The 2nd of January:
The 3rd of January:
Honestly, what’s going on? This horrible winter weather is good though, what January is supposed to be like. It makes me want to stay inside and listen to good music. (Like this amazing live Bon Iver concert: https://youtu.be/YJNi7aRwUzU )
The thing is, 2016 was a good year. Great year, 9/10 (always leave space for things to get better).
Because one of my biggest fears is that – because of fear – I’ll never get to do any of the things I want to do. But this year I moved away from home for the first time, lived abroad. Had several different lifestyles and different jobs. I was challenged and matured and met a whole new family of friends. Got to go to the US, Kenya, Denmark, Germany, Hungary, Austria, and then Germany again. That’s actually crazy?? I’ve lived in 2016 for a lifetime. And those are the kind of years I want. Let’s dare to believe that things get even better.
Golden paper on the table so that we could make party hats. We look fabulous.
Literally. I came home from work and threw up. That was the 23rd. The following days are a bit hazy in my mind. I’ve been on a mattress in the living room, and today is the first day I’ve been able to walk without my legs shaking.
Hope your Christmas has been better and I keep my hopes up for the New Years.
It’s the night of the darkest day of the year. 21st of December, the winter solstice. In the very north of Sweden the sun didn’t even rise above the horizon, which I guess it did here even though I haven’t really seen it in a while.
On a lighter note I highlighted my hair today. I bet you could make something poetic out of that, but I’m not really going to. Looks great though. Even better without the tin foil, I promise.
Good niight.
Today I overslept, accidentaly ditched my friend and almost arrived late to an interview. It was like a movie, trying to grab all my stuff while dropping things, running through the rain and looking disgusting as I got there.
Then everything started looking up. Part of it were some great conversations I had with some random people, but the best thing is that I found a box full of art supplies for 85 sek in a second hand store. It probably belonged to some random artist who died. All artsy and morbid. Hence the title of this post, relatively non-misleading. 
I also bought water mixable oil colours, at the art store this time, and they’re so good?? Like seriously, I found out that this existed just a few weeks ago, and oil colours that can be mixed with water, I don’t quite understand why more peole don’t use them. So far they’re awesome.
bye
I decided for today that I needed to get up at 6 am, make hot chocolate in the dark and read as the sun presumably rose behind the clouds. 
I am the master of sleeping the whole day, but I can’t do it when my life is just an open undefined un-planned white void of a future when I look at it in my head. So I have to make plans. Lately I’ve been making really detailed schedules. I don’t want to feel like I have to do that every day, but it’s good. Also there’s that leaf I picked while I was out biking and longboarding (between 10 and 10.30 am).
And here’s a cozy picture from last week, when my friend asked if we should drive to the national park closeby, bring a thermos with tea and watch the sunset. Life is v autumnal.
Today was the last day of my job. And it was horribly sad. But there’s also nothing that makes you feel so appreciated. I need to remember things people said and how groups of people all ran and hugged me, and how much I care for them all. In the afternoon we had the yearly school race, and I walked around the track as the kids ran, giving them all high fives and hugs.
Then my friend came and we went to Sannamarken, which is a market and basically the biggest event in the town where I (used to) teach. We tried to find all the places where you could try stuff for free. Marmalade and cheese and candy. I got to see basically all of my students again. We bought cozy socks, and she won me a stuffed animal, and I won one for her. We’re not very good at things like that though, so we won small pink fishes instead of cute teddy bears, but that’s okay. Also we met some really tall guys.
Happy autumn!
Today I woke up at six and was out the door before seven. I do like the concept of morning walks, but I don’t feel the need to prolong them, can’t let my mind sing to the beat of footsteps the way it does at night. I’m too aware. But that means I don’t need a lot of time. I walked along the bike lanes through the forest and I saw the white clouded sky and wet green trees, felt a few drops of water. I stuffed my hands in my pockets, thinking that this was the perfect prelude to a warm bath.
The thing is, I haven’t been to work since monday. I’m stressed out and have had some breakdowns over the weeks. I feel a weird mixture of feelings I haven’t quite figured out yet and maybe that bothers me the most. It’s not that I don’t like it, and I love the kids, but it’s been a bit too much and I just can’t handle it. I’ve decided that I will continue though, like it was said, until christmas.
I don’t feel strange being home, just normal again. At times I stress out because I feel like I need to use the time to do more, but I’ve still had some good days. Yesterday my friend came over and we went with our longboards out on the empty roads in the night, where there were no streetlights so everything was a grey/black blur. I felt like someone else, wearing a grey hoodie and converse. Then we went sunbathing on my driveway, like we usually do. With our longboards as pillows stars floated in and out of vision as clouds covered them and moved. As people walked by on the street we tried and failed not to laugh.
September 23rd 2016
I’ve now worked 6 days as an English teacher. And I’ve concluded that teachers deserve a weekend after every day. Most people do I guess, but last week really felt like an eternity. I have almost 150 students, divided into 7 classes, and I’ve never done this before. LIKE ARE YOU KIDDING ME, I have no idea what I’m doing. The week before all the students arrived we were supposed to prepare and stuff, and I literally spent some time just writing nonsense on a paper so that at least I would look busy.
I’m figuring it out though. And I do like it. Today, monday again, and I didn’t have the constant nervousness making me tense from the core. And I like standing in front of a class. But time is not enough, so much more to do at every moment. I live and breathe this, but I guess that’s a thing of habit too. Maybe in a few weeks I’ll be able to relax more. Until then, I’ll just try to do this as well as I can.
And I just wanted to write this short update since I don’t think I’ve even mentioned this job here. I’m only gonna work until christmas though, since they can’t hire anyone for longer if they’re not a legit teacher, which I’m not. And that’s okay, then I’ll do something else. I don’t really know what yet.
And now, before we go, some hipster pictures from spending the friday night in our summer house.
Oh, and a GIF from when we tried to go paddling and rowing. Only to realize that we forgot the key to our boat and canoe. They’re locked together. But we decided to try anyways. Did not get very far but we had fun, sometimes life’s like that. 
Good night!
eirians 