cry. An adorable puppy who stayed a night in my flat and tried to find a way to kill and eat the newspaper delivery guy through the slot in the door.

I have already seen a good film and a bad film, been given chocolate by an (unwelcome) admirer, bought new (second-hand) clothes, missed the bus and had a fit of completely unreasonable rage, had sinusitis, had raspberry soufflé, held in my hand a splinter of the True Cross (stamped "souvenir from Jerusalem" on the back). Not a bad start to the new year after all. Bring on the rest of it!

in the company of the warrior princess

Visited the Island. Xena the Warrior Princess lives there nowadays. At least I think it's her, although she is blonde and wearing wellies instead of sandals.

When I arrive after the long drive through forest and across the shockingly tall bridge, spring has painted the sea in glorious colours. The Warrior Princess is changing the tyres on her car and tells me about her upcoming wedding, the wedding she doesn't have the time to plan because she is (more or less single-handedly) restoring the old cottage where she lives.

"The safe feeling of being loved by someone... that is all I really need." The adventurer who tells me this once travelled alone through the darkest parts of Africa and will let nothing stand between her and her dreams. Against everybody's advice, she has almost torn the cottage apart to restore it to its original, beautiful shape. It's still complete chaos, but this girl can make even chaos look welcoming. There are three beautiful cats in the middle of it. One of them is sitting on the laptop.

The car is left standing with only two tyres attached because Xena has spotted something in the attic of the old barn that she absolutely has to investigate right away. So we climb around the ancient attic where the floor threatens to fall apart beneath our feet at any moment. The interesting object turns out to be half an old table and we haul it downstairs at the peril of our own lives.

An elderly man, a genuine soft-spoken Islander and expert on hand-crafted doors, arrives to look at an old door that Xena has found and wants put into the cottage. These old Islanders must be quite shaken up by this blonde tornado that has swept into their little old-fashioned community. Despite this, I have a feeling they can't help but love her. At least they have something to talk about. She has already engaged dozens of them in helping her repair her boat, give advice on the restoration work and tell her all about the history of the Island.

We snack on sandwiches and cheese crisps among the sawdust in the cottage before Xena gets back to sandpapering the walls and trying to persuade me to buy the cottage next door. The idea is too much for me to contemplate.

Driving back across the bridge to the mainland, I'm exhausted as if I had lived a lifetime in one evening.