Start of the race

Despite the digital era, our small nation of about 5.4 million people still send some 40 million greeting card for Christmas, almost two thirds of all the postcards we send annually. I plead guilty for more than my fair share of them.

This year, I brought some cards from Rome and ordered some from Lyyti, the Etsy shop of a lovely Finnish photographer. I entered into the writing job last night continuing until I ran out of cards. The reduced seasonal postage rate will be valid for two more days and I’m all set. Well done, considering it’s me I’m talking about.

Brewing with the greeting cards is generally the tradition that will start my race for the season. Some people choose to make Christmas a marathon. I’m afraid I’m one of those who tend to succeed in turning preparations of every festivity, however big or small, into a sprint. Wish me luck that this might change one day, at least into a middle-distance event.

Flying times

Late spring and early summer constitute such a wonderful season. Each and every day brings so much new to observe and absorb. There is too much to do, there are too many roads to choose from and time flies. Even if I now manage with a 7-hour sleep instead of the 10 hours or more I needed during the dark season, time flies like a jet plane. And I’m afraid it will continue to do so for the next three months at least.

I should have known this because it happened to me also last year. Now that I am free to drink every drop of it in, spring is such an overwhelming experience – both mentally and physically – it will overpower any good intentions occupying all your attention and energy, which you will be all too happy to offer to it.

It has turned out very hard to return to our recent travels no matter how much I would have liked to, no matter how much there is I’d like to tell. But I will try, on the next rainy day at the latest. Until then, I will make an effort to embrace every moment attempting to silence the uneasy conscience, “Hey there, woman. This is not a job but a hobby. Allow yourself some slack!”

The basic question

Yesterday was the first anniversary of this blog of mine. As I find I haven’t made much progress during the year I need to pose this question to myself in black and white, “What’s stopping you?”

Absolutely nothing! Absolutely everything that’s stopping me is inside my own head and I should be the best expert to handle that.

When I was young, it was incredibly easy to make decisions. In fact, it feels like you hardly ever had to make any but you just let yourself glide with the flow of life: 12 years at school, a few years of studies, getting married with your (first) boyfriend, taking a mortgage, starting a family, accepting whichever job you could find...  To me the 1970s and 1980s were a kind of a continuum of the simplicity of my childhood when practically everything that happened in your life was self-evident.

Now everything seems so much more complicated. There are not only masses of different kinds of options that weren’t there in my youth but thanks to all the means of modern media we are much more aware of them all. No wonder it is so hard for some to settle down and decide which one of the myriad of paths to follow to reach their dream when there are so many competing dreams you could pursue.

I feel I have been smitten by this complexity. But this time I couldn’t find any excuse even if I tried. My children have been grown-ups for years, there are no grandchildren yet and there is no longer any mortgage nor job to tie me down to the nine-to-five cage. I’m completely free to do as I please.

Nothing’s stopping me. This time next year I had better know what to do with the rest of my life and be headed that way full speed.

Handmade treasures

This is my 100th post and it feels like I am finally coming to the point. You see, I’ve been thinking about what would be the ‘thing’ that is most precious to me, the tangible something outside the realm of the incomparable and irreplaceable, such as family, human relationships, nature and this planet itself, for these surely are the only issues that truly matter in the end. But if the larger-than-life things are set aside, what would be the one category of possessions I would find the hardest to part with if need be?

I love books and have quite a lot of them but most books could be borrowed from a library. I enjoy music but you could continue enjoying it without owning a single CD. The same is true about movies (I’m so lucky our home cinema system is my husband’s so it doesn’t count here). My jewellery is more of the pretty than precious kind; according to Colour Me Beautiful I’m a Summer meaning that silver compliments my skin tone so I only have a few golden pieces. (I’m starting to see a pattern here: all the ‘valuables’ first coming to my mind seem to be somehow related to the arts. Shame on those who think art is a waste of time and money!) Most of the other things I own could be replaced or given away without too much distress. But there is something...

For quite some time now, it’s been clear to me that what brings me joy the most are (old) handmade items, especially anything from the past decades that has been handcrafted with care out of yarn or fabric. My mother was very skillful at many kinds of handicrafts. When we were young she earned a living through them for years. You might have started to hate the sewings and weavings and all kinds of needlework that were always present at your home when you were a child but I learned to try some of them, to appreciate them and finally to love them. So did both my sisters, the younger one to such an extent she chose an artisan occupation; she is an entrepreneur in dressmaking.

