Bye bye...

...and see you soon, I hope, at my new blog Sömsmånen. I'm leaving the brooding behind and start anew with things that might inspire you. Welcome!

Sömsmånen will be in Swedish. I know that I'll feel more comfortable that way, or at least I think so. You know, you can always translate... Or get back to me.

Sömsmånen is the Swedish word for "sewing allowance". Only in my language it's a combination of the words for sewing and moon. Pretty, huh?

You may have given up...

..or never have bothered at all. Here I go again.

Hoping that you all are well and that love is with you, in any form and any way. Quoting the great philosopher Burt Bacharach "that's the only thing there's just too little of ".

Heart Hjärta Corazon Coeur

I had some trouble with embedding the clip from youtube in the previous post. The internet kept closing down as soon as I pasted the clip. So, anyway, I meant to say that I worry a lot but I recognise the growth that is taking place. And the liberation, and I so cherish that. I grow too, as a mum, having one of my children in another continent.
How are the words continent and incontinent related, I wonder?
Have a happy Valentine's day tomorrow, by the way!

Down in Africa...

...is where my daughter's at. And my camera too. She's visiting Uganda with her school as part of a project concerning water supply and AIDS prevention. Yeah, serious stuff.

Here she's crossing the equator, the first in the family since her dad in 1964. Ylva is the tall girl in the back with sun glasses.

I'm proud. And I do worry.

Reading

Gee, I almost fell off the chair - 8 comments and it's almost a year since I last posted! Then I realized Eleanor on her own made 3 comments ... But still! Thanks a million for the affection I feel from you all.

This is a fantastic book, I just finished it:

Or, actually, this is the book I read:

I bet I'm the last one to read it so this is probably overkill - but read it!!

I also read this book since we last met:

The Swedish title is - hold on - "Niceville". So weird you just don't get it. But read this one too.

Yes, I'm posting this so I can use pictures I didn't take myself. We still have a camera situation here. The one I use is actually on it's way to Uganda, Africa. More about that next time!

Ok, I've been gone...

...so long that I really don't expect anyone to visit any more. But - I often read your blogs (and yours too) and I feel kinda bad for sneaking around. It's like I don't allow myself to comment when I don't update my own posts. So. In order to feel better about myself and - most importantly - because I miss you all, I will post again.


I'm not going to try to explain why I stopped. Let's just leave it to the fact that I had a huge credability crisis on my own.


I'm much the same, though. Shorter hair. An invisibly wee bit older. Waiting for a new pair of intellectual (mid life crisis?) glasses to arrive. Picture from the optic store.
Like most women in Sweden I have a full-time job. This has for a long time been a stressor to me. Not the hours as much as the identity it supposedly gives me. My job is not as creative as I would've wanted but this is, for many reasons the one I've got. I used to teach but I got a bit bored of the politics in education so I quit. That was a bit more creative than my current occupation, but that didn't help much.
This hasn't been a big problem but I've felt a bit limited because people seem to judge who you are from how you make your money. But suddenly last weekend in a conversation with friends, Johan said "but you don't have to answer a question about what you do with how you make your living. If someone ask you what you do, or what your work is, you are allowed to answer with 'poetry, changing the world, raising kids or travelling' or whatever you want". How true.
This has led me to phrase all sorts of interesting and true work that I do.
So I:
¤ make a difference - world improver
¤ raise four kids - improvisional artist as well as councellor of career and matters of the heart
¤ try to recycle as much as I can - environmental activist
¤ figure out at least one novel plot a day - visionary author
¤ have a nice and clear soprano voice - singer
¤ make my best dinners when there really isn't anything in the fridge - chef
¤ put textile items together - textile artist

The list could go on. It's not hybris. It's a question af definition, more like "because I say so..."

God. I've missed this. What do you do?

Ever heard of Davy Crocket?

I spent today with my Mr Hellyle's sister and her family. And their cat.