The happy place

Today the moon and sun shone in tandem on the morning sky, seemingly disrupting the normal order of the world; indeed a storm is wreaking havoc, toppling the trees who are falling on the power lines, causing power outages, falling on the road causing blockages, falling on pedestrians, killing them.

But that’s north from here. Here in a repurposed prison cell made into a hotel room we make a stop on this little island.

Outside now only the moon shines, I see the stars on the dark sky, and some brightly coloured clouds which looks just as wrong on there — but just as beautiful — as the moon did next to the sun this morning.

Today as we took the whole family on the road we paused to go into a car wash to my child’s and my dogs’ delight.

Last time I parked diagonally in the car wash, outside of the tracks, and I’d forgotten to fold the rear view mirrors so we did that as the water was splatting into the cockpit in a dramatic manner, but this time my wife drove, and also I’ve gotten new glasses.

Last time the car had dirt stripes like a tiger after the wash, but now it’s just red

I am now back from a special norweigan Christmas dinner for family and relatives, and I was on the fringe of that.

The outskirts

I drank aquavit and had this wonderful time of just eating and drinking with people who didn’t really care about me, but still I got all of this food and drink!!

I could just sit there and feel the mist rising with each aquavit and it felt like this was a gateway to Avalon.

Once or twice we come across something which alters our course of action or way of seeing the world in profound ways; like having something chafing inside pointed out more clearly than we are able ourselves at the time.

Do you know this? Like some people says this book or that philosopher, — maybe Adler — did phrase something true enough — like a North Star or something … Could’ve been some song too. Just some single great work of art or idea which altered the course of your own life in a profound way.

I thought of this because I myself have a strong memory of being a travelling consultant, visiting most of Europe during my ceaseless travels.

I remember distinctly the feeling of waking up, and for two disoriented seconds, the feeling of not knowing where I am and then: feeling the heart sink by the realisation of being in some hotel, (like in Neon Genesis Evangelion: ”unfamiliar ceiling”), maybe in Gothenburg, then knowing maybe, that although you’ve a fever, you’d better just deliver the hours of work the client is due (or you’ll have to come back later), even if you fall asleep sitting by his screen.

And then in the evening: at some pub eating all alone with a beer and a book until finally retiring at the hotel, laptop in lap, planning the next day…

This might sound like a bit of self pity and what if it is? I was paying for this job with a currency I didn’t have, so to speak. I wasn’t cut out for this lifestyle (I don’t like travelling, or being alone).

(I am adventurous only in my imagination.)

So there I was then, having arrived at home late one Friday evening. Straight I went from airport to sofa and it felt so right being in this sofa having my wife nearby. At peace.

In this state of mind I did watch Six Days, Seven Nights (1998) in which a successful magazine editor Robin Monroe played by Anne Heche accidentally gets stranded on an island with the handsome older man Harrison Ford.

Unable to reach her destination, which was her career calling to her, (a photo shoot), she finds a truer love and a more down to earth approach to life; for whose sake was she building this career?

Instead a new life opened up to her, far removed from the pulsing New York success and status; living in a bungalow, making a living, maybe, as his co-pilot.

Finding a deep mature love

Maybe she started her family there?

This movie did pop my own bubble of wanting to climb some career ladder or something; I was living the dream of someone else

Walking a path of a career to a destination I didn’t want, reaching for a status I didn’t value.

Just because I was flattered that they wanted me in the first place.

And like that, just like Robin in the movie, I too made up my mind

Rich with this new insight

In the apartment which already contained everything I wanted: my wife, the sofa: that future.

Such is the power of a great work of art, I think.

On Christmas eve, were exactly four snowflakes gently falling from the star clear sky where the moon hung thin like in a fairy tale.

Four are a perfect number: one could be brushed off for a dandruff, but four is a strong enough pattern that confirms the bare minimum presence of falling snow.

Twenty five or thirty years ago exactly on this day I remember a darkened kitchen with a single candle burning on the kitchen table, outside it was very dark — black even — even though the white snow outside was deep to the thighs.

My cousin had bought us each an identical transformers toy, it was Ratchet, he who could transform into an ambulance. This toy had a motorcycle for some reason, because this variant couldn’t transform and so he needed the motorcycle presumably.