I do have a soft spot also for many other sorts of handmade objects, such as hand-painted porcelain probably thanks to my great-aunt who was very clever at that kind of work, but I adore handcrafted textiles, particularly those kinds that have been the tradition here. I can’t get enough of them, of admiring them, of fingering them.

But what is the use of owning gorgeous uplifting things if you keep them hidden piled up in your cupboards and closets? I’ve only just recognized there will never come a time when I would have all my little handmade treasures organized and at display, at least if I’m treating them the way I’ve done so far.

Starting from today, I’m sharing this love of mine with you. The kick-off item is a topical one but very modest: a simple canvas work anyone with a little bit of patience could do. This kind of needlework was popular a few decades ago. So although the pattern is not local – our elks are more robust and our deer have less stately antlers – the item most probably is of domestic doing. I hope it finds its way to please the eyes of a few fellow handicraft lovers. If there is anyone out there who would like to copy the pattern please feel free to do so. And if you do I’d love to hear about it. (So much loving in this post; isn’t life great!)

I found this piece at a thrift shop some years ago. I keep it hanging on the wall of our glassed-in veranda by the main door from the time of the first autumn leaves until spring. Its wonderful bright colours cheer me up every time I step out of the door. If only I could stand the cold and step that way more often. Yes, it is our first snow you can see gleaming through the window here.

A narrow escape

The Golden Gate, San Francisco

A few days ago, I received a phone call delivering the piece of news we had been fearing: nothing of the data stored on our external hard drive could be recovered. Never mind the text files, the most important ones were safe elsewhere anyway, but losing the photos – especially the ones taken when travelling – felt such a disaster the thought almost brought tears into my eyes. Knowing I alone was to blame, I felt so vexed and miserable I was pleased my husband was out when I got the call. After a short moment of despair, I gathered myself and started to explore ways how to diminish the damage.

The Louis Vuitton building under renovation in Paris in May 2005

It goes without saying we are not the frivolous and careless kind. We do regularly make backups of the files we want to keep safe. However, as we have experienced at least three complete laptop crashes in the last five years or so, the latest less than a year ago, the hard drive we now lost happened to be at that moment the only device containing the complete set of our photo files since 2005 when we bought our first digital camera. Aren’t we pleased now we entered the digital photo era that late.

Notre Dame de Paris

Since the latest total crash, I continued to use the recovered laptop. He bought a new one for himself and a pocket-sized hard drive, both a few months ago. All the photo files since 2011 are safe on those. Nevertheless, I was crazy enough to insist I must be allowed the freedom to streamline our photo filing system and delete the duplicates, triplicates, etc, before uploading the older files on the new devices. The mishap took place while I was doing just that. I dropped the old hard drive when it was running, which is sure to have fatal consequences.

Unless otherwise stated, photos from Portoferraio, Island of Elba, Tuscan Archipelago:

Albergo l'Ape Elbana

We learnt at the recovery specialist’s you should never try to revive a hard drive that has stopped functioning to avoid further damage. Or I learnt, only too late, as he probably knew and wouldn’t have done my mistake. What was new to both of us was that in the current pocket-sized hard drives the arm is always resting away from the disk unlike in the older ones in which the read/write head may damage the disk if dropped even when the device is switched off.

Porto Azurro, Elba

Villa dei Mulini, Napoleon's residence in Portoferraio

I spent the rest of the day at my desk, which is not that uncommon. After all, what did I do all last winter but sit at my laptop (and knit a dozen pairs of socks). First, I hunted down all the USB memory sticks I might have used during recent years when transferring files from one place to another. By chance, photos of several family gatherings were still stored on those. This was because a couple of years ago I took some files to my sister whose computer had totally crashed.

Photos from Trastevere, Rome:

Then I checked the CDs. The most important of the oldest files – those of our wedding at home and honeymoon in Paris, a special holiday for nearly 20 of my closest ones in Tuscany when I turned 50 and his two-week trip to the USA with his son, all from seven years ago – were there, together with a few other folders of our oldest digital photos.

Photos from Tuscany:

Monteriggione

View away from San Gimignano

My last hope for the rest of the travel files was his very old business laptop that has all these years served as a substitute every time a newer device of ours has crashed. It also kept me company in the evenings at my parents’ house during the nine months I stayed there practically every other week sitting the days at my mother’s bedside in the hospital, and later when I spent there every now and then a week or so sorting out the incredible amount of stuff accumulated at their place over the 40 years they lived there. Bingo, the dear little laptop contained more photo folders than I dared hope for!

