January. The bright, white cold. Minty enough that I feel it in my teeth. I sleep on my loft, right under the angle of the beams, where the heat has risen to.
Climbing down the ladder feels like dipping your feet in ice cold water. Like a summer lake that’s only warm on the surface. I stand up straight and stretch my hands back up and feel it in my fingers, the heat that’s risen and left the floor boards cold.
I’ve been enjoying running. When I come home I’m overheating and warm to the bones, and I can sit out on the porch as I cool down. I get about ten minutes to look at the stars before I start shivering.
I was running today and I was listening to music and I almost didn’t hear the sound of water running along the side of the road, ringing like bells as it swept across the rocks. And I felt bad for not really listening to it. The sun was almost setting and the grass on the side of the road was golden. The trees in the forest were turning blue from the shadow of dusk.
It was summer and I should enjoy it more, instead of just running past it, instead of listening to music in my headphones. But then I stopped feeling bad and enjoyed the music. And I enjoyed the sound of the water in the background as well, and the sight of the trees. When you feel bad for not enjoying something enough you are actually enjoying it. You are just stuck in guilt at the same time. To fully enjoy it you can do exactly what you’re already doing.
And last Friday I spent a few hours making dinner for the people I live with. And we all helped out with the dishes. And there was music in the kitchen. And then I met my other friend in a wine bar where we’re trying to become regulars, and the owner gave us stickers with a picture of his dog.
And there was a bit of a storm outside, and the snow flakes landed on my lipstick and I was laughing when I walked home. This week I’ve spent every day in my painting shirt and I’ve helped my friend decorate her walls and in the mornings I have coffee in different cafes and in the evenings I fall asleep earlier than usual since I started to work out, and life. Life is shaping up. Ups and downs, there’s been a few, and it doesn’t really matter. I’ve been happy for quite a while. The faster life starts running, the slower I walk.
In the middle of Stockholm there’s a stadium, originally built for the 1912 Olympic Games. In the winter they open it up for skiing, for free. You can just go there and ski in circles on tracks laid along the 400 meter running tracks.
I thought I’d get dizzy from just going in circles, but 400 meters is still enough that it’s not too annoying. The difficult thing is keeping up with how far you’ve gone, after a while I started doubting if I was counting the laps right. I should have made lines for it in the snow at the starting point. Like counting how many days you’ve been in prison on a stone wall.
Anyway. I made it 23 laps before the clock reached 21.30 and they closed down for the night. 25 laps would have been 10 km, so it was annoying. But that’s okay. I’m very happy these days.
October. My hands hurt from the cold when I don’t keep them in my pocket. I went on a walk down by the water, and it was so windy that my eyes teared up completely. On the way home I stopped by the supermarket. People looked at me weirdly as I bought milk and bread. I think I looked a bit crazy, windswept, hair messy from the wind and eyes like I’d been crying.
I haven’t caught up completely with the cold, and neither has nature. The moss down by the water was summer green. Most of the leaves as well. I took photos, because there’s something about it that I like so much. The sun, the water that starts without a border. There’s no beach, no rocks or sand. It almost looks like forest, and then just ocean in it. When it’s windy the waves rise and wash over the moss. I want to live in that little place.
Anyway. Blue autumn skies. October is cold, and sad, and bright.
It’s been a summer of rain here in Sweden. It’s been flooding basements and causing roads to collapse. I guess it’s better than the south of Europe, where it’s been all fire instead. But when I came back to Stockholm and wanted to hike, the path was underwater.
At my parents place, taking summer walks.
Anyways. This post is supposed to be an update. And not just about the weather. I wanted to start writing on here again, so I thought I should start by sharing some of what I’ve been up to. I have gotten a degree since last posting, so I’m a journalist now. I guess. I’ve lived in Stockholm for about three years. I’ve gone through a break up, and I’ve spent the summer visiting people I like.
And now it’s fall. Autumn arrived yesterday, that’s how I wrote it in my notes. Dark skies. More rain. I woke up in an apartment I share with some friends and was confused. I knew I was in a familiar bed, but I couldn’t figure out where.