Anyway his father melted the tyre of mine, so it became deformed and assymetrical, over this burning flame

And my cousin traded his for mine

And I remember I thought this was fair, because it was his father who did it

It was his father who was a wacko

So it was only fair that he’d got the deformed motorcycle

But nothing about this was

Fair

Today has been a good day! I was with my sister in law in her electric car, drinking vanilla latte with her young son sleeping in the backseat.

She was shopping for groceries and in my mind, I was thinking about Celine Dion; about how her singing voice speaks (no: sings) directly to my heart. There’s nothing about her which I don’t love. A voice of an angel although now her duet with R-Kelly (I’m you angel) leaves a bitter aftertaste.

I am feeling pretty ok although I speak slowly. I think it’s cause I think slowly too, like my brain wasn’t in my head, but rather maybe in India, having a laggy SSH or Remote desktop or maybe KVM session which then comes with increased latency or even packet loss.

But it’s good. The coffee tastes good. Being able to help just by sitting there, watching her little cute child, it feels good. And just like the right amount of responsibility for me right now.

Just feels OK

I am enjoying my time off

There’s no snow, but a thin layer of frost is covering the land, giving the fields the impression of a badly shaped princess cake, were the marzipan brownish yellow instead of green.

The sun shines brightly however, and today the moon sickle was thin like on the flag of some Muslim country, and the sky was pink and purple

And pure white smoke rose from chimneys of the factories as we passed them in our 2015 volvo, which with it’s diesel engine, social democratic red colours, and inside coated with dog fur felt like an accidental statement compared to the teslas and polestars crowding the treacherous roads, slick with ice.

And in my heart I felt OK

WE are alone in the hotel lobby, drinking coffee with the dogs, although they are not drinking coffee, only my wife and I.

Outside, the black sky is full of stars, because this is the darkest day.

We’d just been out with the dogs in this quaint little town with its wooden houses and cobbled streets, even in the darkness this is an ideal place to shoot some children’s show, like you would expect to see Pippi Longstocking out there, except the streets were empty. Not even a car could be heard.

The hotel is mostly vacant, like in a dream or something, but there are other people here, because the tiered stand, which yesterday was full of homemade candy now stands empty; in fact I ate the last one yesterday on my way back from my yearly meeting with my father in an Indian themed restaurant which played classical music.

He said he had the best day in decades and that was a fine thing to hear.

To my left is a big Christmas tree.

I am really feeling it.

The darkest day of the darkest year in a long time of my life, my family’s too.

It felt like this is the turning point.

I am pretty sure it is.

To my great surprise, today the sun is shining on an almost cloudless turquoise sky.

Almost.

I inhale deep gulps of fresh air.

We are together yet again in the red Volvo. I sit with the dogs in the backseat feeling the sun through the windows.

We are going to my sister.

In reality my sister-in-law.

But when you’re an adult, you get to choose your family.

So I did.

Today

I feel great!

One more day of work before the holidays.

And it feels pretty good!

I’m grounded today. Looking back at it, I think my last few days, no: year has been one truly of turmoil. I was been turned inside out, then twice!! So back as it were to my original shape

But wrinkled

And some of me still is in the filter of this tumbler or the dryer.

Wrinkled but with the sweater now clean, dry, and turned the right way, I gently stretch my back to stand erect

The sweater all warm.

It used to be blue and gray, but now it’s almost red!!

I’ve met a lot of interesting people during my travels

I’ve even been to England, I saw some tourists there, whereas I was there for business

Once in Germany I even drank beer from a giant glass shoe, maybe one litre, just like Cinderella.

I’ve been to America too, but I don’t recommend.

I didn’t know what ”smog” was before. Still not sure.

Actually, I don’t like travelling unless it’s to Norway.

But on all of these places, shines the same moon

And in Canada once, I ate poutine

That was remarkable.

And there was a giant waterslide, which I saw in a mall.

It was winter there. In Canada (although in the mall it’s all the same)

It doesn’t matter

I have been a few times to Paris

The french are role models

There were poor beggars eating cucumbers from glass jars in the park outside the Eiffel Tower

In Italy there were bad memories of a broken family, my father got blisters on his feet.

Long ago.

I like Greece more than italy

I felt like Theseus once when we were at Crete, but the minotaur was long gone.

It’s the same sky there

There are corpses in the Mediterranean Sea

In Finland they frequently drink beer for lunch, or I did anyway