Photos from Florence, Tuscany:

The Noah panel on the Gate of Paradise door, Battistero di San Giovanni (the Babtistry of St John)

Florentine coats of arms on the exterior of the Palazzo Vecchio

Practically all the family gatherings are now safe.  Those that aren’t can be recovered from a relative. Most of the travels abroad are also covered, at least partly. The only four holidays we have lost all photos of will be ‘repeated’ one fine day in the not too distant future, and with two better cameras than the one we had in those days. In fact, Madrid will be revisited both before and after the Rioja trip in about three weeks. Also, as we are so charmed with Italy, we are bound to travel to Siena and the Amalfi coast in future, too.

Photos from Siena, Tuscany:

As for the fourth one, I certainly hope my sister’s computer crashed earlier than we travelled together to Croatia a couple of years ago. If not, it is such a beautiful country full of great scenery and picturesque historical towns and villages – oh, I miss Trogir with the cutest little bell tower I ever saw – we’ll just have to make our next trip there a bit sooner to refresh the memories.

Photos from Pitigliano, Tuscany:

And what is the lesson of this narrow escape? As reluctant as I am to admit this, it must be that sometimes good enough would do. Surely, messed up files stored somewhere are far better than a perfect filing system in your head only. But most of all: never ever put all your eggs in one basket, not for a moment! Otherwise you might end up against a wall, a dead end with no way out or across. We very nearly did.

A very happy 50-year-old at her party in Tuscany.

An early bird...

There is at least one quality I totally lack but would absolutely love to have: the ability to wake up perky at the early hours of the morning. I cannot but envy and wonder people who have this gift. By the time I wake up, they have already performed a major job or two, and a few more by the time I’m ready to proceed into any occupation.

Daybreak at Porto Santo Stefano, peninsula of Monte Argentario, Tuscany.

In Aristotle’s words: “It is well to be up before daybreak, for such a habit contributes to health, wealth, and wisdom.” It may no longer be necessary to start your daily pursuits before sunrise like the ancient Greek, or people only a couple of generations ago, but I do agree it would be excellent for your productivity and spirits to start early – and have your hardest and least favourite tasks completed by noon.

Who wouldn’t be happy to achieve that? But when early rising isn’t in your nature it is a habit hard to absorb. It has always been so much easier for me to extend the day, even until the morning if necessary or if I feel like it. I’ve spent many a night at my desk, or sewing machine, either to meet a deadline or just because I haven’t been able to stop once I’ve got warmed up.

Moreover, there is a limit to the tasks you can take up at night without disturbing other people in their sleep. And there is a limit to the amount of sleep you can deprive of your own body without causing trouble to your physical or mental health. So as years go by, staying up late will inevitably mean waking up later and later, at least for me, and this is not acceptable!

An early fisherman will catch the fish.

They say you can learn to be an early riser not by adopting a strict sleeping protocol but simply by making sure you get up early at the same time every day. On the other hand, you should not try to go to bed at the same time every day but only when you a tired enough to fall asleep at once. Well, I’ve followed the latter advice to the letter and look at where I’m now. Writing my blog post in the middle of the night only to have another dark and miserable Nordic morning wasted.

Isn’t it so that any bad habit, however innate you pretend it to be, can be changed? In my part of the world, there couldn’t be a better time to start racing with the sun than right now when the day breaks at around 9 am and total darkness falls at around 4 pm.

Present reality at its best: morning glow seen through our upstairs window.

Needless to say, the sun will seldom be actually visible this time of the year here even if you were awake when it rises, nor even later in the day for that matter, but I’m promising myself to witness far more sunrises this year. Not only those I happen to see when taking friends or relatives to or picking them up from the airport.

Teresa Maria

Ex-er-cise!

You may think it is a blessing if you do not gain weight easily. It might be if you are the sporty type but if you are not it is a totally different matter. As years go by you will realize it is, in fact, a curse. How could you ever motivate yourself to exercise regularly if you stay slim without any effort?

Kite surfer by the Golden Horn or Zlatni Rat, Brac, Croatia.

I have tried many times but it seems there just isn’t a drop of an athlete in me. I decided I need to introduce regular exercise of some sort into my agenda when I was turning 40 – with scant result. Then I set 50 years as the final limit to start taking the health of the rest of my life seriously. That never happened either. 

I admit it is rather nice to notice that the older you get the better your looks rank among people of your own age and sex. But I need to reach the level of endorphins when you not only get a free boost to your self-esteem but also achieve improved health as a bonus. I am agonizingly aware I cannot wait until 60 to make this change. Luckily my waistline has begun to help me keep this in mind.