It’s the smell of this place. It reminds me of things, but not just of things that have happened here. This building also smells the same as the church where I grew up. And like old youth camps. So I wake up in the mornings with nostalgia, but I don’t know for what. I feel like my childhood friends should be sleeping on air mattresses next to me. I feel like my ex should be right outside the door. I feel like I’m 12 years old at Sunday school. It’s all blurry.
That’s my update. I’m a bit blue, but also excited for new cities, or old, wherever I’ll end up going. I have a lot of space to do whatever I want and go wherever I want. Horrible, really. I’m not a big fan of all these choices. The only thing I’d hate more would be to not have the choices. Anyways: I should start writing more, for the practice of it. So welcome back to this page. Let’s see where the season takes us.
Autumn is here, and in the beginning of October the lack of sun hit me. Nature was falling asleep, and my body just wanted to join. It got difficult to get out of bed, follow a routine, and really do anything of what’s necessary to stay healthy.
Since then, I’ve had a bit of a breakdown – stayed inside too much, been a bit sad, and almost failed school assignments. That was the culmination really, a weird week where I needed to hand in a text, and I felt like I couldn’t. It’s in times like that you notice how you’re really doing. When you try fighting it. It was such a good week as well, a bunch of great things happened, but I’d been down for so long that it didn’t help.
Anyway. After that, things looked up. Because they had to. A bit of a sad rock bottom, and now I’m doing really well. I’m buying some extra good food for myself, go to the gym, subscribed to the paper edition of the newspaper. Small stuff.
So that’s how I’m doing, how are you? And remember that even if the world is in a certain mood, you don’t have to feel the same.
I’ve spent so long going to places that I didn’t realise how different it is to move somewhere. I’ve spent the past few months saying yeah-yeah, I feel at home here, I feel at home anywhere, fast, but now I start to actually feel it. I just didn’t realise that I didn’t feel it before. Because I don’t mind the time when everything still feels like a visit, I enjoy it. But this, this landing thing, is different. It gives me a sense of control. As if finances and ideas and meeting people is not just something that happens to me, but something I can plan for, for months to come. Crazy?? And so now I’m here, in Germany, just thought I’d let you know. And here are some photos of things that make me feel home home home.
At the Swedish café where I got a small job as a Swedish teacher
My friend making me fancy blue tea
Baking Christmas cookies in our shared apartment
(But then again, maybe this is also a lot about the Christmas season?? That makes me feel all “arrived” and stuff. Because people are creatures of ritual, and few things make you feel as present as a special, or recurring event does. Right?)
So, I moved to Germany to volounteer work at The White Rabbit Arts. It’s pretty nice here. Very german. Like really, I think I’ve only ever lived in really international communities, even when I’ve been abroad. So just being in a new country, in an apartment full of people who mainly speak german, is different. It’s like actually moving.
And so far I think that Germany is:
1. Warmer than Sweden. Not by much, but a little warmer.
2. Bigger. Obviously. Nürnberg is a pretty big city, and there’s just more people here in general, which means that you can walk down the street and find a random four story book store with a little café hidden inside. In Sweden that would go into bankruptcy within a week if it wasn’t in Stockholm or something.
3. More social. Slightly, at least? Once again, I quite like it.
So, here’s a collection of pictures, from the train station (interesting), my apartment and writing out my letters to the people who support my volounteer work.
A few days ago I took a 20 hour train ride from my hometown in Sweden, to Nürnberg, Germany.
Some trains were full, some empty. The last train was from 4.30 til 9 in the morning, from Hamburg to Nürnberg, and that did not look like the picture below. It was overbooked, so I got woken up three times by people saying I was in their seat. In the end I sat in the corridor. But all in all, everything went well. All the connections worked and I didn’t get stuck in some random german small town in the middle of the night, which was my biggest fear to be honest.
And I managed to somehow fit my fluffiest duvet in my suitcase, which was really all that mattered. And now I guess I live here in Nürnberg. Like really live, since I have my duvet with me. Sheets and towels and even my fairy lights. My room is dreamy. I’ll show you sometime.
eirians 