Bikers gone boxing inside a stronghold in Kastela, Croatia.

However, I’m afraid the only method to force me into action is some military kind of command. So my lack of orderly fitness activities is actually due to my lack of a companion who would drag me to the arena. Didn’t I tell you I’m a master of excuses? Left, right, left, right, ex-er-cise!

Teresa Maria

Freedom wasted

Time is incorruptible.

Every now and then I have to remind myself about one of the very basic facts of life. That there are only 24 hours in a day and that the amount of hours is the same for each and everyone of us, even for the most productive, most talented, most famous people.

How is it possible that I often feel the 24 hours are not enough for me to have anything meaningful done when those at the very top of one field or another with admirable scientific or artistic achievements, or responsibilities and difficulties the size of a mountain do not have a minute more?

Naturally, these people generally have staff or family to take care of all their domestic and other ‘less relevant’ tasks but still this is a mystery I cannot explain but in one word: timetable.

I realize I’ve grown to give myself too much slack, perhaps to compensate for the past couple of hard years. Even though I hate the thought of routine in my life, it is now time to abandon the reward excuse. Then I need to build up a daily and weekly timetable­ – and learn to follow that. It won’t happen overnight but I’m promising myself to get there bit by bit.

If I can’t accomplish more now that I am free I might as well spend my days at an office and feel miserable. Then I would at least get a salary.

Teresa Maria

Perils of planning

I’ve always had great admiration for people who are able to jump into working on something the minute it comes to their mind. I don’t refer to the easily inspired ones, those who forget all about their worldly obligations when they suddenly become absorbed by a compelling notion. Even I may have been guilty of such behaviour every once in a while, and that is not necessarily a quality to admire. I refer to the efficient ones who happen to think about something they would like to do and when you turn your head they are busy implementing their idea.

My best friend at university was one of them. She always had some small everyday project or other going on, and I bet she still has. For example, she might think it would be nice to have a particular kind of sweater and the next day she simply bought the yarn and started knitting.

Pieces of Marimekko fabrics waiting for their perfect use.

It seems I’m always stuck in the planning phase. No, I’m not one of those who make a roadmap for each of their tiniest projects with a budget, a timeline and descriptions of things to consider and of those that might go wrong. On the contrary, I rather avoid making any kinds of definitive plans on paper. That doesn’t mean I don’t make plans. For me, planning is a process brewing in my mind almost constantly without requiring much attention or awareness. Still I find my domestic accomplishments modest.

Making a definitive plan would imply abandoning all the other alternatives the situation at hand might offer or could be solved by. I’ve only just realized this may the poison that’s making me suffer if a written plan is demanded. I can’t stand the thought that the options would be limited to just one. – Or is this another excuse because it’s painful to admit your own lack of initiative?

No more pondering about the best use for a piece of fabric or ball of wool for the absolutely optimal outcome. No more postponing the little things to a more suitable moment. I’m promising myself to implement at least one, however small, idea or thought every day at once when I come to think of it or notice that something needs just a little bit of attention to make it right. Quite a lesson to learn, I can assure you.

Teresa Maria

Keeping life open till late

Like so many of us, I’m a master in finding excuses. There has never been any difficulty for me to list dozens of perfectly valid reasons anytime to postpone the fun and creative things I would love to do and am currently unable to but will definitely accomplish one day. There was always something more pressing, more worthwhile to take care of first if I were to consider myself a proper and praiseworthy member of the team: family, workplace, circle of friends, neighbourhood, you name it. 

New beginnings.

Even right now, I could give you an impressive account of things waiting to be urgently tidied out, filed, recycled, rearranged, refurbished or repaired in and around my house. The present list would include quite a number of jobs requiring hours and hours of work. Moreover, many of them are – at least if you ask my husband – obstacles to our future happiness. But even so the burden of unfinished and awaiting tasks is blocking my view so that I’m unable to see the rest of my life. It provides me with a wall to hide behind and avoid plunging into the unknown, although more fulfilling tomorrow that I both fear and yearn for but still believe to be waiting for me, not just yet. 

Wasted potential.

The escape must end this instant. There cannot be anything more pressing ever to require my attention than living my life fully, the way I’ve wanted for ages but haven’t been able to because I’ve been too cowardly, too inefficient or simply too lazy to get a grip of my potential.

Please join me on the journey into venturing towards what might be perfect for me. I’m learning to keep all the doors of my life open till late for any number of new things to enter. Some of them must be simply wonderful. 

Teresa Maria

Open till late with a wide choice of options.